re: #275 BryanS

The solution to the “special interest” concern is not to prevent spending money, but mandate disclosure and transparency. If some Evil Corporation donates too much money to a campaign, there will be hell to pay when the other side makes that a campaign issue.

And sorry, but money is speech, and very much an integral part of enabling assembly as the rights are laid out in the first amendment. The Internet may very well be the closest thing we ever had to leveling the playing field, but even there, money helps get your message heard.

Free speech is meaningless unless you have the right to affect how well it is heard. The right of assembly inherently recognizes this.

What if then the special interest just spends more money to run adds calling the other guy a liar for claiming that the guy they support is beholden to special interests?

It makes more sense to just make it so that they can’t donate that much money in the first place than to hope that our political establishment can self regulate.

So yeah, you’re right we’re done here.

Nothing you say is ever going to convince me that money equals speech.

Sucks for both of us but there it is.