I haven’t read the actual McCutcheon opinion yet (if ever). To be honest , the minutiae of campaign-finance law makes my head hurt, mostly because of the system’s artificial and inane complexity. To be more honest, I have generally always accepted that campaigns with more money tend to win, but I’ve never really understood the mechanics of why. Erik Loomis at Lawyers, Guns & Money offers a bit of post-McCutcheon tough love that, I think, nails the real problem:

My thought on the McCutcheon case’s importance is as follows. Liberals need to quit whining about the money. I’m not saying the case isn’t a big deal. It is. But I am saying that the plutocrats have always had far more money than working people and they’ve always used it to control politics the best they can.

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The problem today is that progressives believe the ballot box is where change is made, when in fact it is where change is consolidated. Organize on the ground to demand the change desired and the money can be overcome. But if you think a social movement is buying ad time on television or the right kind of media messaging, that’s a game that progressives are never going to win.

(Emphasis added)

How do political campaigns spend money? That’s actually a serious, non-rhetorical question. I know they pay for massive amounts of advertising, along with all the expenses of running a campaign. For the purposes of discussing how money influences politics, the advertising seems like the pertinent issue. Continue reading →