Reason magazine's Jacob Sullum sees no cause for concern in the tidal wave of political spending by wealthy donors unleashed by the Supreme Court. The super PACs have made things more competitive, he assures us, and the "fear" of critics like myself that the wealthy will "dominate the discourse and dictate electoral outcomes" simply hasn't come to pass.
You might view this statement as incredible given recent history and odd given that the source is "Reason" magazine, where one would expect facts as well as assertions. What are the facts? As of May 30, super PACs affiliated with a select number of wealthy donors have spent nearly $90 million on ads designed to influence the outcome of the Republican presidential primary. That counts as dominating the discourse in my book -- drowning out the candidates, party groups, PACs and other donors large and small, whom Sullum conveniently disparages as "insiders." And how does that $90 million break out? The super PACs affiliated with wealthy supporters of Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, Ron Paul, Rick Perry and Jon Huntsman spent less than $40 million dollars combined. The Restore Our Future PAC, which backed Mitt Romney, spent $46.5 million.
It's true that the most popular candidate often raises the most money. But Romney wasn't the most popular candidate, not by a long shot. The Republican base wasn't just lukewarm -- they recoiled at Romney, and even his extreme swing to the right didn't help. His main competitors knew it, and they were promising to take this fight all the way to Tampa. Enter Restore Our Future PAC. In state after state, this super PAC, affiliated with Romney's wealthy supporters, came to the rescue, carpet bombing the leading contender with negative ads in order to boost Romney's showing.
Romney is still trying to fix his problems with a base even further right; the latest effort involved a fundraiser headlined by Donald Trump, who proceeded to stoke the wholly discredited "birther" conspiracy theory. But he locked up the nomination because of the influence exerted by a handful of wealthy supporters through their super PAC. The outcome of the 2012 Republican presidential primary was decided by the group that spent the most money.
Super PACs, special interests and wealthy donors have rushed to tee up the same strategy for the fall. On the same day Sullum's column was published, an alliance of conservative groups announced a plan to spend $1 billion in an attempt to dictate the outcome of the general election. Prominent members of the group include the Koch brothers -- who also happen to be major donors to the foundation that funds Reason magazine, a fact Mr. Sullum did not disclose in his fortuitously timed column. This alliance of wealthy conservatives and special interests isn't spending a billion dollars to make the presidential election more competitive, or to make sure "outsiders" find their voice. These are wealthy business people. It would be foolish to believe that they are pouring money into an election without any expectation that there will be a return on their investment. They believe the influence they can buy in the form of an onslaught of negative advertising will allow them to pick the winner. Do you think there's no risk of corruption in an electoral process where powerful interests dominate the playing field on behalf of their favored candidates, or where they can threaten to do so if candidates don't get in line? If so, Mr. Sullum may also have some oceanfront property in Kansas to sell you.
Campaign finance laws were put in place to reduce corruption, the risk of corruption, and the appearance of corruption, and for decades those laws were upheld by the Supreme Court. No matter how much dust one tries to throw into the eyes of people concerned about the integrity of our elections, the fact remains: the undue influence of wealthy donors and interest groups is real, and it threatens corruption on a scale not seen in decades. It also threatens to overwhelm the diversity of voices on which democratic dialogue depends. We need to reform our campaign finance system to empower small donors and restore integrity to our elections. Repairing the damage to campaign finance laws wrought by the Roberts Court's departure from decades of precedent amounts to a national emergency.
Bill Moyers and Michael Winship: Pity the Poor Billionaires
 |
 |
|
| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Electoral Votes (270 to win) |
332 | 206 |
| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Total | 65,899,660 | 60,932,152 |
| Percent | 51.1% | 47.2% |
| Democrats* | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Current Senate | 53 | 47 |
| Seats gained or lost | +2 | -2 |
| New Total | 55 | 45 |
| Democrats | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Seats won | 201 | 234 |
The reason the Republicans are going to be running Romney for president isn't because PACs spent money pushing him, and it isn't even because they can't find anyone better to put up against Obama. It's because Republicans ceased being Republicans many years ago, probably during Bush I's administration (if not earlier, back in the Reagan days). They (and you) are RINOs, Democrats who want bigger government, although they wish to use it to repress the citizens in slightly different ways than the real Dems do. When a real Republican pops up, they do everything they can to discredit him/her and carry on with consolidating power at the federal level. And the worst part is, you probably don't even realize you're a Democrat, do you? Not that there's anything wrong with that, some of my best friends are Democrats. ;-)
In the recent London Mayor election, some candidates were effectively barred from access to tv through the use of the BBC (state radio and tv) to impose draconian restrictions on their access (tv advertising is banned anyway, so all coverage is “free” and just given to those “approved” by the BBC). The BBC handed hours and hours (and millions of dollars worth) of free branding to its “approved class” of candidates and barred the others from anything but a few seconds of pre-records. One party banned from BBC debates was ahead of one the "state favoured" parties in the opinion polling at the time of the BBC ban.
Those candidates were banned from debates by the BBC. Then, through spending laws, those candidates were also barred from raising the money from donors to send even ONE LETTER to their potential voters. They are effectively banned from campaigning, all on the supposed basis of it being wrong for people to spend big money campaigning.
If what the Super PACs in the USA are doing is not illegal, then can’t people make their own decisions as to whether what they say makes a point? Once you allow the state and state money to overwhelm an election, you have a stale event dominated by the established parties and an effective bar on new entrants.
With just a little research I was able to find three different web sites from minor party activists in London who discussed the election, its conduct and its outcome. None expressed concern about a lack of access to television.
On the other hand, there was an article on the UK edition of HuffPost which described more than one televised debate featuring at least two minor party candidates. I did see that one independent candidate was excluded from the debates, but she expressed no objection an any grounds of unfairness.
It seems you are referring to the inescapable and universal practice in elections of qualifying certain candidates and providing election services (ballot listings, debate space) only to them. If you have something else in mind it would be worth seeing.
Nine unelected Justices have told 538 elected Representatives and Senators that if they want a chance to serve their country at all, they will have to compete against the most powerful money-making institutions ever known in human history - American corporations. Corporations have their place, but that place is nowhere near a voting booth.
Why isn't there more bipartisan opposition to the Citizens United decision? There is a clear danger to the institution of Congress itself. Fundraising was already too much a part of every legislator's workload. If this goes on, how will any of them find time for anything else?
This should be a