Well, the final numbers are in, and the 2012 election officially cost a whopping $7 billion. It’s a number that will surely prompt hand-wringing on the left about “getting money out of politics.” This is an issue where I diverge with my liberal fellows; I’m as much of a First Amendment absolutist as they come, and I’d rather answer nasty or inaccurate speech with more speech than with more regulations and contribution limits. I’m all for transparency — more disclosure is absolutely essential, and while money doesn’t necessarily corrupt politics, dark money is another story — but the grand totals don’t really phase me. Like it or not, in the modern age, money is speech. (Just try to get your message out to 250 million Americans by standing on a soapbox in the town square . . . . I guarantee you’ll go running to the major networks in under a minute.)
If citizens don’t like what the onslaught of campaign advertising and ground-game efforts produce, they can leverage the ultimate recourse: voting. We all have brains and choices, and no amount of money can tell a person how to vote. Instead of blaming non-stop TV ads for brainwashing my fellow Americans, I’d rather blame the perfectly able thinkers who let themselves be brainwashed. For what it’s worth, calculations by the Post’s Wonkblog show that, despite the 2012 infusion of cash, advertising was less influential than in 2008, producing an increase of only 0.14% in the votes taken by a candidate with an 1000-ad advantage, versus .60 percentage points in 2008. (And really, a TV ad can’t make you pull the lever in the voting booth.) On that note, it’s worth examining what $7 billion really represents in the long run. Is $7 billion is too rich a price to pay for engaging in the most crucial aspect of democracy? Not if you ask the folks who spend big on other, far less consequential items. Consider the following figures:
$11 billion: Amount Americans spend per year on bottled water.
$13 billion: Disney’s parks-and-resorts 2011 revenue.
$15 billion: Estimated worth of the Harry Potter brand.
$31 billion: The auto industry’s U.S. annual advertising budget.
$35 billion: Americans’ annual spending on gambling.
$51 billion: What Americans spend on their pets each year.
Political spending itself is often considered a form of gambling — surely Sheldon Adelson was wagering on a Romney presidency when he dropped $150 million on the election — but slot machines and scratch-its cost the country five times more than the 2012 race. (Adelson is, as it happens, wonderful proof that money can’t buy votes or guarantee elections.) If given the choice between political activism and 50 billion bottles of Aquafina or Poland Spring, I’ll take the hustle for the White House any day.
. . . So Well Read. . . 