Forum Post: In most elections the one who spends the most wins - We need a new political "Currency"!!!

Unfortunately right now the one with the most $ gets into power. Our elections have become big "beauty contests," with each campaign getting the best professional marketers that money can buy, the whole time selling their political influence to corporations and other special interest with the current "pay to play," legalized bribery system of campaign donations and paid lobbying. They put lots of makeup of the "pigs" and then market them to us like they are the newest kind of laundry detergent. The country divides into camps, the hometown football rivalry starts, and meanwhile the rich and powerful laugh all the way to the bank. At the end of another 4 year cycle the American people have "buyer's remorse" as we realize that, once again, all we have is more of the same political elite who really only represent the rich and powerful.
It is no surprise that almost all of the candidates we ever see are millionaires, sons/daughters of millionaires, or otherwise linked in to the privileged class. We need to update our election and campaign finance laws in such a manner that the political currency is not $, but rather a contest of WHO HAS THE BEST IDEAS AND SUPERIOR SOLUTIONS to the problems our country is facing. The first step for this is real, loop-hole free CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM. Just think of it, real statesmen and women running the country, actually representing the long term best interests of the American people, rather than immediate needs of multinational corporations to meet their quarterly profit goals.