Essay, Research Paper: Campaign Finance

Politics

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“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 sepnt 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 donatoins by food companies,
goverment 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.
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