I recognize the irony. The reason it's ironic is because it's doomed to fail. You cannot raise money in order to lessen the influence of money. If this campaign does anything, it will simply invite opposing groups to raise more money in order to elect anti-campaign finance reform candidates.
What's important isn't a success or failure (in Lessig's "trial" election cycle or in 2016). I think his point is: people care enough about campaign finance reform to help raise $5m in a month.
If candidates knew this was something their constituents cared about, they might actually run on it.
Who cares if Lessig fails. We're finally talking about campaign finance.
I'm not sure which martial art is about turning the force of your opponent's moves against them, but this seems like a prime example. Rest assured, Lessig is acutely aware that what he's doing comes down to a hack. That shouldn't be a tough sell here.
Eric Cantor proved that you can't buy an election with money. Ideas ultimately are what count in an election, and to the extent that any good ideas are removed from the public realm with this scheme, we all lose. The last thing we want is the government regulating money spent on political speech - the corruption potential is absolutely enormous - hence the First Amendment.
>Eric Cantor proved that you can't buy an election with money.
Muffy is a dog. Muffy cannot bark. Therefore, no dogs can bark.
Textbook logical fallacy.
Of course, politicians can and do buy elections. Today's process practically guarantees this will occur.
>to the extent that any good ideas are removed from the public realm with this scheme, we all lose.
There are other ways to ensure that good ideas come to the fore. And, as the ability to raise funds is not solely based on the quality of one's ideas, there is no feasible way that the democratic process can benefit from unrestrained campaign financing and rulings like Citizens United.
1. Money buys the votes of the general public. (Maybe savvy donors just donate to candidates who will win in the hopes of influencing them.)" [edit: quote moved]
Money is necessary but not sufficient in order to become elected.
Politics is not about good ideas. Jim Crow laws existed for decades.
No one gets voted on by the public unless they've bought themselves into the vote in the first place. The public just gets to vote between the few dozen people that can raise enough money to get there.
That people think it works enough to pay money for it isn't proof that it does. I dub this the 'Ion Bracelet Effect' (though there's probably a better name for it already).
"'American Crossroads, the super PAC founded by Karl Rove, spent $104 million in the general election, but none of its candidates won. The United States Chamber of Commerce spent $24 million backing Republicans in 15 Senate races; only two of them won. Sheldon Adelson, the casino mogul, spent $53 million on nine Republican candidates, eight of whom lost.' It was, as the paper noted, 'A Landslide Loss for Big Money.'"[1]
"When a candidate doubled their spending, holding everything else constant, they only got an extra one percent of the popular vote. It’s the same if you cut your spending in half, you only lose one percent of the popular vote. So we’re talking about really large swings in campaign spending with almost trivial changes in the vote."[2]
No, but it's not hard to provide actual mechanisms to explain how money influences politics.
That's not saying every dollar is the same, and the money -> influence function is a straight line. But money buys reach and coverage at the very least.
OpenSecrets.org hosts a long-running effort to correlate the rate at which legislators favor or oppose particular industries with the size of the contributions they receive. Turns out, they track very closely. Like, to the point where reasonable people stop thinking "correlation" and start thinking "causation."
That's a very important point in public corruption debates, since there mere perception of corruption can diminish trust in public institutions. And trust, as it turns out, is their greatest asset. That's why effective anti-corruption laws are written to prohibit actions that simply appear corrupt, along with those that can be proven corrupt beyond all reasonable doubt.
When it comes to public trust, appearance really does matter.
That's actually correct - it requires a gargantuan amount to "buy" an election (double the spending for 1% more of the vote, or something along those lines).
But politicians are a simple and superstitious folk, and they do care a lot about fund raising. And in a 50:50 fight, they'll do almost anything for an edge.
Also, while a politician might be in a safe seat, they'll gain a lot of brownie points (e.g. a promotion) if they can funnel some funds to someone in a marginal seat.
"they'll gain a lot of brownie points (e.g. a promotion)"
That's the sugar coated version. When it comes to people who already have a lot of seniority and don't need the money for their own elections, the ability to transfer funds between their reelection accounts and those of others isn't about "brownie points". It's the raw exercise of political power, and is handled not to praise, but to bury.
