I'll put my "hat" on for a moment and ask: Why doesn't the FEC enforce its policy on the identification of political advertisements and who paid for them when it comes to social media activity? Why is it that a 30 second radio ad needs to have "Paid for by the Candidate X campaign", but millions of dollars worth of paid online trolls needn't disclose a thing? According to their own published rules, this sort of activity should require a financial disclosure. [1]
Question 2: Michael Hastings detailed the legalization of the domestic use of propaganda on US citizens with US taxpayer dollars. [2] How much money has been spent on those activities since they were made legal in 2012?
For question 1: Because the FEC has nobody in charge. There are only three commissioners, and all of them have terms that expired years ago. The current President has made only one appointment.
The commission still operates, but it's not large -- only about 300 employees to monitor all Federal election activity.
The power vacuum at the top has existed since before then. Commissioners' terms started expiring, without being replaced, in 2007. It's practically impossible for them to devote resources to new things like online activities.
And the organization has always been under-staffed. Investigating a charge is difficult. They have to prove their case in order to sanction anybody -- and they have limited power to act even when they do. Fines in the tens of millions of dollars are couch-cushion money for wealthy donors. Or the organizations simply disappear.
The organization has its hands full just managing the many, many campaign committees that are actually complying with the law (or trying to). Its ability to track down violations is limited, and growing more limited by the day.
>Its ability to track down violations is limited, and growing more limited by the day.
I hate to actually don a tin foil hat given the title of this particular HN submission, but is it not possible that this is all by design?
I mean, aren't politicians the ones who are, at once, in charge of making sure that organization is effective, and at the same time beneficiaries of any ineffectiveness in that same organization? So if it's effectiveness has been eroded over the past, say 20 or 30 years, and it has, obviously the politicians benefit. Or more precisely, the various political machines these politicians and campaigns are a part of benefit.
It is very much by design. Even before the current situation, it had been a tradition to appoint commissioners in pairs, one from each party, resulting in deadlocks.
The situation has always been precarious, but especially for the last decade, during which some have benefited more than others.
"Why is it that a 30 second radio ad needs to have "Paid for by the Candidate X campaign", but millions of dollars worth of paid online trolls needn't disclose a thing?"
I don't know, however it probably wouldn't make a difference (1).
It's all about psychology, especially in politics, where the debate has been carefully transformed into fanboyism for the simple reason that people who embrace an idea can still be convinced of the same idea being wrong, while fanboys of that idea will defend it no matter how much evidence one throws at them.
We want to hear what resonates with our opinions, education, etc, and when someone manages to turn us into fans of those ideas, then we're screwed.
When the ancient Romans conquered a foreign population, they practiced sowing discord among people, so that opposite factions would emerge then fight each other rather than unite against the oppressor. The term "divide et impera" (divide and conquer) means exactly that practice, which is alive and well in the modern world either outside the national borders (by igniting wars between smaller nations in developing countries, as an example, so that they keep being easier to control) and sowing discord among people within national borders through fear of each other, the external enemy of the day and the usual tricks, for the same purpose: making the mass easier to herd.
How do we fight this today? We don't, just no way. There's some hope for future generations though. I think we should act while they're not yet morphed into disinformation zombies, that is, in schools. What, for example, if kids were taught Carl Sagans' Baloney Detection Kit applied to the proliferation of fake news on the Internet, with examples? Just my .2 nibbles.
There is a simple answer to this question (excellent question, BTW !)
The FEC can only do this if "political advertisement" is first defined.
And that's where you will most likely hit a wall. Let's run through a scenario to see if we can get people on HN to agree what is or is not a political "ad":
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "God, I hate paying taxes."
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "God, I hate paying high taxes."
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Why are we paying such high taxes?"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Why does anyone vote for these high taxes?"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Who votes for these high taxes?"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "We shouldn't have to pay such high taxes!"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Why wont anyone reduce our taxes?"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Why wont (insert politician) reduce our taxes?"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "They should vote to reduce these high taxes!"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "(insert politician) should vote to reduce these high taxes!"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Anyone who thinks these taxes are reasonable shouldn't be in office"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Anyone who thinks these taxes are reasonable shouldn't be voted out of office"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "That's it - I'm voting these tax-mongers out of office"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "That's it - I'm voting (insert politician) out of office"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "That's it - I'm voting these tax-mongers out of office, and you should too"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "That's it - I'm voting (insert politician) out of office, and you should too"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Vote these tax-mongers out of office"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Vote (insert politician) out of office"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Stop our excessive taxes!"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Stop our excessive taxes, (insert politician) !"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Stop our excessive taxes NOW!"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "I'd vote for anyone who will reduce our taxes!"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Vote for anyone who will reduce our taxes!"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "Vote to reduce our taxes!"
- Person tweeting on April 15th, "I'll vote for anyone who can beat (insert politician) and lower our taxes!"
Perhaps, the "what" is less important than the "who" or the "how". Maybe any statement made by a member of a political campaign or anyone paid by a political campaign should be considered political advertisement.
Great idea...until you realize you’ve just run headlong into the Citizens United decision.
In reality, if enacted as you say, campaigns would probably just reorganize themselves into a loose federation of organizations, and only one would formally have a candidate.
There are political entities which exist solely to provide an online presence for their clients. It's no different than "Russian trolls", except they're being paid by campaigns and committees instead of the KGB. It is my opinion that every comment, submission, and account operated by these organizations should bear a disclosure stating who is paying for them, just like every other paid public communication they might do.
Question 2: Michael Hastings detailed the legalization of the domestic use of propaganda on US citizens with US taxpayer dollars. [2] How much money has been spent on those activities since they were made legal in 2012?
[1]https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/making-di...
[2]https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/mhastings/congressmen-s...