>Poor John McCain. He only gathered $11.2 million in his second-quarter (of the year before) efforts for the Republican nomination.
>
>Barak Obama, on the other hand, reaped a cool $32 million in his attempt to become the Democratic Party's nominee.
>
>There were lots of other millions of $$$ garnered by the collection of candidates trying for the nomination of their respective parties. And all this more than 6 months before primaries start and over 12 months before the actual election.
>
>My guess is that the McCain and Obama totals for the quarter - close to $50 million - is more than is spent by **all** candidates for any federal election in Canada. Around 315 'seats' contested, which include the Prime Minister and all of the Cabinet Ministers.
>
>I'm very curious as to how the U.S. voters on the UT view this situation. Are you confident that party nominees will be unemcumbered by financial 'gifts'? Are you confident that the party nominees will be taking care of the needs and desires of 'you the People'?
>
>I assume my view is obvious - I don't see how Joe Average will have even an iota of consideration in any policy/regulation/law passed by those who get elected.


Is it news to you that money plays a big role in politics? I'm sure it isn't.

This is not just a U.S. thing, as I'm sure you also know. See Thomas's post about Germany. I was just reading an article about the recent French election; same thing there.

The concept that every citizen has exactly equal say and influence is a nice one but that's all it is, a concept. A nice vision for Pollyannas. We have some reasonable safeguards in place to try to prevent the worst abuses, but money is always going to make itself heard. We couldn't keep it completely out of politics even if we wanted to.