I’m a smug Canadian when it comes to political financing. Corporations, unions, and NGOs are not allowed to donate a penny to federal candidates or parties in Canada. Only regular Canadians can kick in and we are all restricted to donating no more than $1,000 a year to a candidate or a party.
Though we still have some improvements we could make to our system, we have successfully removed the distortions of “Big Money” from our politics. Every party in Ottawa would agree with that assessment. (It’s very much a different matter in provincial politics and I encourage Premiers Redford, Wall, McGuinty, etc. to do something about that.)
But in the U.S., billionaires, giant unions, and mega-corporations can spend hundreds of millions of dollars to warp the political process. Continue reading Not that U.S. politicians can be bought or anything …