1.   The Tory party used cash and back channels and foreign donations to influence elections and change laws.

2.   He says Mr Kirk is just trying to influence the election and even the school headmaster wants nothing to do with it.

3.   Among other efforts, the board encouraged brainwashing experiments and masterminded ways to influence elections in Italy and France.

4.   Because as never before, the gender gap is influencing election results.

5.   Both sides said the commercials were not intended to directly influence an election, because they did not explicitly tell voters to vote for a particular candidate.

6.   But officials abandoned the idea after deciding that the effort might be construed as using public money to influence an election.

7.   But now politicians fear that more money will be channeled through often anonymous independent organizations that attempt to influence elections.

8.   China has repeatedly denied that it has tried to influence American elections.

9.   Critics of soft money say special interests buy access to government with these donations and that the parties use the donations to influence elections.

10.   Critics of soft money argue that the cash is all too often spent on ads attacking or promoting candidates and that it allows wealthy donors to unduly influence elections.