Citizen's United: The Supreme Court's Gift to Democrats(For Now)

     When the ruling came down it was shocking. Unlimited, untraceable, unregulated money could flow directly into federal political campaigns.  Billionaires with agendas could blanket the airwaves with negative, false, and vile attacks against candidates without any rebuttals. The end of Democrats every getting elected nationally was done for.  Truly the end of democracy was in 2009.  Fast forward to today and you will find a very different story.

     Candidates like Perry, Santorum, and Huntsman are still in the race despite getting destroyed in primaries.  Newt Gingrich continues his one-man wreaking crew of Mitt Romney unabated. The front-runner since time immemorial, Mitt Romney, still hasn't wrapped it up, and all because of Citizen's United.  Today brings us a barrage of stories on the matter.  Sen. John McCain from 2000 comes out of hiding and calls it "one of the worst decisions I have ever seen".  A anti-Romney film made by an ex-Romney staffer was just bought at "auction" by Newt's PAC.  Finally, Politico ran a story about the three billionaires keeping the race going well beyond it's natural death.  Candidates who should be gone because of a lack of ad buy money can now stay in the race by the grace of millionaires and their SuperPACs.

     All of this is great news for President Obama and the Democratic party in 2012.  From this point out, every SuperPAC ad will be negative, attacking the conservative credentials of it's target just in time for the Southern Primaries.  If Romney makes it through to the nomination, it will be without the full-throated support of the conservative base, meaning very few volunteers and very little non-big donor money.  If Romney is able to be knocked off, none of the conservative candidates would stand a chance winning the moderate and independent vote.  That would not only kill their chance at a GOP victory, but it would weaken all the down ticket races. Senate and house seats in toss-up districts and states would be in play.  Governors and state legislature would be subject to the public opinion of their party nationally.  Not exactly what Citizen's United had in mind in 2009.

     Yes, Citizen's United will destroy American democracy forever if not overturned, but for right now it is the greatest weapon the Democrats have.