Whenever I hear most people talk about the state of our government, they claim that Washington is the problem. Despite what seems to be a new distaste for Congress, citizens railing against their legislature is just as American as apple pie, Ford Motor Company and childhood obesity.

Congressional approval ratings are more often below 50 percent than not, according to Gallup polls. Currently, less than one-fourth of adults approve of Congress’ work as of August, and the rates are predicted to stay well within that range in the coming months. Why is that? One reason is that Congress is seen as the proverbial puppet of Wall Street.

Without arguing the merits of a bailout, it just plain seems unfair that our government would give enormous capital to the firms that got us into such an economic rut. Needless to say, this November should be the time to reject the corporatist lawmakers.

But, really, it seems quite the opposite. In Pennsylvania, Patrick Toomey has been leading in the polls for the open-seat Senate race in the state. Toomey, a Harvard graduate and former U.S. representative, worked for Wall Street interests for his entire pre-congressional professional life. He, in fact, traded the complicated derivatives that contributed to the recent economic mess, working for multiple banking firms.

In fact, Toomey was the president of the corporatist Club for Growth, a right-wing conservative group, funded by Wall Street, which pays out millions of dollars every election cycle to pro-Wall Street candidates.

Even more obvious examples are in California, where former eBay Chief Executive Officer Meg Whitman is running for governor and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina is running for U.S. Senate. The two Republican women have spent their entire

professional lives in the corporate world and have no history in public service.

The list of corporate candidates doesn’t stop there. From Florida to Delaware, corporate and self-funded candidates are buying nominations. In addition, political action committees are unloading millions into various campaigns in the wake of the Citzens United Supreme Court case.

All of this is a serious argument for real campaign finance reform. When a candidate has millions coming from corporate political action committees representing industries ranging from oil to tobacco, it’s easy to see why they would favor Wall Street before their constituents. What’s more, with so many self-funders, they are likely to support the big business world they know well.

There is a glimmer of hope, however. Perhaps we don’t give enough credit to the American voter to reject Wall Street candidates

It’s important to note, however, how powerful moneyed interests are in this country. We saw what the Tea Party Express did in Delaware just last week. Furthermore, corporate interests firmly back many of the leaders in Congress. For instance, GOP Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) was featured in a recent New York Times article for his laundry list of lobbyist friends, including those who represent powerful tobacco companies.

“So what?” You might say. “Rich people are running for Congress. I have no problem with that.” But how can we enact serious campaign finance reform if we have a senator who ran one of the most powerful corporate special interest groups fighting against it? How can we make sure that CEOs don’t receive golden parachutes for running companies into the ground if we have a senator from California who received one? Republicans and Democrats are both guilty of receiving corporate money, no doubt about it. And despite the anti-corporate, anti-Wall Street mood, money talks just as loud in this election cycle as it does in any other.

For the future, we need to strive for elections won on ideas, not money.

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