Daily Inspiration Quote by Robert McChesney

The numbers aren’t the point; the acceleration is. McChesney frames campaign spending as something with its own grim momentum, “leaping every two or four years” like a recurring tax you can’t vote off the ballot. That verb choice matters: it suggests a system that isn’t merely expensive but structurally addicted to getting more expensive, on a schedule as predictable as the elections themselves.

As a media critic, McChesney’s intent is less bookkeeping than indictment. By anchoring the claim in comparative benchmarks (1996, 1992) he makes the escalation legible to a lay audience while quietly implying a bigger causal chain: if the price of entry rises this fast, power narrows. Candidates don’t just need ideas; they need infrastructure, donors, airtime, consultants, and access to the channels that convert money into visibility. The subtext is that “democracy” starts to look like a pay-to-play market where attention is scarce and therefore purchasable.

Context sharpens the critique. Coming out of the 1990s, with television still the dominant battlefield and campaign finance rules repeatedly gamed or reinterpreted, spending growth wasn’t a side effect; it was the business model. McChesney’s forward-looking estimate (“I think this year…”) also signals frustration with how normal the trend has become. If everyone expects costs to surge, then reform is no longer a political project; it’s a disruption to an industry.

He’s warning that elections risk becoming less a contest of persuasion than a contest of fundraising capacity, with policy shaped upstream by whoever can afford to keep the money machine running.