I mean, my email inbox is literally inundated every day with politicians and their minions requesting donations. The "we have to get the money out of politics" people never seem to miss an opportunity to beg for more money. I'd say about 3/4 of my email is given over to this nonsense.
These are people i've never heard of requesting donations for politicians i don't know, mixed with pleas from everyone from Bernie to Obama to support the "DCCC" or some such organization which promises to fight for some cause or another. I've tried unsubscribing from them and marking them as spam, but they just pop back up like some kind of email wack-a-mole!
Now i don't know about you, but i don't have a lot of excess income. What little i do have goes to an occasional Starbucks French Roast (black, no sugar please) or a fish fillet meal at McD's. I simply can't be expected to pay for my democracy....i already pay the people who pay the politicians!
...and it's not like money wins elections anyway. That's just a loser's excuse. Bernie outspent Hillary....he lost. Hillary outspent Trump....she lost. In my district the Democratic candidate outspent her Republican opponent...and lost. It's time we threw away this myth and admitted that it's votes that matter not the size of the "war chest". Politicians need to actually get out and campaign intelligently in order to gain votes. If the people understand what will benefit them, they might actually (no guarantee) vote responsibly. If not, more campaign money won't fix that. Paid-for political announcements, dumb and often misleading memes, lying lobbyists and pundits.....none of them work on well informed voters. You can't buy their votes...they know better.
In a democracy, the people have the responsibility to inform themselves and vote reasonably. All of this soap opera bullshite that we fund with donations just detracts from that.
So to the various politicians begging at my email and mail box i say, "No....i won't give you money. I shouldn't have to give you money. Get out there and make a reasonable case for why i should elect you. If you can't convince voters using logic and reason instead of drama and innuendo, then i don't need you....and if the voters don't respond to logic and reason, no amount of money spent campaigning will persuade them."
I think the last election has finally proved that.
