Money = freedom of speech?

Red posted something about being sick of political commercials by now and I feel the same way but it makes me ask for your opinions on campaign financing.

As many of you probably know, the courts, especially the U.S. Supreme Court has consistently rendered decisions basically equating the donation of money to a politician as an individual’s right of freedom of speech. Unfortunately, the court has recently seen fit to bestow the status of an individual citizen upon corporations, etc.

To get to the point, I’ve been saying for years that, in order to remove the corrupting influence of money on our political system, there needs to be a constitutional amendment requiring that election funding for all public offices be publically financed and only publically financed. If you are on the ballot, you will receive x amount of money to run your campaign and that’s all. You wouldn’t be permitted to use any other funds and no one would be permitted to make political contributions unless it was to the general fund from which all candidates got their money. Of course, hardly anyone would do that but so what?

Funding this wouldn’t be the most difficult thing because candidates wouldn’t get nearly the amounts they spend on elections now. There could be a graduated national sales tax. 1¢ (not 1%) on all purchases up to a certain amount. 2¢ up beyond that amount, etc. A $1 surcharge on all tax returns. There are a lot of pain free ways to raise this money. Media outlets like newspapers, radio and TV could be given the option of donating a certain amount of free access to all candidates or pay a small fee to the government.

Based on an earlier question of mine, “Do you vote?”, I think I can predict some of your answers but I would like to see what this country could be like without the corrupting influence of cash by special interest groups. Can you imagine how nice it would be if we didn’t have to listen one side accuse the other of having sex with goats, etc. because they didn’t have an obscene amount of cash to do that? Yes, I know this is a pipe dream of mine. The red and blue clubs in charge would never willingly kill that golden goose. OK, I'll step off now

I think that it would be ideal to have our general elections funded by government, therefore regulated. But, even in the areas of the U.S. that have tested the waters with clean elections did not seem to favor it once it was implemented. So, I don't think that a majority of Americans would ever vote for government funded elections. I have always been in favor of it. It is inspiring to think about how different it would be in a time where money did not talk with these elections. I think it would encourage people to be more involved in learning more about the candidates instead of falling for the smears on the trashy ads. The slew of ads that we are all so sick of are dumbed down for the average joe who may not even vote.

Shale wrote:
WHAT!!??

Are you suggesting leveling the playing field?

It won't happen unless there is a way to force a national petition - or storm Capitol Hill some night with pitchforks and torches.

Yes, it would be nice to see everyone go into an election using just their good words and not inundating us with all those lies we now have to see non-stop.

Also, there needs to be some curtailment of monied interests buying our politicians. It is not democracy when the deep pockets have the elected ppl in them.

I said I knew it was a pipe dream but I'm all for the pitchforks and torches!