[Elrac]

I think _theoretically_ the way this is thought to work is that Amazon or Google could take out daily ads in all major media that say "vote for John Doe, he's a great guy!", i.e. well-heeled companies could do candiates' campaigning for them, while we ordinary people can't afford that much public exposure.

That may be true enough, but it's not a phenomenon we've been seeing. What we _have_ been seeing in the past few years, especially after _Citizen's United_ and the dawn of PACs, is wealthy corporations legally handing money to candidates to do their campaigning with.

This would and should have nothing to do with free speech, except that there have been recent (SC?) rulings declaring financial donations, i.e. money, to be a form of speech, so basically unlimited political donations are considered protected under the 1st Amendment. I personally consider this a grave error in judgment, undoubtedly politically motivated.