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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 28, 2024

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giving all candidates a goverment backed x amount of money and a right to get small donations.

Living in a European country with state financing of political parties, it is utterly alien to me to donate to political campaigns. I know it happens, but I would never do it (aren't you psychologically locked-in after donating to Trump/Harris?) and the amount of effort and time American politicians have to raise funds seem gross.

I looked up how UK does it and they actually harshly restrict political expenses:

https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/explainer/election-spending-regulated-uk

Each party can spend £54,010 for each constituency that they contest. A party that chooses to contest all 632 seats in Great Britain at the election will therefore be able to spend just over £34m.

A small proportion of spending at elections is conducted by third parties – groups like charities and trade unions that do not stand candidates of their own, but campaign for particular outcomes. … Several spending limits are then applied to registered campaigns.

If the UK (or Canada or Australia or whichever country) is better governed is debatable, at least theoretical raising funds could also be a useful signal in a democracy, but I wonder how an election cycle in the US would look like if Democrats/Republicans (and GreenParty/Libertarian) could only spend $100 Million each?