According to the Center on Responsive Politics, outside spending in the 1992 elections was $19.6 million; in the 2000 elections it was $51.6 million; in the 2012 elections it was $1 billion. It is hard to believe that the Supreme Court decisions had nothing to do with this. According to the Court, this is not problematic: Buying access and influence is part of what it means to have a responsive democracy. If you believe helping the wealthy is the same as advancing the public interest, this is all well and good. But some of the same people who believe that the original understanding of the Constitution should control interpretation need to recall that the framers sought to guarantee a Republican form of government and that form of government was designed to resist various forms of corruption in particular the corrupting influence of factions. Instead of a Republican form of government, we are saddled with a government in which moneyed elites jockey for power with bribes masquerading as free speech.
There may have been a time when it was appropriate to respect government decisions because its decisions represented the will of the people. No more.
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