Political Campaign Funding
"No matter what your social issue, if you want
to solve it get the money out
of politics. Only then will lawmakers vote for
their people rather than their
pocketbooks." Jack E. Lohman. Money corrupts
politics, and when contributions
are being made to candidates it is not in
the best interest of the American
people. Campaign Finance is out of control
in today’s political races.
Candidates are taking money from wherever and
whoever they can get it. Soft
money is flowing through elections without care
or caution. People who make
these contributions do not share the views of the
average citizen, so
politicians end up representing the wrong people. Money
decides races, sometimes
leaving the better man but lighter spender out of a
position. Candidates make
decisions based on what will help them financially
that what is better for the
people. Contributions by industry are made not in
the interest of the people,
sometimes hurting them in ways they don’t even
know. No matter what the
opposition may say campaign finance reform is needed
urgently to keep our
democracy as our founders intended it. People and
corporations that make the
largest donations to campaigns do not share views
with the general population.
Politicians will listen to those who give
them money so that they can depend on
that money being there again when it is
time for reelection. Yet individual
donors making a $200 dollar or more
contribution make up only .33% of the
population. This extremely small
percentage of mostly wealthy individuals gain
the power to influence
politicians to their liking. The idea that these people
should have power to
affect government more than those with less money goes
against the concept of
equality for all, which is what made this country great.
People who make
large donations do not share the same views on most issues as
the general
population. Robert L. Borosage and Ruy Teixeira report that while 53
percent
of voters want stricter regulations on businesses and corporations, to
give
workers a fair salary and working conditions, 58 percent of campaign
donors
want to see less control over the businesses and corporations of
America. Donors
also want less government spending with lower taxes, while
the majority of
citizens want a larger, more powerful government. A very tiny
part of our
population is giving money to campaigns telling candidates what
they have to do
to continue getting campaign contributions, yet these people
do not represent
the ideology and sentiment of the people as a whole. There
must be a change in
the way that campaigns are financed if democracy is to
survive. If we do not
reform campaign finance we will have politicians
working only for those who can
afford to contribute. Money is the major
factor in any political race. It can
sway a decision very strongly depending
on how well it is used. In the House,
the candidate who spends the most money
on his or her campaign wins 92% of the
time. Things are no different in the
Senate, here 88% of the time the bigger
spender wins. Incumbents are usually
the tip money spender, because they raise
more money. Paul Starr, writer for
The American Prospect , estimates that it
would take $1,000,000 for a
challenger to defeat the incumbent. The only way a
challenger could get this
kind of money would be to appeal to big business and
the wealthy, who have
radically different ideas about government than the
general public. A
challenger, to even have a chance, would have to turn to
business and wealth
to win. With this great difficulty to de-seat an incumbent,
turnover in
congress drops, and members become stagnant, winning on name alone.
All
the while, they are giving breaks to the corporations and wealthy people
who
got them there. With campaigns finance reform, we could get challengers
and
incumbents on a level playing field so that the candidate with the better
ideas
who will honestly help the majority will end up the victor. It would
not matter
much where candidates got the money from for their campaigns
except that when
elected, politicians act on in accordance to the wishes of
those who have made
donations. 71% of citizens say that a politicians choices
and votes are made on
the basis of money. 61% of donors agree with this. Its
been explained that a
small percentage of people make donations, and these
people do not represent the
population as a whole. If politicians make
decisions based on this small group
of people they are not representing the
entire population ,or doing what is best
for the majority, as they were hired
to do. Politicians realize where they get
funding and work to please those
with the money. Robert Reich estimates that
half of all Americans with a
million dollar a year income or greater have had
their picture taken with the
president. All this attention is going to a group
that consists of less than
90,000. This cannot be healthy for a government that
is supposed to work for
all Americans. When congress persons make decisions
based on whether it will
fill their campaign fund, it is not representative of
the people that they
should be representing. The decisions that they make may be
harmful to the
people, but that does not matter to some politicians. All that
matter to them
is dollars. The people don’t know this though because those
dollars are spent
trying to convince everyone that their representative did a
good job and
worked for their best interest. Money does matter to politicians
and they
remember and reward those who get them into office. Donations made
by
corporations often hurt individuals either financially or even
medically.
Corporations make up a large portion of the groups that give
generous donations.
These corporations do not care what is good for the
people, all they care about
is their own bottom line. If this means shipping
unsafe or unhealthy products,
that is what will be done. Food companies have
donated $41 million dollars on
the promise by candidates, that once in
office, will not make stricter
regulations on e-coli protection. E-coli is a
deadly bacteria that infects
numerous people every year. But as a result of
donations by food companies, government
will not regulate these companies to
protect Americans. Food companies are not
alone, the cotton industry is also
at fault. Safety standards that some
companies include on night wear
voluntarily because of the great risk of burns,
are not national law. The
cotton industry gives generous contributions to
Congress in hopes that
any legislation concerning safety standards will be shut
down. These are
safety standards that have already saved dozens of lives and
could save many
more. Campaign money from industries stops laws that would help
out every
American. New drugs are released into the market for public use
everyday. The
company that originated the drug holds a patent on that drug for
an amount of
time, after this time any company can make this drug and offer it
at a
competitive price. Competitive prices would be of great help to those who
are
on a fixed income, such as the elderly population, and cannot afford the
high
price of medications. Contributions of !8.4 million going to campaigns
and
8.4 million in soft money from medicine developing companies have
influenced
politicians to lengthen the amount of time that patents on drugs
last, costing
Americans millions. These are just three examples of how
industries hurt the
people of America by donating to campaigns. There are
many more hurting average
citizens everyday, without them even knowing it. In
the end taxpayer pay for
these contributions that hurt them so much anyway.
When a large business makes a
donation, they must make up for the lost money.
They do this by raising the
prices that they charge consumers. Congress gives
the contributions back to
companies through corporate welfare. 167 billion
dollars a year is given to
companies that donated to campaigns. This money
has to come from somewhere. It
comes from the taxes every year of John Q.
Public. So we are not only paying
higher prices as a result of campaign
contributions, but we are paying the
corporations again through corporate
welfare. Consumer safety is commonly
ignored because of special interest
industries. Higher prices are put upon us a
the cash register every time we
buy something from a company that funds
campaigns. Taxes are high because of
corporate welfare. Reform is needed to save
Americans from this kind of
treatment from the big businesses. Opponents of
Campaign finance reform
have many reasons that they feel reform is bad. But most
of these arguments
boil down to; contributions are an expression of freedom of
speech, and
reform would not help as illegal contributions take place now and
would only
be increased with more laws. The voices of those who fund
advertisements that
do not go on campaign reports are those of a small minority.
These voices
are being heard above all the voices of the greater majority of
people who
cannot afford to have their voices heard. Letting one persons opinion
be
louder than another goes against the ideas of equality for all,
infringing
upon the rights of others. If reform is to take place we must
enforce the laws
that we set in place. Laws that are not enforced are
worthless. We must be ready
to punish a candidate and make him or her face
the consequences, whether it be
elimination from the race or removal from
office. Reform is needed to fix our
crooked and corrupt congress, and we must
be willing to punish those who break
the law. One option that we should
consider is that of Jack E. Lohman, a
business man from Milwaukee, WI. Under
his plan special interest and corporate
donations would be eliminated.
Instead, taxpayers would fund political
campaigns. Special interests and
corporations spend 750 million on campaigns. As
it was explained, this hurts
taxpayers when purchasing goods and when paying
taxes for corporate welfare.
By eliminating these donors politicians would not
be affected by outside
interests and would be free to do what is best for the
people. The 750
million dollars for campaigns would come from the taxpayers and
only cost $5
dollars a year. After cuts from corporate welfare and wasteful
government
spending this would save taxpayers 495 to 995 dollars a year, not to
mention
price drops as a result of reduced corporate spending on political
campaigns.
This would put more money in the hands of the taxpayer to buy more
products
helping the economy. Most important, politicians would not be swayed
by
monetary interest offered to them for help in other areas. Donors
not
representing the public, money, not people and issues deciding
races,
politicians voting for campaign funds instead of the public,
corporations
risking the safety of people, these are all problems that could
be fixed by
reforming campaign finance. Campaign finance is an urgent problem
that must be
remedied soon or we will be facing a situation in government
where the power
lies in the hand of those who have money to donate to
campaigns. If something is
not done we will be heading straight into a
corrupt and contemptible government
whose only care is that of being
reelected. Action must be taken now before it
is too late and scandalous
congressmen will only support scandalous policy. If
our government is to be
saved, we must have campaign finance
reform.