"While these PACs have the money they don't necessarily have the political infrastructure to come up with a particularly sophisticated campaign strategy." If they do get "sophisticated", our electronic toys will be inundated!

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Outside Spending on TV Advertising is on Pace to Break $2 Billion This Election Cycle
By Tess VandenDolder, July 29, 2014

It doesn't seem to add up. With Americans spending less time watch[ing] cable television in favor [of] online streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime, you would think that political campaigns would reduce their spending on traditional television campaigns in favor of new digital outlets. But it looks like that memo was never delivered, with outside spending groups on track to spend over $2 billion on television ads ahead of the midterm elections, a 70 percent increase in television spots since the 2010 midterms.

This phenomenon is most noticeable in a handful of the most competitive Senate races, such as those taking place in Alaska, Colorado and North Carolina, however the number of ads for Senate candidates is up across the board. This summer has already seen 150,000 distinct ad spots, more than were on the air during the entire 2010 Senate election cycle.

The Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity, the Senate Majority PAC and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce have already spent a combined total of $80 million on television buys. This extreme spending has allowed these outside groups to shape the narratives of a race, independent of whatever strategies are put together by the campaigns themselves, which in many instances has made the races seem more negative.

This boom in outside spending has also been facilitated by the Supreme Court cases of Citizens United  and McCutcheon. The first made it legal for corporations, associations and labor unions to spend as much as they wanted on political expenditures. The second allowed individuals to give as much as they wanted to political groups. The result is that these PACs are able to raise much more money than they ever could before, more than the campaigns themselves are able to raise.

Putting the obvious debate over money in politics aside for a moment, it's worth wondering why these PACs see TV ads as their most important expense. A March study found that Americans spend more time every day looking at their smartphone screens than their television sets. And the combined amount of time Americans spend on their mobile phones, tablets and laptops a day is two and a half hours more than they spend watching television. So why the TV ads?

Primarily it comes down to demographics. While these PACs have the money they don't necessarily have the political infrastructure to come up with a particularly sophisticated campaign strategy. In that regard, television ads still reign supreme as the easiest way to reach a ton of Americans. But that conventional wisdom is rapidly changing. Voters under the age of 34 watch far less TV a week then their older counterparts, with Americans over the age of 65 watching twice the amount of television programing.

Therefore the conclusion to be drawn from this story is twofold. First, the breakdown of campaign finance laws has opened the floodgates for PACs to spend exponentially more than they have ever before. But, it doesn't look like they're wielding their newfound spending power as smartly as they could be.
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