This article originally appeared on Dean Baker’s Patreon. It is reprinted here with permission.

Virtually everyone who is not a billionaire, or owned by one, agrees that we have to limit the ability of the rich to buy elections. While the Republican Party has taken “policy for sale” politics to a new level, there are plenty of Democrats who have been happy to support obviously awful policy in exchange for contributions from the AI industry, the pharmaceutical industry, the crypto industry, and Wall Street more generally. It costs a lot of money to run a competitive campaign and it’s hard to raise that from small contributions, so there will always be a temptation to bend policy positions to get some serious money.

While most people favor limits on campaign contributions, the current Supreme Court has made this very difficult. They have ruled that campaign contributions are speech and therefore any effort to limit campaign contributions is an unconstitutional restriction on speech.

There are some promising alternative paths that focus on making small donors matter. Seattle has a system of “democracy vouchers” that give every voter in local elections a modest sum that they can contribute to a candidate(s) of their choice. To qualify to get the vouchers, candidates must agree to limits on spending and large contributions.

Super-matches are a comparable system. Under this system, small dollar contributions can be matched up to 8 to 1, which means that even a $50 contribution can make a difference to a campaign. New York City, along with several other cities, have gone this route.

While these paths for amplifying the voice of ordinary people are promising, it will take much more to match the power of the billionaires. It is important to realize they exercise their political power in ways other than campaign contributions, primarily through their ownership of the media.

The importance of billionaire ownership goes far beyond the constant stream of lies and right-wing propaganda from Fox News. Last year, the very Trumpy Ellison family took control of CBS and immediately began to shift its news to the right. They are now taking control of CNN through the merger of Paramount and Warner Brothers. They also got control over TikTok, after Trump wrestled it away from a Chinese company for them.

Trumper Mark Zuckerberg owns Facebook and Instagram and is not shy about banning political material he doesn’t like. And Elon Musk bought Twitter, explicitly to advance his right-wing agenda. The rest of the media landscape doesn’t look much better. The rich and very rich own the countries’ newspapers and broadcast outlets, and most of these people lean right, even if they have not yet joined the Trump Reich.  

And let’s just be clear. The idea that the campaign ads bought by the rich can influence votes, but not the material that people see between the ads, is beyond absurd. Even if we banned all political contributions from rich people and corporations, the rich could still control elections by showing us nothing but their propaganda on television, in newspapers, and on social media.

This is why the Community News Act that Governor Gavin Newsom just signed is so important. The measure provides $20,000 each for up to five journalists per news outlet covering local news. This subsidy can keep newspapers and news sites across the state in business and help to support new ones that might start up. It is similar to other programs that have been started in Illinois, New York, and New Mexico.

This might seem like small change in a world with multi-billion dollar media empires, but it is not realistic to imagine matching the super-rich dollar for dollar; the goal is to sustain reality-based reporting that people can rely upon. (Repealing Section 230 protection for the mega-platforms like Facebook and X would be a big step towards leveling the playing field.) And support for local news reporting is likely to also lead to better national and international reporting, both by training more reporters and also increasing the comfort level with public funding, perhaps opening the door for a national system.

To be clear, there are no political conditions attached to this funding. Conservative news outlets are as eligible for this subsidy as more liberal ones. The point is to support local journalism, not to favor a particular political perspective.

To my view, this system is not ideal. I prefer support coming through an individual refundable tax credit to support local news. This would allow people to have a more direct attachment to the news outlets being supported with public money. Ideally, this would give them a sense of ownership that many feel towards other community organizations.

But whether or not this is the best approach, there is no doubt that the California bill, along with the ones already passed in other states, are big steps forward. It will help to reverse the collapse of local news reporting, which is giving corruption free rein in many areas. We need to build on the positive and make it better, rather than reject a plan because it may not be ideal. Progressive opponents of California’s wealth tax initiative may want to give that point some thought.

Europe’s Green party has called on the European Commission to exercise the powers it previously used during the Ukraine war to tax the exceptional profits made by big oil and gas companies during the ongoing conflict in Iran. 

“There are models in Europe that we can use to tax these super profits,” German MEP Rasmus Andresen told a European Parliament debate in Strasbourg on Wednesday (7 October), in his call to crack down on Iran-crisis profiteering.

The Strasbourg debate came after Austria, Germany, Italy, Poland, Portugal, and Spain wrote to Ireland’s finance minister in August calling for an EU-wide framework to tax windfall profits.

Ireland holds the rotating EU presidency and can set agendas in the EU Council until the end of the year.

Several of those in the group of six EU states already put in place energy windfall taxes since this summer, ranging from 60 percent levies on excess fuel profits in Poland to 33 percent in Portugal.

Many other EU countries oppose introducing another tax at European level, which would require unanimity among all 27 member states to put in place.

But for his part, the Greens’ Andresen told MEPs in the hemicycle on Wednesday: “I don’t understand how despite the fact that there is this initiative from these six member states, that the commission is not taking action.”

Estimates from NGO Transport and Environment found that excess profits of €7.5bn were seen by eight oil companies alone in the first half of 2026 in Europe.

The figures were twice what they had made in the previous quarter. 

The EU had reacted to soaring energy prices after Russia’s full invasion of Ukraine in 2022 with a special “solidarity” tax on oil and gas firms, said groups on the Parliament’s left.

A commission assessment found that the measure raised €28bn in 2022-2023.

A senior official representing the Irish presidency, Thomas Byrne, said on Wednesday that windfall taxes “could be considered to respond to the concern related to the rising cost of living“.

But energy commissioner Dan Jørgensen poured cold water on appeals for EU-level action, saying “corporate taxation falls mainly in the realm of national competence” in legal terms.

Andresen’s fellow Green MEP, Marie Toussaint, said taxing Iran profits could be used “to pay for the energy transformation” in Europe, in the context of difficult talks on the EU’s next multi-annual European budget.

If they were not taxed, “how can they be exonerated from all responsibility in the rise of prices at the gas station?,” said the French vice-president of the Greens group.

This article continues, but the full version is available only to EUobserver.com subscribers. Visit account.euobserver.com/membership

Commenting earlier on reports of plague or another infection in the Irkutsk Region, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said people should rely on assessments by Rospotrebnadzor, rather than rumors and idle speculation.

For days, many American bloggers and politicians have been sounding an alarm that currently appears unjustified and blown out of proportion.

British Medical Journal: “Russia plague outbreak: Epidemic risk is low, says WHO”

Excerpt by BMJ (former British Medical Journal)

«The risk of a plague epidemic is low after the death of a laboratory technician who worked at a plague research institute in Russia, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said» BMJ reported today confirming Moscow statements.

However, the United Nations body said that it was closely monitoring the situation and urged Russian authorities to be “transparent” about the death.

Darya Shipilova, 28, worked at the Irkutsk Antiplague Research Institute in the Siberia region of Russia. She died on 2 October, two days after being admitted to hospital and placed on a ventilator.1

Russian authorities have downplayed the incident and said that Shipilova died of “pneumonia of an unknown aetiology.” However, media reports suggested that she died of pneumonic plague and that she may have become infected after an accident in the laboratory.

VIDEO – US Epidemiologist Hulscher: ““NONE PANDEMICS from lab-acquired PNEUMONIC PLAGUE infection”

Nicolas Hulscher, American epidemiologist posted on Social:

«Before everyone panics about the lab-acquired pneumonic plague infection in Russia: This isn’t the 1300s. We now have effective treatments (antibiotics). At least five documented pneumonic plague outbreaks/clusters have occurred since 2011».

«NONE became a pandemic. Multiple lab-acquired plague infections have also occurred in modern history. NONE became a pandemic».

Russia’s sanitary watchdog says no epidemic risks in Irkutsk Region

Originally published by TASS News Agency

All the links to previous Gospa News investigations have been added in the aftermath by virtue of the ties with covered topics

A review of compliance with biosafety requirements in the Irkutsk Region has been completed, with no emergencies involving work with pathogens identified, the press service of Russia’s sanitary watchdog – Rospotrebnadzor – said.

The watchdog also noted that the World Health Organization (WHO) had published an assessment indicating no risk associated with a case of community-acquired pneumonia in Irkutsk.

TASS has compiled the key facts about the situation in the region.

Rospotrebnadzor statements

– The review of compliance with biosafety requirements in the Irkutsk Region has been completed, with no emergencies involving work with pathogenic microorganisms identified.

– Comprehensive preventive measures have been implemented in the region, and there are no epidemic risks to the public.

– Monitoring has ended for 90% of those who had contact with the patient, with no health problems caused by infectious diseases identified.

UKRAINE BIOLABS – 11. “NATO Lethal BIOWEAPONS Ongoing Program”. Evidence from 3 New Russian & US INTEL VIDEOS by FSB Chief, Ritter (ex US Navy), Gabbard (ODNI)

– Rospotrebnadzor has also provided the WHO with information about the situation in the region.

– The WHO, in turn, published an assessment indicating no risk associated with the case of community-acquired pneumonia in Irkutsk, according to Rospotrebnadzor.

Response

– Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the WHO had been duly informed about the case of pneumonia of unknown etiology in the Irkutsk Region.

– He urged the public to rely on Rospotrebnadzor’s statements, noting that the watchdog regularly releases detailed information about the epidemiological situation.

– According to Peskov, the media have published a large amount of information about the epidemiological situation in the Irkutsk Region, most of which is false.

PENTAGON BIOTERRORISM – How EBOLA became a Lethal NIGHTMARE in Congo (almost 4,000 deaths) after Dangerous, Secret FAUCI & GATES Experiments

– Commenting earlier on reports of plague or another infection in the region, Peskov urged the public to rely on assessments by highly qualified Rospotrebnadzor specialists rather than rumors and idle speculation.

Situation in region

– An employee of an anti-plague institute in the Irkutsk Region was diagnosed with pneumonia of unknown etiology, Rospotrebnadzor previously reported.

– The watchdog emphasized that a special set of measures had been implemented in response.

– Expanded testing of samples taken from the patient found no microorganisms associated with her professional activities.

– Subsequent testing identified two cases each of COVID-19 and rhinovirus infection among those who had contact with the woman.

NEW PANDEMIC FROM RESPIRATORY VIRUS IS COMING! Here’s Covid-CICADA (Video) after WHO ran a shady Simulation Exercise in the Pacific

– About 16,000 cases of acute respiratory viral infections are recorded in the Irkutsk Region every week, with no increase reported over the past two weeks.

– The sanitary and epidemiological situation in the Irkutsk Region remains calm.

Originally published by TASS News Agency

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