I don’t know enough about campaign finance laws, but I am under the impression you can raise about 2300 per individual for a candidate, about 25,000 to the party the candidate is affiliated with and endless money for independent groups that are either pro or anti a certain candidate.
Obama raised about 750 million in 2008, and wants about 1 billion in 2012. We have a public financing system of about 84 million you get in between accepting the nomination and the election (around the end of august through early november). McCain took it (by force if I recall correctly) Obama did not. Bush and I believe Kerry took public financing in 2004, but it really can’t keep up with private funding.
What if someone decided to just cut out all the various individuals, organization and corporations and just had one individual or one organization or corporation fully fund each candidate via independent expenditures. How would that affect the publics opinions about financing or democracy, if at all?
The left has wealthy interest groups and individuals (the Democracy Alliance has dozens of millionaires and billionaires in it. They also have labor unions, environmental groups, trial lawyers, etc). So does the right (energy companies, wealthy individuals, business groups, etc).
If David Koch offered the GOP candidate a billion, and George Soros offered the dem candidate a billion and both candidates agreed not to take money from anyone else in exchange for it, how would the public respond?
Why would any candidate agree to refuse money from more than one source? What would the candidate, or the fund provider for that matter, think would be of benefit from it?
I can’t see any positive result from it, except to the fund provider who makes an explicit heal that “his” president will do as told. That would of course be a negative for everyone else, except possibly the other Koch brother.
Just because they are billionaires doesn’t mean that they all have billion in cash just laying around. Most billionaires have their net worth tied up in the equity of their companies. I don’t see the Koch’s selling off their company just to be able to finance a political campaign.
Candidates for sale to the highest bidder. And then you’ll see crap like Microsoft Presents: The State of the Union or The Exxon Oval Office. Maybe auction off naming rights for national monuments. No more Washington Monument, now it’s* The Safeco Spire*.
And you’re completely shutting out the “voice of the people”, for whatever that’s worth.
There have been billionaires who self-funded their campaigns to varying degrees. Forbes, for example. Admittedly that doesn’t exactly raise eyebrows the same way taking someone elses cash does.
If you accept public financing you can’t accept private donations. McCain wanted to accept private donations since he figured he could raise more than 84 million in September and October, which is the amount you get with public financing for the presidential race, about 84 million. But the democratic party sued him and forced him to accept public financing because he took out a loan a year earlier using public financing as collateral (something like that). So Obama raised about 200+ million in September and October 2008 while McCain had 84.
You’d get a lot more money and save a lot of time. You wouldn’t have to spend tons of time fundraising, since that would be taken care of. And one individual offering you a billion dollars would be more than you would gain if you accepted money from everyone else.
Like I said, Obama is hoping to raise a billion for 2012. He raised 750 million in 2008. If someone offered him a billion in 2008 but said he couldn’t take money from anyone else, he’d have more money than he would’ve had otherwise by accepting donations from everyone.
The point of this thread was to see how people think the public would respond to naked plutocracy like this rather than one where endless wealthy groups hide their identities, you just have one wealthy person be transparent about it. I’m not ‘pro’ this idea, but it would really cement the role wealthy groups and individuals have in politics and clarify it.
