I tire of repeating myself over and over. Read my other posts in this thread.
Believe me, I have...
I will only give you these hints: advertising has en effect that diminishes with time, so an established party with a huge budget and repeated media recognition (like the current government) will suffer far less then a small party whose tiny budget offered it only a modicum of advertising before the "cooling off" period. By the time the election comes the effect of advertising of smaller players will be nullified.
If that were true, smaller parties would be severely disadvantaged and would gradually disappear. Care to run a reality check for some European countries, where such laws are in effect?
As to the government being disadvantaged it is laughable. Exactly the opposite happens (that is why the laws were made - by the governments in power) as it affords whomever is controlling the process an opportunity to indirectly harass the other players by either accusing them of "breaking the law" or making exceptions for the ruling elite because of "particularly malicious attacks" etc.
I call bullshit. At least in the case of my country, there are no exceptions whatsoever to the radio silence period and all the media refrain from reporting anything even remotely political - which actually looks kinda weird, as for a day or two news program are filled with absolute trivialities.
And then there is the fact that most media these days are owned by affiliates of one of the major parties or even outright by candidates themselves and media are not exempt from "reporting" on the other, usually "upstart" challengers, who of course have no recourse.
Again, please run a reality check. All media are forbidden to report anything that could be considered election-related or politics-related. There have been some highly-publicised early transgressions that ended up with huge fines and universal disapproval, and now the situation is absolutely clean election after election.
Censorship never "helps" democracy. It is in fact the very anathema of it.
Citation needed. There are in fact multiple censorship laws in force around the world, like forbidding publishing Nazi ideology, hate speech etc., and democracy does not seem to suffer as a result. Care to point to some example country where there is no such restrictions and democracy actually flourishes?
If the laws were truly meant to help democracy they would concern themselves with ensuring that smaller players have a level playing field and that all candidates have a chance to make last-second replies. They would ensure that the voters get maximum exposure to information, complete with information kiosks at the polls where all parties could post last minute appeals free of charge so they stay fresh in the voter's minds, etc and so on.
There are multiple ways in which smaller players are being favoured in many countries I know of, including mandatory airtime in public media and state-allotted funds for running both the party and the campaign itself.
If what you claim were true, the discussed laws would grossly favour current political establishment, and the government side in particular. Care to check whet the situation actually looks like in Europe and how often ruling parties change?
