To The Editor:

In the U.S. Our tsunami will be a tidal wave of corporate cash contributions to candidates in 2012.

Its impact will result in more corruption to the elections than ever imagined here on American soil.

The one way will be from corporations, unlimitedly contributing to elect their choice. This choice will buy the furthering of corporate agendas.

It will buy more loopholes (tax exemptions) and influence on government decisions.

The second way will be from foreign corporations which will funnel their secret donations through a straw/ dummy entity.

In effect this will disguise the source of this influence on legislators.

Both of these are now possible, thanks to our Supreme Court ruling: corporations are persons with unlimited rights.

Now about 30 percent or less of corporations pay no income taxes, while 80 percent of people pay taxes. What’s wrong with this picture?

I think everybody should pay a fair share.

So, while we dwell on our deficits, suggesting extreme cuts, that will slow down our recovery in 2011, we are allowing some corporations to go “scott free,” no pun intended.

We are rewarding these corporations by allowing them to further corrupt our elections with corporate cash and secret foreign cash.

This process described here completely undermines the voting citizens. A citizen’s vote is being distilled by foreign contributions. Nowhere did I learn that “we the people” includes corporations or foreign influence.

Campaign reform is mandated.

Legislatures will be required to pass laws to undo this situation.

Some states already have publicly-funded local and state elections thus avoiding outside influences.

Was the fact that America slept through this loss of democracy due to wars, economic crises, lobbyists, globalization, bad rulings of our Supreme Court, citizen apathy or all of the above.

This important question is what to do to effect change?

Joan Patterson

Lehigh Acres