Powerful interests have no problem getting what they want in America. By spending big money, they influence the outcome of elections to ensure that their favored politicians get into office.

These fat cats aren’t like most of us; indeed just one out of every thousand voting age Americans gave a contribution of $1,000 or more to a federal candidate in the 2002 election. But these big donors enjoy overwhelming influence. The congressional candidate who raised the most money won 94 percent of the time in 2002, usually by dramatically outspending their opponent.

Well, enough is enough. To get things back on track, the rest of us must take matters into our own hands. Representative democracy has been hijacked and we’ve got to take it back.

TheRestofUs.org is a non-partisan watchdog committed to exposing the role of big money in politics and telling citizens what they can do about it. Research for The Rest of Us is a sister organization that analyzes issues affecting our democracy and conducts public education.

Derek Cressman founded TheRestofUs.org and Research for The Rest of Us after spending eight years studying money in politics with the nonpartisan state Public Interest Research Groups (click here for Derek's cv.). He testified as an expert before Congress and the Supreme Court, explaining the dangers of big money in politics. After watching Congress enact a so-called reform law that actually increased the amount of money politicians raise from big donors, Derek knew that the people had to get more informed and engaged to bring about real reform. With startup funding from the State PIRGs and support from individual contributors (click on the link above if you'd like to give!), TheRestofUs.org is working to do just that.

Ned Wigglesworth joined TheRestofUs.org in April 2004, after working as a corporate lawyer, bartender and creative writer. From these experiences and his time spent growing up on a sheep farm in Kansas, Ned brings a common-sense populist perspective to the problem of big money in politics.