What could you do with $454 million

— By Kate Sheppard, Mother Jones

By the time voters went to the polls last week, outside groups had spent more than $454 million to influence campaigns. But there's little evidence that all that spending benefited Republicans much more than Democrats, as the final tallies on spending were actually pretty close.

A total of $197.4 million was spent backing Republican candidates, while groups spent $181.1 million for Democrats, according to Federal Election Commission data compiled by the Sunlight Foundation.