Critics of Republican Representative Lauren Boebert had something to celebrate on Thursday.
Boebert’s political rival, Adam Frisch, raised $3.4 million for his campaign in the third quarter of 2023, ratcheting up his cash on hand to $4.3 million. The fundraising was backed by more than 100,000 donations with an average of $32, according to a press release from his campaign. The announcement comes after Frisch outpaced Boebert’s fundraising 3-to-1 in the second quarter, when Boebert raised $818,000 to Frisch’s more than $2.6 million.
I don’t like Boebert any more than the next person with an average IQ … she’s an idiot.
But the most disturbing thing about this story is the idea that whoever has the most money gets to be elected.
I have my criticisms about conservatives and I have my disagreements but normalizing the idea that money is what gets people elected should be just as disturbing.
Because if that is so … it isn’t a democracy. It’s something else.
It does strongly correlate but it’s an open question whether the donations cause the win, or more viable candidates attract more donations. Big donors want to garner favor with and gain access to the winner, after all.
How about neither?
Big donors shouldn’t be able to garner favor or gain access to the winner over other interests. And donations certainly shouldn’t cause the win.
It would be great to get money out of politics, but that’s not the way things are. The game must be played as it is if we are to improve the rules to be more fair and less corrupting. Current law is political money = free speech.
Wealth and power have always had that privilege. It’s the very basis on which America was founded. Though it didn’t originate in America, and predates it.
Over the centuries we’ve done minor things to ameliorate it. To whit those with wealth and power have rigged it back twice as hard. As long as capitalism goes unpunished however. That’s not going to change.