The Great 2016 Money Chase By Peter Fenn
The article begins by noting that it cost $100 to attend John F. Kennedy's birthday party fundraiser for the Democratic Party in which Marion Monroe sang "Happy Birthday, Mr. President." This is in stark contrast to today's world of political fundraising. For example, Jeb Bush was supposed to have event at a Wall Street moguel, Henry Kravis's home, where the entry fee would be $100,000. Clearly political fundraising has taken a life of its own since the 1960's. Hillary Clinton's committee, Priorities USA Action, is having trouble raising its goal of $500 million because the only 10 of the 30 individuals they have enticed have donated a million dollars each.
The author of this article was trying to showcase the drastic changes that have taken place in political fundraising. At this rate the 2016 presidential election will break all the records and then some. Candidates spend so much time trying to fund raise that it takes away from their duties as a leader. Also, I don't understand why they spend so much money on campaigns when in the 2014 elections there was the lowest voter turnout in a midterm election since 1942. Clearly, voters are ignoring all of the candidates expensive attempts to attract their attention.
There were some interesting facts there. That $100,000 party entry fee better lead to a pretty amazing party experience because that fee is ridiculous. Those numbers are extremely large and shocking. Hopefully, the amount of spending leads to an interesting, competitive election.
ReplyDeleteThere is a crazy amount of money circulating around presidential elections. The amount of money dropped in order to attract voters will only increase as time goes on and government policy issues become more and more debatable. Limits should be set simply to save our country a few bucks.
ReplyDeleteThe amount of money that is technically being wasted is horrible. I find that campaign funds are useful for the candidates running for president, but the amount of money is way out of proportion. And I don't think the price will be going down either.
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