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Fair enough. So you're saying that the outrage is manufactured to focus people's attention on how our elections are bought (post Citizens United) instead of how

by joesmo 10y ago

Fair enough. So you're saying that the outrage is manufactured to focus people's attention on how our elections are bought (post Citizens United) instead of how our elections are bought (pre Citizens United)? Or is the actual issue not the fact that our elections are bought? Because to me that seems to have always been the issue and Citizens United just added a littler more money to the pot.

Lazare 10y ago
I think the question of whether it's accurate to say our "elections are bought" is an open question, and a very subjective one. What I'm saying is that the things people talk about when they say "our elections are bought" have not changed in many years, and were entirely unaffected by Citizens United. Prior to the decision billionaires could spend unlimited funds on almost any part of the electoral process except directly contributing to the actual campaigns of individual politicians, and did so regularly. After the decision, this was still true. Conversely, I'm aware of no aspect of our political process which is 1) ethically troubling and 2) actually taking place in significant amounts that arose (or increased) only after the decision. The way our elections are bought after the decision(if they are bought, see above) is the same way they were bought before. > Citizens United just added a littler more money to the pot. I'm not even aware of evidence it did that to any meaningful extent. We're entering an era of $1 billion dollar campaigns (there was talk of Clinton running the first $2 billion dollar campaign), which is absurdly high, and clear evidence that more money is flowing into the system, but remember: Citizens United didn't change how campaigns are financed, and did not allow corporations to donate to campaigns. We're seeing a lot of extra money in the pot, and a lot of it is clearly not stemming directly from that decision. (I've seen it suggested that campaigns are having to raise more funds to compete with the "shadow" money coming from non-individuals, but as mentioned in an earlier comment, the shadow money is also overwhelmingly coming from individuals, so that doesn't seem to work either.)

by joesmo 10y ago

Lazare 10y ago

I think the question of whether it's accurate to say our "elections are bought" is an open question, and a very subjective one. What I'm saying is that the things people talk about when they say "our elections are bought" have not changed in many years, and were entirely unaffected by Citizens United. Prior to the decision billionaires could spend unlimited funds on almost any part of the electoral process except directly contributing to the actual campaigns of individual politicians, and did so regularly. After the decision, this was still true. Conversely, I'm aware of no aspect of our political process which is 1) ethically troubling and 2) actually taking place in significant amounts that arose (or increased) only after the decision. The way our elections are bought after the decision(if they are bought, see above) is the same way they were bought before. > Citizens United just added a littler more money to the pot. I'm not even aware of evidence it did that to any meaningful extent. We're entering an era of $1 billion dollar campaigns (there was talk of Clinton running the first $2 billion dollar campaign), which is absurdly high, and clear evidence that more money is flowing into the system, but remember: Citizens United didn't change how campaigns are financed, and did not allow corporations to donate to campaigns. We're seeing a lot of extra money in the pot, and a lot of it is clearly not stemming directly from that decision. (I've seen it suggested that campaigns are having to raise more funds to compete with the "shadow" money coming from non-individuals, but as mentioned in an earlier comment, the shadow money is also overwhelmingly coming from individuals, so that doesn't seem to work either.)