The Best Democracy Money Can Buy (2016)

The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: Directed by Greg Palast, David Ambrose. With Edward Asner, Richard Belzer, Rosario Dawson, Von Eckardt-Manzoni. When Donald Trump says, “This election is rigged”-he should know. His buddies are rigging it. Rolling Stone investigative reporter Greg Palast busted Jeb Bush for stealing the 2000 election by purging Black voters from Florida’s electoral rolls. Now Palast is back to take a deep dive into the Republicans’ dark operation, Crosscheck, designed to steal a million votes by November. Crosscheck is controlled by a Trump henchman, Kris Kobach, Kansas Secretary of State who claims his computer program has identified 7.2 million people in 29 states who may have voted twice in the same election–a felony crime. The catch? Most of these “suspects” are minorities-in other words, mainly Democratic voters. Yet the lists and the evidence remain “confidential.” Palast and his investigative partner Leni Badpenny do what it takes to get their hands on the data, analyzing it to find the names of nearly one million Americans about to lose their vote by November. They hunt down and confront Kobach with the evidence of his “lynching by laptop.” Then they are off to find the billionaires behind this voting scam. The search takes Palast from Kansas to the Arctic, the Congo, and to a swanky Hamptons dinner party held by Trump’s sugar-daddy, John Paulson, a.k.a. “JP The Foreclosure King.” Palast and BadpennyThey stake out top GOP donors, the billionaire known as “The Vulture” and the Koch brothers, whom Palast nails with a damning tape recording. In this real life detective story brought to life in a film noir style with cartoon animation, secret documents, hidden cameras, and a little help from Law u0026 Order: Special Victims Unit detectives, Ice-T and Richard Belzer, Shailene Woodley, Rosario Dawson, Willie Nelson and Ed Asner, Palast and his associates expose the darkest plans of the uber-rich to steal America’s democracy.

“I really cannot give u0026quot;The Best Democracy Money Can Buyu0026quot; at perfect 10/10 because it is so irritatingly disjointed and confusing. While Palast, who has been on these kinds of issues since before 2000 has done a lot of investigating, there is something about what he says of the way he says it that undercuts his message.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eHe blabbers on like a derelict, but if you listen you begin to see what he is getting at. The points are that he sees monied interests in the US as trying to remove people they do not like from the election roles so they cannot vote. That seems bad, and it is bad according to our democracy meme which says that everyone can vote. But the examples he uses are often talking with people to feeble to think or to know what is going on. I am for everyone voting, in fact I think it ought to be a law as it is in Australia, but if someone cannot git it together to get an ID, or to verify their registration how much sympathy am I supposed to have for them?u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eFinally, after all that talk Palast really starts the movie at roughly the 30 minute mark with a history of the Koch family, and how they initially stole their money from the Indians, Native Americans, and how they had the help of Bob Dole to do that. This segment of the movie shows how old crimes created old money which took over our system and still runs it today to a large extent. It is a clear and logical story, which not much of the rest of this movie is.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eIn my opinion Palast spends too much time on these election shenanigans for the simple reason that if someone wants to vote if they take the time to see it through they can vote. I actually think that voter ID would make our elections better, but perhaps some help could be given such as having the state governments which run the elections have to pay for it. The bottom line is that it is to both partyu0026#39;su0026#39; advantages that elections be fair.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThis movie is not really entertaining or funny. It might have been 20 years ago, but there is too much going on and it goes to quick to really explain well the issues that he is trying to cast light on, and he spends too much time looking at the wrong issues with the wrong people.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI suggest that it is an important documentary to watch if you are not familiar with these issues, and I rate u0026quot;The Best Democracy Money Can Buyu0026quot; a 9/10.”