Politics and Society

A detailed Summary of Politics and Society

Media, money, and the First Amendment are three key influences in a successful political run. Media coverage is important to familiarize the public with the candidate and to show where he stands on certain issues. Money is needed to buy television and radio time. The First Amendment guarantees everyone the freedom of speech, but how can this be reasonably defined. One possible solution would be restrictions on the amount of money that individuals can donate to support their candidates.

Modern media has influenced and possibly altered the history of politics. As stated by Washington Post reporter Dan Morgan, "The most valuable commodity in American politics today is advertising time on TV." The problem with this statement is that only the people with money have access to this option. Republican campaign chairman, Mark Hanna, was quoted saying, "There are two things that are important in politics. The first is money and I can't remember what the second is." In support of this quote, millions of dollars are spent on political campaigns in one week.

One example of this problem is demonstrated by Ralph Nader, the candidate for the Green Party, who is not as well-known as George W. Bush or Al Gore

The contents of a political ad, should not be governed by rules because it would violate the First Amendment, the freedom of speech. To a certain extent, there should be no rules against slandering. It should be allowed as long as the party can support the issues with legal, trustworthy documents. This provides not only the truth about the candidate getting slandered, but also a real view at what kind of person you are actually voting for: one that concentrates on finding out "dirt" on the opponent or one that concentrates on the issues that matter.

. His popularity has lagged because he does not have the funds to buy as much television time as the other, more funded, candidates. When Nader, ran for Presidency in 1996, he only spent $5,000 of his own money and received only one percent of the votes. Also, on October 3, 2000, he was denied access into the third and final debate at Washington University, and as a result, he filed a lawsuit against the Commission of Presidential Debates. Even though all the necessary passes were presented, the CPD security still would not let him enter onto the Washington University campus, where he had a previously scheduled interview with the campus television station. In contrast, when multimillionaire Ross Perot ran for presidency as a third party in 1992, he received almost a fifth of the votes because he could communicate with the public through paid media and debates. Unlike Ralph Nader however, Ross Perot was leading the race up until July, when he dropped out of the race because of negative media that his family was receiving. When he reentered in October he spent over $37 million of his own money for campaign ads and infomercials in the final month of campaign. Perot was allowed to participate in the presidential debates, a privilege that Nader was denied.

No matter what restrictions are set on the contributions to the parties, there is never going to be a "level playing field." It is important to keep restrictions because the third parties do not receive an amount of funds anywhere close to what the other parties receive. Also the third party has to worry about receiving at least 5% of the votes in the federal election to receive federal campaign funds during the next election. Without all this money, they are at a great disadva

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Approximate Word count = 1553
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Politics