In the U.S. the best elections money can buy

The Center for Responsive Politics calculates that the money spent on congressional and presidential races this year will come close to 6 billion dollars. This is 7% more than the last elections four years ago.

The American author and humorist Mark Twain or Samuel Langhorne Clemens once remarked sarcastically about the United States: " We have the best government that money can buy." No doubt the U.S. also has the best elections that money can buy.

This year more money will be spent through Super PACs and other outside groups now that the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that corporations have the right of free speech. To summarize briefly the Supreme Court decision:

Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. 50 (2010), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that the First Amendment prohibited the government from restricting independent political expenditures by corporations and unions.

One result of this decision was the formation of what came to be called super PACs(Political Action Committees) described as follows:

The result of the Citizens United and SpeechNow.org decisions was the rise in 2010 of a new type of political action committee, popularly dubbed the "super PAC".... Super PACs may not make contributions to candidate campaigns or parties, but may engage in unlimited political spending independently of the campaigns. Also unlike traditional PACs, they can raise funds from corporations, unions and other groups, and from individuals, without legal limits.

Super PACs are not required to reveal their donors.

Sheila Krumholz the executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics says that present data shows that the record breaking expenditures of the 2008 elections are on track to be broken. She also noted:

"More important than the total spent, the real difference this cycle is how great a portion of that money will come from purportedly independent, often secretive groups."

The Center predicts that the presidential race on its own will cost close to 2.5 billion. A reporter for USA TODAY estimates that spending by candidates, parties, and the super PACs associated with each candidate has already crossed the one billion mark.

The big change in 2012 is outside money. There have always been outside groups supporting different causes and candidates but the Supreme Court Citizens United ruling has led to a huge surge in super PACs. While even in earlier elections huge sums were spent to convince voters to vote for Democrats or Republicans now the influence of money and corporations will be even larger. Third parties who simply cannot raise the funds required to gain public attention haven't a chance. The media pay them no mind. The end result is as Mark Twain said: "The best government that money can buy".

John McCain criticizes Supreme Court decision to grant corporations rights to free speech

While prominent Democrats and their defenders regularly lambaste the Supreme Court decision that corporations are people in the Citizens United case, it is rather surprising to find a prominent Republican also taking a very jaundiced view of the decision.

  However the former Republican presidential nominee John McCain claims to be very worried by the decision. McCain noted that billionaire Sheldon Adelson may contribute up to 100 million to support the campaign of Mitt Romney through a Super Pac. While it is unusual for Republicans to worry about donations to their own party, McCain is also worried that the decision will allow unions to finance the Democrats. However the unions do not have the deep pocket of large U.S. corporations.

McCain said:“I’m not only worried about him, I’m worried about may others,”“I’ve always been concerned about the labor unions who take money from their union members and without their permission, contribute to causes that they may not support. So am I concerned about the incredible amount of money that’s washing around? Yeah.”

McCain continued in criticism of the Supreme Court decision:: “I think there will scandals as associated with the worst decision of the United States Supreme Court in the 21st century,” Since Adelson earns some of his billions from a foreign casino McCain even suggested that his donations involved foreign money entering the campaign.

McCain's musings may not sit well with Romney and his supporters. Romney himself has said that corporations are people. McCain's gloss on his statement is that Romney was saying simply that they are made up of people. For more see this article.