Quote: (02-23-2014 07:28 AM)Maciano Wrote:
In House of Cars Kevin Spacey says this after running into his former protege Remy:
"Such a waste of time, he chose money over power. In this town, a mistake nearly everyone makes. Money is the McMansion in Sarasota that starts falling apart after ten years. Power is the old stone building that stands for centuries. I can not respect someone that doesn’t see the difference."
So, I guess the choice should be between 1% in looks & 1% in power.
If that's the choice, the latter would be better: power > money or looks.
The choice is usually not nearly as stark as Frank made it out to be.
Money often is power. Power often doesn't come absent money - this is a big reason why your typical congressman/woman is
quite well off. Your average Senator is worth just under $3 million (and that's just what they disclose publicly - there's much more). When you start talking about the more powerful, well known and influential members of congress (ex: Pelosi, Issa, Cantor, etc), you begin talking about much larger sums of money than that average.
Money is, more often than not, the main gateway to power: it is the wealthy who get a leg up in the race for elected positions or in the race for influential political appointments (ex: the appointment of Hank Paulson as Sec. of Treasury, among other similar appointments). Political fundraisers are some of the most powerful people in this country. They use their money and the vast connections they've obtained to raise money for political candidates, who in turn often depend on them. Some have gone as far as to say that these people are basically puppetmasters, pulling strings in the House/Senate and ruining the democratic process because their cash is giving them too much influence. They're not lying - these people can often control the political narrative with the money they spend funding political campaigns and producing political advertisements, nevermind the business interests they can leverage (ex: Congressman A must be wary of Millionaire B potentially shutting down his business in his district and costing Congressman A jobs and political capital).
Names like Warren Buffett, Koch (both brothers), Sheldon Anderson, and many others who are much less well known (Steyer, Singer, Schlosstein, Norcross, etc), are really some of the most powerful men in the USA, more so than all but a handful of men/women in Washington. These are people whose wealth and fundraising prowess give them control over much of the political narrative: they can almost totally LOCK DOWN politics in their local stomping grounds (state/municipal elections and appointments, for example) and they can essentially buy influence in the US Senate and House as well. Congressmen/women grovel to these people - there are hedge fund managers out there who have these men and women lining up outside of their offices just to get a word in edgewise.
In the developing world, the relationship between money and power is even more blatant thanks to lower transparency (more corruption, nepotism, etc), greater inequality, and other crucial factors.
Consider the Phillipines, one of the largest nations in South Asia, where political power is
almost entirely hogged by a
handful of wealthy families.
Or consider Thailand, where the control wealthy political dynasties wield is
even stronger. It's
bad enough that the Prime Minister's seat in that nation has essentially been
passed around in a single family for the better part of a decade now. Why have they been able to hold onto political power?
They're obscenely rich, that's why.
I could go on - these narratives play out in a lot of other developing countries where a cunning individual with just a few million dollars can essentially buy his/her way to the top.
And, speaking of House of Cards, this show is not at all out of line with what I'm saying here. Consider all of this (I'm gonna try not to spoil anything here for those who haven't watched it all yet):
-Who is Frank's most powerful rival in the show? Answer: Raymond Tusk.
-Why is Raymond Tusk so powerful? Answer: He's got absurd amounts of money, which he has used to discreetly exert significant amounts of influence on the political process in Washington for decades.
-Who is the President of the United States in "House of Cards"? Answer: Garrett Walker.
-How did Garrett Walker become the President of the United States? Answer: He became bosom buddies with one of its richest men, Raymond Tusk, as the CEO of Tusk's airline. This relationship made him rich as well, and got him a direct line to the White House.
-Who is a major foreign player in the second season of House of Cards? Answer: Xander Feng.
-Why is Xander Feng such a big factor? Answer: He's a billionaire.
-Remy's move got him more power. He had more influence as a highly paid lobbyist than he did as one of Frank's not-so-highly paid henchmen.
-House of Cards, in its bid to give you good drama, doesn't tell you the whole story about the influence money has in politics. To keep it simple, the show makes money seem like less of a gamechanger than it actually is, and it is that creative license what allows Frank to directly lock horns with someone like Raymond Tusk and other really wealthy people (thus creating good television). In real life, big players like Tusk and Feng have a
much easier time influencing US politics with their cash than the show let's on, and their activities are FAR harder for the likes of Underwood and his henchmen to counter. In the real world, Remy's choice is not a bad one to make. Money is power.
-Don't forget how Frank Underwood himself got started in politics to begin with:
he married a VERY rich woman and rode her money to his first seat in congress.