What does the salary have to do with the cost of the campaign? The US is a massive country requiring large aircraft to run a campaign, the election runs for months/over year, multiple television and newspapers in each market requiring duplication of already expensive advertising. If they cut it down to 6-8 weeks then they could bring the cost down but if the elections run for so long it is not surprising it costs so much.

The money comes from major companies who’ll need favours in the future

Corporations cannot donate directly to campaigns. They can form political action committees and donate that way but unions and ideological groups (environmental, gun control, gay rights, etc) can do the same. There is also bundling but this is just a group of individuals that put all their donations in one group. The US definitely needs campaign finance reform especially when it comes to things like Super PACs.

And when it comes to super PACs they dont come any soupier than AIPAC…not a healthy political tail to be wagging such a big bad dawg

How else can you get the message out without advertising? It costs money simple as that.

Political party’s here cannot advertise on television – if only they couldn’t clutter every street light and telephone post in the country every election! The money can be better spent.

Very true @B Lowe. The truth is, the most powerful man in the world, has no power at all. Just like all other ‘political eaders’ in the western world, they take orders, and must comply.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWyCCJ6B2WE

It makes a difference to the people living in the US whether it is a Republican or Democrat. If a Republican got in last time it is safe to say healthcare reform would not have passed, gays would not be serving openly in military, the federal government would still be in courts defending the Defense of Marriage Act that discriminated against gays, hate crime laws would not have have expanded to include protection of people because of sexual orientation or identity, stem cell research would still have been prevented from using federal funds, federal funding for college grants would not have been expanded, young illegal immigrants who were brought to the US before age 15 would not be receiving temporary visas, 9/11 workers who got cancer would still not have been covered by death benefits, two conservatives instead of two liberals would have been appointed to an already conservative Supreme Court.

Xadovan – it’s all well and good saying “reform” but do you realise what Obamacare actually does and what it means?

Interestingly, all of the things you’ve stated are not part of the US Constitution, and then there’s surprise when there’s lobbying going on in Congress.

Government has nothing. It only has what it takes from the productive sectors of society.

Life, liberty and national defense. That’s it. The rest should be individual states issues.

I know all about the health care law and have read the reports from the Congressional Budget Office.

No, you are getting two sets of figures mixed up.

“Military industrial complex”- some people love to throw those three words around because its sounds cool or they think it sums up something which it does not.

The term was introduced by Eisenhower as a warning of what he saw as the greatest threat to US democracy as he was retiring.
Viet Nam kicked in shortly after, making giants out of such micro midget war-profiteers as Halliburton, who have been trying to engineer something similar since the till-drawer was slammed on their knuckleduster.
Surprise surprise..Dick Cheyney belonged to them..how handy can it get.

But no Declan, I don’t think it sounds the least bit cool.

I’m pro democrat by the way..

Well..you’d sorta need to be lobotomised four times to support the GOP.