Biden takes Record Amount of Dark Money

#26
#26
Velo Vol said:
Do you think dark money should be illegal? Or are you just mad that Biden did a better job raising it?
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Of course dark money should be illegal. If you hide the donor, then in essence any donor can contribute any amount - including foreign donors. And it seems like just a few years ago people were up in arms about foreign involvement in an election.

In fact, if you are not eligible to vote in an election, you have no business contributing to the election. You could actually consider a CA person or company contributing to a TN or GA election as foreign meddling in the same way as Russian influence in a US election.
 
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#27
#27
AM64 said:
Of course dark money should be illegal. If you hide the donor, then in essence any donor can contribute any amount - including foreign donors. And it seems like just a few years ago people were up in arms about foreign involvement in an election.

In fact, if you are not eligible to vote in an election, you have no business contributing to the election. You could actually consider a CA person or company contributing to a TN or GA election as foreign meddling in the same way as Russian influence in a US election.
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If foreign companies and people can own property, companies and live in the US why shouldn't they be able to donate to various political groups that represent their interests?
 
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#33
#33
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#35
#35
hog88 said:
If foreign companies and people can own property, companies and live in the US why shouldn't they be able to donate to various political groups that represent their interests?
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It's complicated. I see the point and I agree, but I also have a problem with the normal person being "out donated" and left out in the cold because they don't mean as much as a result of what a corporation or group, etc can give - especially if donors can go unaccountable. I generally have a huge problem with the concept of campaign finance to start with - the buying of politicians.
 
#40
#40
AM64 said:
It's complicated. I see the point and I agree, but I also have a problem with the normal person being "out donated" and left out in the cold because they don't mean as much as a result of what a corporation or group, etc can give - especially if donors can go unaccountable. I generally have a huge problem with the concept of campaign finance to start with - the buying of politicians.
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I hate the idea of publicly funded campaigns but I do agree that we normal people really are left out in the cold when it comes to influencing our government. I don't really know what the answer is because any law congress passes will have exemptions and holes that will be exploited.
 
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#42
#42
hog88 said:
I hate the idea of publicly funded campaigns but I do agree that we normal people really are left out in the cold when it comes to influencing our government. I don't really know what the answer is because any law congress passes will have exemptions and holes that will be exploited.
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All money used in campaigns has to go to a big publicly held pot. All donations tracked. Campaigns then apply for reimbursement from that. If there isnt money in your pot, no reimbursement. All money spent on campaign items has to be tracked thru this system.
 
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#43
#43
LouderVol said:
All money used in campaigns has to go to a big publicly held pot. All donations tracked. Campaigns then apply for reimbursement from that. If there isnt money in your pot, no reimbursement. All money spent on campaign items has to be tracked thru this system.
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That's just inviting corruption from whomever is controlling the pot. Again I don't have the answer and I don't know that anyone does. Maybe we should just have a lottery, anyone that wants to be President buys a ticket and we draw names out of the hat?
 
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#44
#44
hog88 said:
I hate the idea of publicly funded campaigns but I do agree that we normal people really are left out in the cold when it comes to influencing our government. I don't really know what the answer is because any law congress passes will have exemptions and holes that will be exploited.
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I know. The least evil is public campaigns, and the person can't even add his own money so people - like a Bill Gates couldn't supplement and buy the election. I'd really like to take a crack at campaign promise accountability, too. That's just another way to buy an election. We're just running 24 hr popularity propaganda during silly season. If money limits exposure, then perhaps candidates would have to focus, and maybe that would limit making different promises to different groups to buy votes. Probably not, but almost anything is better than the crap that's going on now.
 
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#46
#46
AM64 said:
I know. The least evil is public campaigns, and the person can't even add his own money so people - like a Bill Gates couldn't supplement and buy the election. I'd really like to take a crack at campaign promise accountability, too. That's just another way to buy an election. We're just running 24 hr popularity propaganda during silly season. If money limits exposure, then perhaps candidates would have to focus, and maybe that would limit making different promises to different groups to buy votes. Probably not, but almost anything is better than the crap that's going on now.
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It's a delicate balancing act between the 1st amendment and accountability. I tend to defer to least impact on rights as possible.
 
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#48
#48
hog88 said:
It's a delicate balancing act between the 1st amendment and accountability. I tend to defer to least impact on rights as possible.
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Without the immediacy, it's still a lot like yelling "fire" in a theater when a candidate claims there is a crisis and promises to hand out money to solve it. I agree with you, but we've got to find some accountability. The people with buyer's remorse also have very short memories - what they see as betrayal now will mostly be forgotten by the next election. Of course, if we have just decided to impeach a president for his words every time his disaffected voters get angry and rowdy, it might work out anyway.
 
#49
#49
BTW, on the speculation about where a lot of the black money came from, did anybody else read a couple of stories today about the Chinese blocking imports? Carriers refused to load US agricultural products - containers went back to China empty. Chinese airlines are not taking delivery of airplanes from Boeing but are accepting Chinese built aircraft.
 
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