Sally Jones
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01:18:19 pm on January 2, 2012 | # |
Selinda: I agree, the money spent on getting elected is obscene. Just think what could be done with that money instead of spending it on TV ads and rushing around the country smiling, shaking hands, pandering and making promises impossible to keep.
My solution would be to require the radio and TV to turn over a massive number of hours to politicians for free and require the politicians to actually discuss real topics with each other using facts instead of rhetoric. The air waves belong to the public not to the stations, so they can just serve the public for a change instead of their bottom line and give time to intelligent public debate.
Politicians would not be allowed any other air time, just the free time. That would cut the cost of campaigning by about 75%.
After that I would wave my magic political wand and prevent groups of any kind from contributing any money in any form to any part of the political process. Corporations, companies, unions, think-tanks, pressure groups, coalitions, PACs are not people and should not be allowed to give money to politicians. Only individual citizens would be allowed to send money to politicians.
I think a very good argument can be made that when organized groups of any kind whether they are unions or corporations get involved in politics in the name of free speech and can spend millions to control elections and drown out any opinions but theirs you are essentially denying the individual citizen their right to be heard.
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