What interest groups are spending the most on lobbying?
Politicians are the group known best for spending on lobbying for their campaigns. With the implementation of the citizens union where campaign spending is unlimited, the American campaigns have been a hot topic in the country. For instance, the Trump and Hillary Clinton campaign spent approximately $6.5 billion for the Presidential and Congressional elections. Both had various sources of funding. Following the legislation on the citizens union, Obama and Rodney’s campaigns also cost approximately $12 billion in the campaign. Some PACs were also created to fund the candidates who ran individually and also supported Romney were Restore our future with $97,963,836, and priorities the USA supporting Obama with $217,052,304. These statistics show that PACs have changed the direction of campaigns in the United States because some candidates can stand out better. For instance, Trump and Hilton’s campaigns had a much higher cost compared to Obama’s campaign since, during the Obama and Romney campaigns, they did not receive PAC funding while the latter used the PAC funding. Educational and business organizations have been a significant role in the financing of these candidates even though over the years, PAC funding has been increasing. The campaign out to be fair where people are not influenced by money to make decisions since this is lobbying people to make decisions based on the money that has made in the process. Additionally, lobbying and using money in the political system increases the cases of corruption that are not healthy for any political system.
Are lobbyists bad for our country’s governance and legislature? Why (or why not)?
Naturally, there is nothing wrong with lobbying since it encourages people to assume a role in their Government and is included in the First amendment as American’s right to appeal to the legislature. However, when the lobbyists use funds to buy the legislature’s way, it becomes an issue. Currently, lobbyists pipe a lot of funds under the control of Congress because of the overreliance on funds from lobbying to support themselves politically. This, in turn, leads to winding up Congress laws instead of passing laws that are of importance to the American citizens. The mostly used stunt by lobbyists is a method they use to guarantee Congress an individual’s unregulated funds saved into their ledger. This happens when they offer Congress individuals pay from their lobbying firms, mostly future multimillion-dollar pays. Lobbying should, however not be banned and should instead be naturally secured and should be central to a working nation. Lobbying is vital in enabling citizens to appeal to the legislature.
Is there a power imbalance between whose 3.interest groups influence the policymaking? How could this power imbalance be corrected?
The presence of lobbying in the United States has improved the performance of the Government in different ways. For instance, in Jack Abramoff’s case, he says that he would shower the lawmakers with gifts, and in return, he could get the tax breaks that were suitable for his clients. He also admits that the use of money from his clients gave him the capacity to pay the minds of influential individuals to get their votes in legislation. There is enough evidence to show that lobbyists have enhanced the policymaking process by assisting in the presentation of the essential arguments in making the changes. However, the presence of the Lobbyists has caused an imbalance where it has enhanced the ability of the Government to have a higher impact on making the public policies. The Lobbyist presents the issue of interest to the Government for potential reasons along with tactics that facilitate the decision of the Government to approve the law. This can be corrected by monitoring lobbying and ensuring that it is not done ethically in that policies being made should be benefiting the American citizens.