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Comment by notRobot | Hacker News Reader

So then shouldn't be a problem to stop it entirely, right?

How do you stop people from running 3rd party ads in the US while not violating the 1sr amendment? You get into dicey territory quickly. The old overturned election laws were used in many cases to prevent books from being published in election years.

>The old overturned election laws were used in many cases to prevent books from being published in election years.

Which laws and which books? I can't find anything.

I assume the poster is referencing Citizens United v. FEC, specifically about the government's use of the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act to restrict showing of political documentaries (apparently, called "Hillary: The Movie" and "Celsius 41.11").

While (as far as I know) the law was never actually used to ban books (only documentaries), the case became infamous because the government argued that it had the right to ban books if it wanted to. See, e.g., the NYTimes article below: "The [government's] lawyer, Malcolm L. Stewart, said Congress has the power to ban political books, signs and Internet videos, if they are paid for by corporations and distributed not long before an election.".

https://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/25/washington/25scotus.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/cert/08-205

Yeah I made a mistake. There were a couple of films the FEC went after and they claimed the power extended to books as you pointed out. I was under-caffienated.

No, because then the race wouldn't be competitive. It's a game theory problem, and it only holds true when both sides try their best. It's just that when both sides are trying their best, money doesn't seem to have a significant impact. It's why presidential races are often won by the candidate with less money (sometimes significantly less, like half the funding)

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