Myth- Big business and special interests buy politicians?
Just because they get money from somebody doesn't mean they are going to be like well how do you want me to vote on this issue? Tell me what to do because I am spineless. It doesn't work like that. These are very ambitious people who have their own goals and their own agendas and they're not going to let somebody giving them money get in the way of that. Campaign contributions tend to provide access to a politician. So if I am a business person; let's say I am Exxon Mobil, for instance, I give money to Nancy Pelosi's campaign or Newt Gingrich's when he was in office, his campaign. That doesn't mean that Newt Gingrich or Nancy Pelosi or New Gingrich are going to do what I say. But it does mean that if a big vote comes up that really affects my business, I say hey Nancy, I need to talk to you. She's going to say, okay come and talk to me. Not only that, but politicians have many other things to look at when they're making a vote: things like partisanship, is this going to look good for the party? Things about institutional power. Is this good for Congress having power over the United States instead of the president, which is a huge issue that Congressmen and women have. They have issues of is this actually good policy, which again, a lot of people are going to say no, that's not the case, but political scientists can't get around the fact that this is an issue. Politicians actually care about having good ideas.
