Take the Money and Run for Office

Last week Ira Glass's This American Life devoted it's entire program to the United States campaign finance system focusing on congressional elections. Some of the episode contains data analysis performed by a political scientist (Lee Drutman), a nod toward the much welcomed trend of data journalism. Results of the data analysis are interspersed with clips of members of Congress telling stories which support the results. It's a powerful discussion. The episode wraps up with a joint interview of John McCain and Russ Feingold talking about their disgust with Citizens United.

The podcast version of the radio broadcast is available to stream at the link above and I recommend listening to the whole thing. It is worth your time. The This American Life blog has also posted an extended version of the McCain-Feingold segment along with a transcript.