less than 1/20th of 1% of America are the “relevant funders” of congressional campaigns. That means about 150,000 Americans, or about the same number who are named “Lester,” wield enormous power over this government.
What’s So Bad About a SuperPAC?
Campaigns are increasingly focused — with amazingly sophisticated technology — on sweeping up small contributions as much as they possibly can. The lesson these campaigns are learning is that the best way to do this is by being as polarizing as they can. Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT), the Senate’s youngest member, reports that when they send out an email to their list attacking Republicans, they receive three times as much as they receive when they send an email praising Democrats. Polarization pays — which is why no one should be surprised that polarization in American politics is increasing.
.. Because if you’re going to convince a SuperPAC to be there when you need them, you need to signal that you’re the kind of incumbent they want to protect. “They’d love to support you, Senator, but they have a rule that they can’t support anyone who doesn’t get a 95 percent on their score card.” So the rational representative has a clear goal to work towards — 95 percent or better — long before he actually needs anyone’s money.
.. The “primary” wasn’t “the election” — it was just a step on the way to an election. Along that way, the First Amendment gave citizens certain fundamental guarantees. Among these was the right “to associate.” All that the southern Democrats were doing — or so they insisted — was “associating” with whomever they wished, so as to select the candidates they wanted. They were exercising, as the Supreme Court put it in Grovey v. Townsend (1935), the “liberty to organize political parties.” That their “associates” were exclusively white wasn’t a concern for the courts, or the Constitution, any more than the courts, or the Constitution, have any concern with the mix of people I call “friends.”
.. Astonishingly, it wasn’t until 1944 that the Supreme Court finally found a way around that argument and abolished (in theory, if not immediately in practice) the white primary.
.. No one can honestly believe that the makeup of the funders of political campaigns is irrelevant — at least in a world where candidates spend 30 to 70 percent of their time raising money from these funders