The right to political voice is the most essential and fundamental building block of our government, and should–ethically and morally–be held to a different standard than “you get what you can afford.”
Debaser, are you seriously arguing that the wealthy should receive better representation because they can afford to purchase it?
No, not better representation! Just more of it.
Its role in the electoral and public-policymaking processes, the results of which we all have to live with.
Good luck with that. It’s simply not possible to make a homeless person and Bill Gates have the same “political voice” in this country. Whatever that even means.
You have to rephrase this for me to answer. I’m not quite sure what you mean by “better representation” exactly.
My argument so far in this thread is that there’s no evidence that lobbying spending results in meaningful influence over who’s elected. Groups that spend a lot don’t correlate to the groups that have the most power. Voters, and being able to effectively represent them is a far more powerful tool to control politicians, as illustrated by the NRA and the AARP.
Now, if you want to move into the question of whether an individual can use his wealth to get better access to politicians, that is true. But there’s no way to stop it. A Congresscritter is always more likely to pick up the phone when it’s the local real estate tycoon than a typical middle class person. This will be true regardless of what campaign finance laws we pass.
That’s what this comes down to, really. Some people just hate that we have a society where some have more money and power than others. This reflexive fear and hatred of money and those who have it is behind most of the outrage regarding campaign finance laws, IMO.
I get what you two are saying, but I would make the exact opposite argument.
Because elections are important, this is the most sacred and important type of speech that we have. The more important the speech the more it needs protection from interference from government.
I know you have good intentions, but the I trust the free market a lot more than the government to regulate who can say what about politicians running for office.
Besides, if only people in the richest zip codes in Manhattan and Beverly Hills could vote you’d never have a Republican elected again. I’m not sure what you guys are afraid of. There’s a Soros for every Koch.
Plus, as I’ve been pointing out, the money these rich people pour into the process doesn’t alter things nearly as much as organized groups of voters like the NRA.
Well, no: there are two Kochs and only one Soros. 
I see your point, but I don’t want Kochs or Soros deciding our elections.
How do you know they committed a felony if they haven’t been convicted?
You know, I’ll live to a hundred and not understand how people, educated people, smart people even, can trot out this “trust in the free market” shit without reddening with shame. Of course, **Debaser **is neither of those things, but that’s besides the point.
The free-est market there ever was was the situation around the turn of last century, you know, before regulations and laws to restrain untethered greed. You know what “the free market” is, **Debaser **me lad ? It’s all-encompassing corruption, *especially *in the political arena. It’s rigging every game in town. It’s monopolies and protectionism and nice little deals behind closed doors to keep the competition out. It’s hiring goons with billy clubs to bust the heads of strikers. It’s dumping heavy metals and toxic sewage in lakes and rivers because fuck them as live downstream. It’s hiring girls to paint watches with radioactive materials, telling 'em to lick their brushes clean and tossing them on their arses when they start looking like Elephant Man. It’s mining scrip and corporate villages and debt slavery. Or, y’know, actual slavery 'cause that, too, was the unregulated free market. It’s cutting every safety corner there is because a buck is an irreplaceable buck, but there’s other workers when those get killed and it’s not you who gets to do the oil spill clean-up. It’s manufacturing brown-outs to drive up both prices AND demand at the same time, remember that one ?
Trusting “the free market” is nonsensical as a concept, but trusting millionaires is asking to get fucked with rusty switchblades. That they’ve probably sold you first.
Holy unnecessary escalation, Kobol2!
I don’t want limits on campaign contributions, and you hit me with Slavery and Radium Girls.
Do you even realize how silly and hyperbolic you are being?
Actually, I daresay there are at least a dozen Kochs for every Soros.
There’s even a Koch for every Koch.
Of course it does, it alters the whole nature of the electoral-campaign industry (and industry it is). It obliges congresscritters to spend time and effort fundraising, and it obliges them to become obligated to the biggest donors. Something like the NRA does none of that.
It’s a perfectly fair reductio ad absurdum in this case, Debaser. Did you really think we had gotten past the radium-girl-slavery mindset? It’s alive and well in China, and would come back here if the likes of the Kochs had their way.
No. It’s not.
It would be in response to some sort of absurd argument on my part like “we should have no laws”. But it’s not a reasonable response to someone simply in favor of free speech in campaign finance laws, which I’ve stuck to in this thread.
Maybe he’s responding to something I’ve posted elsewhere, but I doubt it. He just heard “free market” and went nuclear.
Yes. I do.
Unless you have an example of someone in the US (assuming that’s what you meant by “we” being in favor of radium girls or slavery?
There’s radium girls and slavery in China? Cite?
Your opinion that the Koch’s would bring slavery to the US if they had their way is just silly. Most of their employees are well paid and many are unionized.
We neither must nor should accept some having more power because they have more money. Democracy and plutocracy are fundamentally incompatible and mutually inimical. Thomas Jefferson would have agreed with that.
There’s sweatshop slavery in China, and please don’t insult us all and disgrace yourself by asking for a cite for that. And you think American bizcritters ain’t making money off it?
Well, reluctantly!, sure.
Your definition of “plutocracy” seems to be very open ended. Do you think that any country where the wealthy have more power than the poor is a plutocracy? If so, every country on earth is a plutocracy as well as every country that has ever existed.
Even if that were true, would that mean it is something we are obliged to accept? It Is Written, then? Was and Ever Shall Be?
They might have such power based on education and prestige and fame and connections, all of which they probably have in greater measure than the poor. That’s a problem, but a different problem. But if they can use their money to buy power, I say it’s plutocracy and I say to Hell with it.