I often hear a lot of people complain about politicians buying votes – outspending their opponents to win elections. This pisses me off. Not the fact that politicians spend this money. Not the amount that is spent (which is famously, less than we spend on potato chips). What bothers me is the naivete present in that phrase: “buying votes”. I do not think they are using that phrase to mean that a transfer of money to voters is happening conditional on a vote. This happens frequently in other countries, and it diminishes the global struggle for democracy to call what goes on here “buying votes”.
What money typically buys in US elections is eyes and ears. It pays for TV ads, campaign mailers, door-to-door campaigns. Money is used to disseminate positive information about the candidate, and negative information about the opponent. However, this information is only effective to uninformed voters. For those who have done their research, a flyer with a positive spin on a candidates record is not going to add much. For informed citizens, attacks reflect negatively on the candidate especially when they stretch the truth. The fact that spending money on campaigns is so effective is not an indictment of the political process, or politicians. It is a rebuke of an American public that is more interested in watching project runway than being informed citizens.
A representative democracy allows us the luxury of only having to cast a federal vote every two years. We do not have to know about every bill and every issue. But do the research, be informed, and vote according to what you believe. The only way to take money out of politics is to minimize its effectiveness.