[nlittlepoole]

Their influence largely comes from their ability to buy media timethrough PACs. Direct contributions to politicians is still highly regulated. You could argue that they can wield influence by threatning current politicans to fund the campaigns of competitors but at the end of the day this still happens through PACs buying media campaigns.

The influence of the Koch's or Adelson is largely hinged on the fact that Americans don't use critical thinking when consuming their media. Rather than trying to find a way to wiggle around the first ammendment when it comes to spending on speech, why not try to build an electorate capable of critical thinking? If you don't think that's possible, then what's the point of any of this?