Al Franken has a nice post about his work as a Senate candidate--namely, constant fund raising. That, along with Joe Biden's impassioned comments in Sunday's Democratic debates, underscores the need for public financing of elections. All presidential candidates should be required to meet a certain threshold of popular support, at which point they would qualify for federal funds. No more money from corporations or PAC's. Every dollar the candidates spend comes directly from the public. Non-cable channels (NBC, PBS, CBS, FOX, ABC) should be required to provide free air time to the candidates; after all, the people of this country own the airwaves, not corporations. The Supreme Court decision that equated campaign donations with free speech could not have been more wrongly reasoned. Corporations should not be entitled to more "free" speech by virtue of their immense wealth.
Such a system would of course help rid campaigns of corporate dollars, but also encourage the candidates to spend money wisely and frugally. It shouldn't cost hundreds of millions of dollars to be president of the USA.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
To force taxpayer's to fund candidates that they don't agree with? Who decides who gets the money? The people who already power? Who do you think they are going to choose to give the money to?
Post a Comment