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I agree that, especially nowadays with the internet, there should be easy and cheap ways for outspent candidates to nonetheless widely communicate to their voters what they're about. No one should be getting their candidate information from advertisements anyway. Campaign ads are by and large pure unadulterated garbage. Not the least bit convincing or intelligent. And if we as a people are too stupid to turn off the ****ing TV and investigate candidates directly and intentionally, then how is Congress going to save us from that?
Up here for example, I do not favor Mark Begich at all, his politics or his party, never have had any intention of voting for him, but it's clear there are some enormous, national-level pots of money fueling the incessant deluge of propaganda ads about him to take him down. Every single YouTube video you watch within Alaska's boundaries right now starts with a 15-20 second hit piece on Begich. Every single one. Not so much having anything to do with Begich, but just because his seat in Congress is valuable to some very powerful and rich people somewhere. Does that make me want to vote for Begich's main opponent? No. The obnoxious ads make me more skeptical of his opponent than if there were no such ads.
The ads should be completely ineffective at swaying public opinion. They certainly are for me. It's so easy to just get online and find non-biased or at least significantly less-biased analyses of candidates' positions, voting records, etc.
I don't think we can trust federal politicians to write laws that protect people from their own utter ignorance. It's up to them to not be ignorant. And if you're letting a TV ad convince you who gets your vote, you're ignorant, and your ignorance weakens the country -- no way around it. The answer to Citizens United and Congressional corruption is not to ask Congress to police how people are spending money to fund their own campaigns. The answer is for the American people to use the tools at the fingertips and do their own homework and stop being idiots. If we can't figure out how to stop being idiots, then we deserve all the corruption and bad leadership that's in store for us.
I agree about voter's responsibility to do their homework, but the fact is many people are lazy and/or busy. That is why I want to put the information in their faces by putting it on prime time TV. In some cases, getting info on cadidates beyond the brief voter pamphlet description is hard. I live in a small town near a larger city. Our major reagional newspapers give almost no coverage of our local races and we no longer have an accessible local paper, using the internet is required to be an informed voter.