There was a failed vote today to require disclosure for corporations funding political advertising. This brought to mind the holy debated Supreme Court decision that conservatives say is a triumph for free speech, and liberals say allow the rich to “buy” elections with waves of anonymous advertising and such.
I’d like to examine this basic premise for a moment, if I can. In the modern world, to what extent can an individual’s or corporation’s money “buy” an election, in whatever way you choose to define that term (but with special attention to advertising and other such media “control”)? If they can’t completely do it, to what extent can they influence said election?
I think it’s about manipulating awareness of the alternatives. I think voters typically vote tactically, choosing a candidate they think will win. So control of the media means control of the impression of who is electable.
Which is arguably why we need equal time laws again.
Huge corprations and special interest groups “hedge their bets” by giving huge sums to both parties. that way, no matter who gets elected, the winner owes them political favors.
Not sure about buying an election, but having money sure makes it easier to become a well known candidate. In that way, it limits the potential slate of candidates. Not that it’s an absolute limiter, but it’s a major factor.
I’m all for free speech issues, but I continue to be baffled at the assertion that campaign contributions somehow equal free speech and must not be abridged. And free speech or not, money appears to be the most important factor in elections - it’s usually the first metric mentioned about the predicted success of a candidate.
I have heard (ETA - oh yeah, it was in Freakonomics. ;)) a different explaination given for that than the obvious one of money “buying” the election. Namely, that if a candidate looks like they are going to be successful they find it a lot easier to raise funds from donors who want to be backing the winning side.
So its a chicken and egg problem - do they win because they had more to spend on advertising, or do they get more money because it already looked like they were going to win?
Part of your cite seems to lend weight to the second hypothesis - the bit about self-funded campaigns. Apparently they don’t do very well.
I wonder how widely this sort of stuff is known among candidates themselves? Obviously if it is true that the money follows teh electability, not the other way round, this ought to reduce the importance and influence of lobbyists considerably. But there’s probably still at least a minimum threshold of money you have to spend to get at least your name recognised, and that amound is probably still pretty high.
Not much I would imagine. There’s a sea of competitors trying to do the exact same thing, so the impact of a single actor is drowned out. They all want the $$$ siphon to come their way. They could introduce a particularly popular meme that could dramatically influence an election, but whether an idea will take root in the public mind is difficult to predict. So I think it’d be easier to go the destructive, rather than constructive route there.
A confluence of industries may decide it’d be better for the blue guy to get in this year and so devote more resources to him. Maybe next time it’ll be the red guy. But that type of “buying an election” doesn’t mean much in my view. The bigger issue is where these candidates are coming from and the narrowness of the spectrum which allows a systemic assumption of payback no matter who is given up.
It’s entirely possible it’s both. The argument people flock to winners does make sense, however that’s not the entire story.
Look at how the politicians treat money. They spend larges amount of time and effort raising money for their campaigns. If money was not a big issue, I think they would realize that and wouldn’t focus so much on the war chest. Watching their actions, it’s clear politicians think money is very important to winning. I suspect the average politician probably knows a bit more on what it takes to be elected than I do.
Also you mention the part of the self-funded campaigns. They, mostly, lost so it’s true that money isn’t everything. However, money was enough that each of them were serious contenders based on nothing but their checkbook. Look at Linda McMahon. Now I won’t judge her qualifications on way or another, but I think it’s clear she would have never had a shot if she didn’t have her own money. You even acknowledge this aspect of things with your final comments about a minimum threshold to get your name known.
But you’re saying that the objective value of raising more money (as in whether it is fact that more money equals better electoral success) is measured by the subjective value of politicians (of course I want to run more TV ads!).
I think in reality, the emphasis placed on candidates on raising ever-vaster amounts of money is more like an arms race. The US and the Soviet Union had ample amounts of nuclear weapons to accomplish their mission, but the fear of the other getting an edge means that one side just couldn’t allow itself to be outdone for fear of what might happen – whether or not that fear was reasonable.
Obama raised a lot of money. He almost certainly would have won if he had spent the same amount as McCain. But, of course, that’s just one anecdote, but let’s look at advertising. Do products with the most advertising always “win?” Of course not. So, what is the substantive difference between advertising a commercial product and advertising a political candidate? Why would spending on one (the candidate) be more effective than spending on the other?
A certain critical mass of cash is required just to have any hope of being elected. More money to get into a national race, of course. In that sense you could say many local elections could be “bought.”
There is also the questions of voter fraud, election rigging, poll tampering and similar illegal fixing. I’d like to think this doesn’t happen on a national scale but there is ample evidence that it happens locally and that can affect national elections. Given enough money, this sort of thing might be one tool in buying an election. Some unscrupulous local official might deliver his precinct this way in the hope of reaping a reward, especially if a lot of money is flowing.
The reason candidates raise so much money even though it does not help much is that it helps on the margin. Getting one less vote than your opponent is functionally the same as getting none. So if the person who spends the most money gets one percent more votes than he would otherwise have gotten, it makes sense to spend as much money as one can raise. It also makes the campaign much nicer if one can stay in a fancy hotel surronded by paid sychophants.
It would be nice if we also had campaign finance reform laws put in place so that those large corporations and investment banks at the top can’t buy candidates for us to choose from.
Ive been saying this for years, but sadly it will never happen. Those in power have no intention of every letting the general public decide who should be president from the ground up, and should one pop up, though go on a massive smear campaign to halt any ideas of it happening.
I wonder, if a survey was taken from the American public, how many would know all the potential presidential candidates that existed, besides the two main ones: McCain and Obama.
I think this democrat / republican is a bunch of crap and treated like its a sport rather than choosing whom to run this country.
I think the labels democrat, republican, independent etc should be dropped all together and no labels applied.
Then people would have to actually study what the men and women running actually stand for.
Leland Stanford apparently spent $100,000 to become a US senator back when San Francisco did not offer needful assistance to people earning $100,000 a year to buy a house.
I guess only a small proportion of that was for advertising.