If you watch one video this week, make it this one from Stanford & Harvard Law professor Lawrence Lessig.

Highlights:

75% of Americans believe money buys results in Congress.

Only 11% of Americans have confidence in Congress. There were more people who believed in King George III at the time of the [American] Revolution than believe in the Congress today.

At the end of the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin walked out and he was asked by a woman in the streets of Philadelphia “Mr. Franklin, what have you wrought?”. He responded: “A Republic ma’am… if you can keep it.”

Granted, pessimism may be the new black, but I’m an realist. It’s becoming blatantly obvious that the no term limit Congressional policy combined with the modern day corporate benefactor (e.g. campaign donations) system has, by a process of vastly accelerated natural selection, mutated the original concept of the Republic to such a degree it’s killing the American spirit our present day leaders proclaim it instills.

It’s not our Congressional leaders fault they can’t catch on — well yeah, it kinda is since it’s their job to serve the people, not their campaign donors — but it’s simply the new Beltway status quo, the new herd psychology, and to hang on to what you have when times are good for you while doing everything in your power to retain that power is nothing but Human Nature 101. But when the status quo only benefits a few select people, it takes a lot of money to continue to persuade people to allow you to hang on to that power. Thus, creating a negative feedback loop for the people, and a lot of persuasion based campaign promises, advertising campaigns, etc., to make you believe “all is well.”

But if you, me, or any other group disapprove of modern day Congressional psychology and want to change it back to the way the founders originally intended, you better have a very persuasive argument to tear a few million people away from their content consuming addiction (cable TV, Facebook, American Idol, NFL, etc.) willing to do something about it (e.g. Egypt, Wisconsin, etc.).

Hat tip to Washington’s Blog for locating Professor Lessig’s video.