Let’s Fix the Presidential Electioneering Stupidity

Let’s Fix the Presidential Electioneering Stupidity

© David Burton 2008

 The poor voter
 

The Presidential elections are still 10 months away and I’ve already had enough campaigning to last the rest of my life! For over a year now, I’ve been continually subjected to radio and TV broadcasts, along with newspaper and magazine articles that have assaulted my senses with speeches, debates, interviews, pictures, articles, analyses and editorials. Enough already! The process is wasteful, out of control and needs major revision.

My suggestion is to mandate the following:

  1. Campaigning for the Presidential primaries shall be limited to the 4 month period from the 1st of February until the 31st of May.
  2. All state primaries and caucuses for the presidential nomination shall be held on one day, the 1st Tuesday in June.
  3. Campaign spending by any candidate shall be limited to a total of $10 million and will be adjusted every four years for inflation.
  4. Campaign contributions shall be allowed from any and all sources with no limit on any single contribution.
If this mandate is adopted, it would stop the stupidity of the various states fighting over who will hold the first primary in the nation, will force the candidates to present one unified message to all the voters in all the states instead of their pandering to the voters in the separate states, i.e. will stop their presenting one position in one state and a different position in another state.

Holding primaries on one day would stop the arguments about the influence of states holding early primaries on those states that hold later primaries. Each state would now be equal with every other state in terms of importance.

Because primaries would be held on one single day and campaigning would be limited to 4 months, campaigning would have to be done on a national basis instead of on a state by state basis. This will reduce campaign costs and stop the ridiculous amount of rhetoric, noise and energy that is currently being directed at the voting public over a one to two year span of time. Current estimates by the Center for Responsive Politics are that over $1 billion will be spent on the 2008 presidential campaign, a 50% rise over the 2004 campaign.

Limiting campaign spending would help to reduce the advantage held by an incumbent and by wealthy candidates. It would also lessen the impact of the well-heeled special interest groups. It's now estimated that Hilary Clinton has already raised $91 million and spent $41 million while Mitt Romney is estimated to have raised $63 million and spent $54 million - and the election is still more than 9 months away.

It’s time to clean up the environment, our audible and visual environment that is. Let’s reduce the pollution on the airwaves and in the print media that is the result of our nomination and election processes.

 
  22 Jan 2008 {Article 28; Politics_03}    
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