NationStates Jolt Archive

Many people seem suspicious of 'contributions' that may affect who a politician may actually represent. So what do you guys think about a cap on the ammount of money they can spend on advertising before an election? It seems to work well enough here (Australia), I believe that the cap has recently been raised to about a quarter of a million dollars. Would you like to see the US presidential campiagns run on only a quarter million dollar budget?

It is possible. America, land wise, is about as big as Australia. So would you support legislation that would prevent politicians from raising more than a quarter million dollars for PR? It would be an extra check against wealthy causes from buying politicians and allow more equal representation of the poor.

I think it's a very good idea. It would keep all parties on even ground in that sense, and that alone is reason enough to do it.

it would be nice but i doubt it could really pass a constitutional test and it would be impossible to get through the republican controlled congress.

it would be nice but i doubt it could really pass a constitutional test and it would be impossible to get through the republican controlled congress.

I don't know too much about the American constitution, could you please explain to me how it would be unconstitutional? (not having a go, just curious)

Capping finance restricts freedom of expression, as well as freedom of property (its your money, if you want to give it away, that your business)

Capping finance restricts freedom of expression
It restricts freedom of expression less than charging people money to express themselves through your media outlet does.

I totally agree that campaign financing should be severly capped - here in the UK (I can't obviously speak for the USA). It seriously concerns me that New Labour are/were throwing money on sending SMS messages to students, or forking out for billboard adverts at the side of busy roads. Not only does this sort of target advertising detract from the issues of an election but it also puts parties in the pockets of their financiers. If a party wanted to out-advertise another (to win an election) they would need to cosy up to wealthy benifactors, who may or may not have thier own agendas.
Personally I think that each party should have the right to a telivised party-politacal-broadcast (as they currently do) and perhaps telivised debates, nothing more.

That I heard in the USA and maybee other countries too you have companies giving funds to both parties. Then it seems like they doing it for other reason then politcal conviction...

It's like, ya know, I get a cute haircut, and then my friend get's a cute hair cut and a new jacket, so like I gotta get a new jacket and new shoes. And then he get's his face waxed, so like, I gotta go for the whole body wax (Eeee OUCH!) and then he's gotta get a new Masserati and I've gotta get an Astin Martin, and like, we'd both save a lot of money if we'd just be ourselves, ya know? So like, as long as they can get their platform across, what do you need hundreds of millions of dollars for? The political parties should just be themselves!

P.S. I've given up trying to give straight answers for now because some people my language pick apart. If I write like I'm an idiot, people seem to be a lot less pendantic and a lot less grumpy.

They should limit advertising to road-side signs only. Then they should removed laws on vandalising them.

it would be nice but i doubt it could really pass a constitutional test and it would be impossible to get through the republican controlled congress.
See by that you mean
*Add Texan accent*
Ive got a lot of money here Senator and if you make Alaska free for me to explore for oil youll get some green!

They should limit advertising to road-side signs only. Then they should removed laws on vandalising them.
Sigh the things i do for you people....
http://www.allthegoodness.com/images/thumbs/600_scale_kerry_stick_it.jpg
twas another but its a bugger to get...
http://images.google.com/images?q=Stick+With+Kerry&hl=en&lr=&start=0&sa=N
Yeah some of the other famous ones wre
SUCK IT KERRY-Dont google it. ;) :p
Stick it Kerry
Stuck With Kerry

Many people seem suspicious of 'contributions' that may affect who a politician may actually represent. So what do you guys think about a cap on the ammount of money they can spend on advertising before an election? It seems to work well enough here (Australia), I believe that the cap has recently been raised to about a quarter of a million dollars. Would you like to see the US presidential campiagns run on only a quarter million dollar budget?

It is possible. America, land wise, is about as big as Australia. So would you support legislation that would prevent politicians from raising more than a quarter million dollars for PR? It would be an extra check against wealthy causes from buying politicians and allow more equal representation of the poor.

If this were the case Soros could not have funded Move On . ORG and other interestests. Dems usually get the largest donations, so it would hurt them the most. In spite of that, I would still have to say I cannot support something that infringes on an individuals freedom, so - no.

It restricts freedom of expression less than charging people money to express themselves through your media outlet does.

So, the right of a private property owner to charge people a fee for the use of his property restricts freedom of expression?

Bollocks.

Freedom of expression is not the unfeted right to use other people's property.

If TV stations want to charge for advertising time, that's their right, and frankly, they should charge politicians more for advertising space than normal commercial enterprises because political advertising turns most people off.

There are caps on how much you can give as an individual currently (although I can't remember the figures for the life of me) even these could be relaxed more, if you want to support a political candidate with your own money so be it..

Not to go off subject, but this all reminds me of the Saturday Night Live skit where Bob was running for "Nice Guy", and his neighbor kept having attack ads..... "Bob claims he is a nice guy, Jim is the true Nice Guy"..

A cap of $50,000 (probably more, I don't know) per state paid to the candidates by the government.

An expendature like this is a small cost to rid the government of corruption and unbalanced campaigning.

Capping finance restricts freedom of expression, as well as freedom of property (its your money, if you want to give it away, that your business)

Since the candidates with the biggest election purses are the most likely to be elected it weakens democracy greatly to allow those with the most money dictate the winners, and therefore policy.

Ummm, forgive me if I'm wrong... but I think it is capped. Now this is purely from memory, and maybe they've changed it recently, but I believe the maximum a Presidential candidate can raise and spend campaigning is something like twenty-seven million U.S. dollars. The problem isn't what the Presidential candidates themselves are spending, it's what the PAC's are spending in advertising for their candidate. And you can't put a cap on how much a PAC can spend campaigning because they'll just split into multiple PAC's and be able to spend twice as much. This just wouldn't work for how the U.S. deals with things.

By the way, whoever has been comparing Australia to the U.S. based on size needs to look up the populations, because that's what matters in advertisement cost. Whereas we've got three hundred million, you probably have twenty million or so, at the most.

Since the candidates with the biggest election purses are the most likely to be elected it weakens democracy greatly to allow those with the most money dictate the winners, and therefore policy.

I'm not sure it really has that strong an affect who can afford more ads, anyway. Like I said, PAC's pay for 99% of their campaigning, and also you'd think Kerry would have beaten Bush if it were based on the money each of them had. Heinz is loaded.

How about a cap of 1/2 million for the primary and limit the campaign to three months. For the general election a cap of 1 million and limit the campaign to two months. (for US)

Ummm, forgive me if I'm wrong... but I think it is capped. Now this is purely from memory, and maybe they've changed it recently, but I believe the maximum a Presidential candidate can raise and spend campaigning is something like twenty-seven million U.S. dollars. The problem isn't what the Presidential candidates themselves are spending, it's what the PAC's are spending in advertising for their candidate. And you can't put a cap on how much a PAC can spend campaigning because they'll just split into multiple PAC's and be able to spend twice as much. This just wouldn't work for how the U.S. deals with things.
i THINK its capped but only if you want to get the federal funds for your campaign. if you forgo those you can spend as much as you can get your hands on. plus there is that extra "soft money" and party money stuff that go under different rules. and there are different primary and general election rules.

its pretty complicated.

i THINK its capped but only if you want to get the federal funds for your campaign. if you forgo those you can spend as much as you can get your hands on. plus there is that extra "soft money" and party money stuff that go under different rules. and there are different primary and general election rules.

Right, I'm pretty sure this is an general election rule... I wasn't aware that you could forgo government funds and ignore campaign budget caps, but that's possible. Even so, the party money stuff is kind of what I was referring to. PAC's are not limited to any amount of spending, and even if we tried to limit them, they could simply break up into multiple PAC's and thus dodge caps. I'm not saying a cap on campaign spending isn't a good idea, I'm just saying that it would be nearly impossible with the way things are run in the United States, and I'm not sure it has that much of an affect on election outcomes. The only people it would really benefit would be third party candidates and independants and the like. But they'll never win, anyway; we're too close-minded for that in the U.S.

Spending lots of money on campaigns looks like a waste because the money on side spends is countered by the money the other side spends. It also results in the crowding out of business advertising, resulting in increased advertising costs. I demand campaign spending limits to protect the interests of business! Coming to an agreement on limiting spending would help America fiscally.

One possible solution:

Give each party one cent or so per vote they get from general revenue to be used for campaign funding. Also limit donations to say $20 per person.

Party affiliation is a much bigger part of elections than wealth of the candidates - they're all multimillionaires that can afford to campaign as much as the next guy, anyway. And we can't ban parties... or can we? ;)

Spending lots of money on campaigns looks like a waste because the money on side spends is countered by the money the other side spends. It also results in the crowding out of business advertising, resulting in increased advertising costs. I demand campaign spending limits to protect the interests of business! Coming to an agreement on limiting spending would help America fiscally.

One possible solution:

Give each party one cent or so per vote they get from general revenue to be used for campaign funding. Also limit donations to say $20 per person.

Hahaha, you demand it? Like, set campaign spending limits or else?

"Or else what?"
"Or else we'll be very, very angry with you, and we'll send you a letter telling you how angry we are."

Besides, your solution is highly extreme, and your comments prior to the ridiculous demand and strange suggestion make it quite apparent that you haven't read anything I've posted on PAC funding and self-campaigning monetary caps.

The problem is that '527 groups ' can raise as much as they want, since they're not part of the government. So, no matter how much of a cap you put on Hilary's election campaign, Moveon.org can spend whatever they want, and are unrestricted about the message they play.

Exactly.