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One of the major points I took away from Lessig’s Republic, Lost is that these campaign donations trackers are unable to factor in the credible threat of a donor funding an opponent.

The dollar amount may be relatively low, but the value to an incumbent politician is that wealthy stakeholders will not fund a challenger.

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> One of the major points I took away from Lessig’s Republic, Lost is that these campaign donations trackers are unable to factor in the credible threat of a donor funding an opponent.

They also aren't able to factor in independent expenditures (especially direct independent expenditures), or facilitation of donations (bundling) as opposed to direct donation, as well as the credible threat of doing those things, as well as direct donation, in the opposite direction.

That's a very interesting game-theoretic view of the issue. I've got to read that book, thank you for the recommendation.

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