Americans may find amusing the relatively paltry amounts that Canadian politicians spend on elections because of our limits on donations and spending!
Thatâs because corporations arenât people in Canada.
Really hope Jimmy makes it to election time when he will be 100.
Actually, the US vs Canadian difference could be described more as âAmericans think spending money is âspeechââ than âAmericans think corporations are peopleâ.
Canada restricts the amount of money candidates and other election participants may spend on campaigning. That wouldnât fly in the US because spending money to support campaigns is seen as a form of âspeechâ or âexpressionâ, and thus is broadly protected by the First Amendment.
I think there are other constraints on campaign speech (content and timing) in CanadaâŠbut Iâm not certain enough to describe them here. (I do, however, remember during the last Canadian federal election there being a memo went around to a few folks at work, reminding us of things we could not discuss in Canada as company representatives, due to Canadian election laws.)
Canada has more than a few laws and practices that would be inconceivable in the US due to the First Amendment.
What we have in Canada instead is freedom from large corporations and unions making large political donations to politicians and thus unduly influencing government policies. Happy to trade off some âFirst Amendmentâ-type freedoms for that!
Of course, Canada is also home to the Office quĂ©bĂ©cois de la langue françaiseâŠ
Yes, I was referring to the Citizens United decision that often gets the shorthand, Corporations are People too.
I think Americans that think one of these things generally think the other, and there is a very small minority of Americans who think either of these is true. I know of at least 5 for sure.
Bad actors tried to cancel voter registration for Marjorie Taylor Greene and Brad Raffensperger after their moronic data breach. Officials were watching for abuse, likely meaning watching for cancelation of high profile GOP accounts. Everyone else is SOL.
I hope they learn a lesson that this is a shitty way to âpurgeâ voter rolls for their own benefit.
Trump just spent a bunch of time at his rally in Atlanta talking about how terrible Kemp and Raffensberger are. Not sure that this issue made his list, though.
They learned that they need to make sure Rs arenât purged?
Thatâs not what Donald said in Atlanta.
Well, he did say that because Elon has endorsed him, he has changed his mind and is now in favor of electric cars. Strong leadership there, definitely not putting up a for sale sign.
Yep. When I saw the Musk endorsement, I wondered how long it would be before Trump decided that EVs were just fine. Now we know, about 3 weeks.
Money talks in US elections. So much for the âone man one voteâ concept.
I have thought âWhy be indirect about it? Instead of rich people paying TV stations to run ads, why donât they buy their votes directly from the govât?â
Every citizen gets one free ballot. Extra votes are sold Aâ la carte. You pay a price for a vote for president and a separate price for a vote for senate, if you like.
Iâd start the pricing at $35 per presidential vote. Thatâs the the $5.7 billion spent on the race divided by the 155 million votes.
Interesting questions: How many votes would be purchased? Who would buy them? How much money would be donated anyway?
Regarding the second question, there are people who donate $100 to a presidential campaign. Would those people buy 3 votes instead, or is this just a rich personâs game?
My gut says that at that price most of the money will go to buying votes directly. So, close to half the votes cast would be purchased.
So you want the person with the biggest check book to win the election?