I note that in the UK political parties just .. aren't allowed to run TV ads at all, but have a set of broadcast slots allocated for free to them. This certainly makes it a lot quieter. While there are serious problems with UK libel law, it also restricts ability to run the levels of overt "Jim eats puppies" libel that is seen in US elections.

Total UK spend in 2024 was about £70m or about £1 per citizen. https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-...

> It is incoherent to endorse restrictions on free speech while also supporting universal suffrage.

Even in the US free speech does not allow you to simply sell fraudulent goods and services. There has to be some sort of defense in the system against lying, or the entire process just turns into competing to write the worst fantasy about your opponent.

Voters' minds are made deliberately feeble. Check the kind of thing taught in private religious schools paid for by public money in the US in strongly red areas, and you'll see a significant chunk of what that is. Creationism and millenarist biblical literalism are thoroughly enforced at all curricular levels and across all disciplines.

The SC could have made a way more limited finding about movies without unleashing the superPAC hell we find ourselves in. Why did a case about a limited run movie enable people to run ads during football games?

> If you think voters’ minds are so feeble that they can be swayed by propaganda

Buddy, advertising works, there is a reason why coca-cola does it.

What you’re missing is that, yes, human minds are actually feeble in some ways. And you’re not even immune either!

Firstly, consider how freaking adaptable humans are. Even though you would hate moving somewhere with really poor living conditions, you would get used to some degree of it within several months or years. People have health problems they… just kinda get used to and ignore (which causes them problems down the road).

My point: it’s part of being human to adapt to your environment.

So here’s the problem: if you have enough money, you can influence other people’s environments. Specifically, their information environments. If your information environment is extremely negative and stressful, you’ll tend to feel more negative and stressed too.

And not to mention, have you heard about how the human brain is so susceptible to addiction when technology manipulates dopamine response? So social media companies are also manipulating your attention by spending money.

This isn’t some personal failing in you or me or anyone else. This is billionaires and tech giants manipulating very normal aspects of humanity to make more money and control politics.

Like, you’re seriously telling me there’s nothing wrong with billionaires buying up and merging nearly all of the media companies and newspapers in America? It’s just our feeble brains that are the problem?

Give me a break. The problem is that because of technology, anyone with enough money can very easily manipulate and influence the information we consume and the media we’re attentive to.

That gives a small number of people frankly too much power in a society. And your argument is that whoever “figures out” this hack of… having a lot of money… should have the right to control elections, because humans can’t be trusted.

I personally find that argument incoherent.

The real question is: why exactly should a society put up with a power dynamic that gives 99% of people less power and worse lives?

> Had Citizens United gone the other way, do you really think the Trump administration’s FEC would fairly decide which movies are allowed to be shown in the months before elections?

Had Citizens United gone the other way, do you think Trump would have won?