How much money a candidate has or can raise should not be a factor in whether s/he runs for to high public office or gets elected. Choices should be based on candidate’s proposed solutions to public problems, their ideas for creating a better world, and their qualifications for getting the job done well.

A presidential candidate’s qualifications should include in-depth understanding of the nation’s needs, good grounding in foreign affairs and in the historical and political background of the times, including American and world wide economic realities, excellent negotiation skills, practical ability to do whatever needs to be done, and a good deal of relevant hands-on administrative experience.

Recognizing and evaluating such qualities is not simple. Frequent live interaction with the public, in which candidates spend more time listening and speaking with people and less time speaking at them would certainly help. Campaigns should include as many public interactions as possible. They should meet with hostile as well as supportive groups of all sizes in as many states, cities, and towns as they can and answer all the questions asked. Broadcasts of presidential debates should be weekly occurrences that cover several related issues at a time, and present the diverse positions of all of the candidates on every issue discussed.

More direct public exchanges of ideas are needed, and there should be far fewer, if any, short sound bite advertisements. We have to stop allowing candidates to be sold to the public like soap or breakfast cereals.

There should be no private contributions to any candidate’s campaign of more than $100 per person or organization. (This includes the candidate him or herself.) The same upper limit of a hundred dollars should also apply to the value of gifts or donated trips. People wanting to support a candidate will be urged to volunteer time, rather than money, and to personally share the hands-on work of electing their candidates. Indirect third-party payment to supporters for their time will also be illegal.

The press, the networks, and the other media should be asked or, if possible, required to contribute expanded public service T.V., radio, and other media time and to contribute this valuable public exposure equally and at no cost to all candidates as an important public service. The availability of free media space should be enough to allow all candidates to fully and repeatedly express their positions and report their public records on all issues. In this way, candidates could become familiar figures in everybody’s household, much as T.V. and movie actors are. Voters might get to know what the candidates really think about the issues.

Campaign committees, supportive organizations, and individuals would be permitted to raise or spend campaign funds somewhat above the predetermined limit, if needed, to cover costs of specific kinds, such as travel, printing, space rental, food for campaign events, etc. In addition, non-profit organizations would now be allowed to participate in political campaigns in this way, as well. To expose potential exploitation of loopholes in this arrangement, all contributions would have to be public and routinely periodically evaluated.

The salaries of executive supervisory and technical or design personnel and other paid campaign staff will be covered by the government. Paid media advertising would be prohibited. Supporters would use whatever public service T.V. and radio time candidates agreed to share with them. All the media would be required to refuse any paid political advertising during all campaigns for federal office.

Eligibility for inclusion on the ballot and for government campaign funding, including free media time and space, should require a minimum number of validated supporters. Recruiting that support on a limited budget will require a great deal of volunteer time, and the development of creative new ways to reach voters. Candidates might increase their efforts to meet with people in groups small enough to permit some face-to-face interaction with a great many voters.

Activist organizations that support specific candidates would be expected to do whatever they can to help get their candidate on the ballot and then to get him/her elected, but would have to do so strictly using volunteer time. They might help recruit volunteer support from among their members, and encourage them to actively join with campaign efforts. They might speak for their candidates publicly, organize meetings, rallies, and discussion groups, distribute campaign literature, and help organize policy and strategy campaign planning groups.

Current technology makes it possible to reach huge numbers of people and to process their responses and answer them very quickly. Live T.V. can show close-ups of every commenter that speaks, and every questioner at every meeting. Some interaction with everyone in the audience who wants to be heard is possible.

Elections could provide great incentives, and many opportunities, for political candidates and their parties to inform the public of the issues and the available options. It might become possible to generate much more grassroots participation in politics than now exists. Better bottom-up communication and closer contact might be established between would-be leaders and their base supporters, as well as with the rank and file of the activist organizations that support them. The time and energy liberated by eliminating “fundraising” from the political scene could and probably would produce a plethora of innovative approaches to connecting with the public. The model of a national network of small “meet-up” dialogue groups established by Howard Dean in the 2004 primary campaign might be replicated by the supporters of many of the candidates.

PROBLEM: Too many inadequately qualified candidates are nominated and far too many political platforms are shaped to further the interests of large contributors that can pay for T.V. time, and for expensive media strategists that get the votes and win elections. “Dirty trick” campaign strategies are widely held in contempt by the public, but nevertheless they’re accepted as part of the cynical political picture that politicians and all political parties are thought to share. Perhaps taking private money out of campaigns will change that picture and reduce some of the cynicism that keeps many good people from actively participating, or even voting. Hopefully, opening the field to some highly qualified, but not so rich people, will also encourage many of them to get actively involved and perhaps to run for public office.

Possibly the primary purpose for taking big money out of political campaigns is not only to liberate candidate time and level the field, but also to cut down the possibilities for exchanging political influence for campaign contributions. The way elections are conducted now, public office is too often for sale. For example, personal contact with candidates is mainly reserved for individuals able to make very large contributions. Also removing the possibility and the necessity for huge amounts of private money might give the public a wider range of candidates to choose from. Some of the people that could join in the race might actually have a chance to be elected. Whether they win elections or not, however, many will at least get more of a public hearing, and they might have a lot to say that’s important to hear.