In the 2012 Congressional election cycle, almost $2 billion was raised in candidates’ efforts to win.

In the Senate, where there were 34 races (about 1/3 of senate seats is up for election every two years, senators service six-year terms), incumbents–that is, candidates already in office running for re-election–raised an average of over $11 million. Challengers trying to defeat them raised an average of less than $1 million. One hundred twenty-two candidates competed for the last four ‘open’ seats (where the incumbent was leaving office), and spent an average of over $2.8 million. Overall, senate candidates spent . . . . get ready for this . . . over $834 million–almost a billion dollars.

Over in the House of Representatives, where there are 435 races every two years, over $1 billion was spent. There were 420 incumbents, and they raised an average of $1.6 million per campaign. Over a thousand challengers for those seats raised an average of $267,000 trying to unseat the incumbents. Three hundred fifty-seven vied for 35 open seats, and raised an average of $444,000.

As for the 2016 presidential campaign? It cost $6.5 billion. Some things to understand about this last one:

• The Trump campaign benefited from lots of news coverage, which held down his campaign’s costs (Trump coverage dominated the headlines, and the ratings, so it was good for news organizations, too). And some friendly media coverage and a billionaire.
• .001 percent of donors gave $2.3 billion dollars. Most of this was not in the form of direct donations, but was ‘soft’ money (given to organizations that use it to campaign for issues, for instance, so it doesn’t count against a candidate–and it’s hard to identify its source)
• A handful of billionaires can influence an election at the national level.

How does money get spent? Here’s how it was spent on the 2008 presidential campaign–over $700 million going to media, or 40% of the total cost–consultants, producing commercials, buying commercial time. In total over $5 billion spent on the 2008 presidential campaign. One might ask, who is making donations to this bottomless pit of money? Well over half a billion comes from major industries, with finance (you know, the ones involved in the global economic recession??), lawyers/lobbyists, business, and single-issue campaigns leading the way. Why would they give so much money? Why indeed. Each industry has its own pet policy preferences, its own aversion to paying taxes, being regulated by the government, each industry likes subsidies when they can get them. And their lawyers are often willing to do most of the drafting of legislation to boot (here’s one example of an organization created to distribute legislation to various statehouses. Here’s whose interests they represent).

We’ve discussed mass incarceration and the effects on African-American communities in class. Here’s how that expresses itself in terms of lobbying, legislation, etc.–The American Legislative Exchange Council. Yes, money well spent is money well spent.

And if money wasn’t corrupting enough in the political process, the US Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decision, in Citizens United vs the Federal Election Commission, pretty much ruled that any limitations on campaign financing is a restriction of free speech, even if it’s mostly the restriction not of individual citizens, but multinational corporations. And who can compete in the campaign financing campaign with multinational corporations and industry-wide groups?

Who benefits?

Politicians who spend the most in the campaign win most of the time, in some elections up to 98% of the time. So obviously, incumbents with resources and connections and political clout have an advantage over challengers in elections. They spend a good deal of that money on media consultants and advertising, benefiting media companies, public relations firms, etc. The media industry stands to benefit greatly–every two years they see a bump in income, and a bigger one every four years in the presidential cycle. And there is more interest near elections as well in the news, so ratings increase, as will advertising rates. So one could say advertisers benefit from this system as well–often the same large, deep-pocket corporate advertisers who are helping to finance politicians’ election campaigns.

Who is harmed?

One might say that citizens are harmed when much of the information they use to make judgments about candidates comes from really, really biased and twisted campaign commercials. Here are some classics:

• Obama and ‘urban terrorism‘
• Dukakis Furlough program
• Call me Harold (Ford)
• Obama and ‘the promise‘
• Jesse Helms’ ‘hands’ ad
• Is he ‘the one?’

Some of the above–like the Dukakis / ‘Willlie Horton’ ad–made a huge difference by appealing to fear and race. But we have the presidential debates, right?? Except those are controlled by the two major parties, have been since the late 1980s, and as a result are largely scripted and provide very little information that might hurt the candidate. In addition, the rules in presidential debates are such that withouth a certain level of public support from opinion polls, minor party candidates can’t participate (back to the ‘Coke-Pepsi’ problem we discussed in class). There have been a few debates that went badly for one candidate, and so the parties pretty much try to help them play it safe (a few short samples below if you’re interested):

• Quayle and Bensten
• Clinton and Bush, Sr.
• Carter and Ford
• Carter and Reagan

And when we think about harm, it may be certain groups, underrepresented by political candidates and their policy proposals. It could also be institutions, such as . . . . democracy. Have we reached a point where public office is available to the highest bidder? Would anyone have considered Donald Trump, real estate tycoon and ‘reality’ TV show participant-turned president, a viable presidential candidate in 2016 otherwise??

Media as a social problem and a window on social problems

Is bias in the news media a social problem?

Use the framework:

• Is it a problem?
• Is it social?
• Who’s harmed? Who benefits? Think in terms not only of individuals, but groups (e.g., by race, age, gender, social class, nationality), organizations, etc.
• Who has the power to define the terms of the debate? Who can ‘socially construct’ the problem of bias?
  • As a liberal bias (how is this argument made?)
  • as a conservative bias (how is this argument made?)
• Nagging questions-what about media censorship, stories that aren’t covered? Why aren’t they covered?
• Corporate/private media and the propaganda filter-is this about capitalism and consumption?
  • The informed electorate issue-how do people decide who to vote for? How do they acquire information about what social problems exist and who they harm?
  • What are the consequences?
    • For democracy, informed citizenry
    • Why do so few people vote? Why does social class predict voting behavior (the less you make the less often you vote or even register)?
      • Increasing corporate concentration of media
      • More advertising, less diversity of viewpoints.
      • Is there a problem, in terms of how reality appears through mass media?
      • Are social media different (asks Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram . . . )?
    • Do media reflect broad consumer preferences-think about your news media assignments-whose views are represented? Whose aren’t?
      • Who should do something about it? (if we decide it’s a problem)