It doesn't matter how convincing your message is if it never reaches anyone because your opponents are paying more than you for the same keywords / etc.

Many places do say the same about commercial ads, for example, banning advertisements for cigarettes.

A key difference in many cases is that my life and the world are much less affected by me choosing to go to KFC instead of MacDonalds, than they are by a large country being run by a parties of different ideologies.

There’s a limited amount of time in each day. A limited part of that day, you spend engaged with social media. A wealthy party can buy out all this prime time advertising and control the only narrative you get to see.

But it obviously is, this is the whole point of advertising, and why advertising messages don't focus on information but on emotions.

This is why many things are not allowed to advertise in many countries (not only topics like cigarette or alcohol but also form of advertisings), and why advertising is regulated.

Political advertising on the other hand should be much MUCH more regulated because they can cause major market disruptions. A brand advertising can maybe change one very specific market for some time, but political advertising can change the WHOLE market for a very long period.

To be honest I don't even understand how it is even a debate given how the US democracy is completely failing to tackle that particular issue.