Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert demonstrated on Tuesday night's episode of The Daily Show just how absurd the coordination rules between candidates and super PACs really are. Not only is the video hilarious, it's also entirely true how much coordination is actually allowed to go on. This sort...

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama entered the fray over two controversial anti-piracy bills with a Jan. 14 statement aligning the White House with technology and Internet community critics of the legislation. The statement put the president on one side of a major debate between two of...

This is part three of a five-part series by The Huffington Post about Stephen Colbert's ongoing exploration of the nation's campaign finance laws. Stay tuned through the week of Jan. 16, 2012, for the rest of the series. Read about his PAC launch in part one and his...

How much effect are negative advertisements from the super PACs having in the Republican primary? AP's Jack Gillum explores this question, "The AP's examination, which looked at official election results, Nielsen data and Census Bureau estimates, found that ad spending correlated more with election results than other known factors, such...

WASHINGTON -- In Monday night's GOP presidential debate, Mitt Romney attempted to sidestep questions about a pro-Romney super PAC by stating there was absolutely no way he could have stopped his former aides who operate the super PAC from running negative, often false or misleading ads assailing his opponents. Romney...

This is part two of a five-part series by The Huffington Post about Stephen Colbert's ongoing exploration of the nation's campaign finance laws running during the week of Jan. 16, 2012. See part one and part three.

WASHINGTON -- Back in the 1980s and 1990s, political...

This is the first part of a five-part series by The Huffington Post about Stephen Colbert's ongoing explanation of the nation's campaign finance laws. Stay tuned through the week of Jan. 16, 2012, for the rest of the series. (Update: See Part Two and Part Three.)

WASHINGTON -- South Carolina has a reputation as the most vicious contest in the presidential primary calendar. It's where Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) was attacked for having a black baby, it's where then-Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and former President Bill Clinton were labeled racists, and it is now where Mitt...

Newt Gingrich is now backing off attacks on Mitt Romney after his super PAC's ads were deemed to contain falsehoods. HuffPost's Jon Ward reports, "Newt Gingrich has called on a pro-Gingrich super PAC to edit a 28-minute film attacking Mitt Romney to "remove inaccuracies" and asked Romney to make the...

President Barack Obama announced that his campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) have combined to raise more than $220 million for the entire year of 2011. The fundraising haul falls short of the fundraising record for an incumbent president in an off-year set by George W. Bush and the...

Mitt Romney won the New Hampshire primary, but not before spending nearly $1 million on television advertising in the state's biggest media market. Candidates, and their super-PAC sidekicks, spent $3.6 million on advertising in the Boston, Mass. media market, the biggest market in New Hampshire. How far did...

The Newt Gingrich super PAC documentary assailing Mitt Romney's record heading Bain Capital hit the web today. At 28-minutes long and styled like a Frontline expose the documentary is a godsend to Democrats. The movie, the content of which has been echoed by both Gingrich and Texas Governor Rick Perry,...

New Hampshire results should be trickling in and only one candidate -- Jon Huntsman -- really got any support from a super PAC. Huntsman's super PAC, funded by his billionaire daddy, is one of numerous examples of the ludicrously defined "independence" that super PACs operate under. HuffPost's Jason Linkins gives...

Air War in New Hampshire: Voters head to the polls in New Hampshire tomorrow to determine the winner of the first primary in the Republican presidential race. Those voters have only seen a light dusting of advertisements from the candidates in the run-up to the primary as Mitt Romney's big...

WASHINGTON -- Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, with a year-long, double-digit lead in the polls, has gone in for the kill in New Hampshire with his largest ad buy of the campaign. In an effort to swamp his competitors as they try to catch up to Romney after his razor-thin...

$11 billion. That is the amount that the Federal Election Commission is predicting will be spent on the 2012 election. By comparison, the 2008 election cost $5.28 billion. We're talking about a doubling of the amount of money to be spent in the coming election. Get ready!

Is...

Dabbing their heads and waving paper fans, Republican big-wigs are now decrying the unprecedented spending by super PACs in the GOP primary. HuffPost's Sam Stein writes that former Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge and Sen. John McCain have both stated that there needs to be more disclosure around the super PACs,...

WASHINGTON -- Behind the sweater vests, the faith and family, and the self-definition as a congressional reformer lies another Rick Santorum. This Rick Santorum favors big business, curries favor from lobbyists, and helped to bind the Washington influence industry to the Republican Party while serving in Congress.

Beginning in 2001,...

Mitt Romney is moving on from his 8 vote win in the Iowa caucuses and is looking beyond New Hampshire to South Carolina and Florida. According to the Washington Post he's made an $825,000 ad buy in Florida. The Miami Herald reports that this ad buy...

Today's the day where the Republican presidential primary contestants finally face the voters for their first test. How has all of the money they've raised and spent played out? The big take-away has been the phenomenal effect that the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision has had on the race. Super...