Not Quite Finished On Campaign Finance Reform

We hope to have a big wrap up post on campaign finance reform. Our theme will be, just as generals fight the last war, politicans (and courts) regulate the last election.

As much as I object to the lastest BRCA, changing circumstances will probably render it irrelevant. And there is a silver lining related to the astonishing notion that "special interest groups"such as Planned Parenthood or the NRA must form a PAC and report their contributors to the government if they want to buy broadcast ads criticizing a candidate in election season.

How does this work if your concern is privacy rights? One can imagine the following exchange" "Congressman Smith supports legislation that encroaches on my privacy, and I want to oppose his re-election". "OK, concerned about your loss of privacy, register here".

Well, the silver lining is that my government has achieved a level of drollery I would not normally look for. Yes, there are loopholes, but I worry (with Justice Thomas) that loopholes exist to be closed.

So, the counterattack - many lefties are hopeless as possible recruits, because (I infer) they hope to steer this into the direction of full public funding of elections. Congress will determine the level of funding available to its critics, and the media through which those critics can speak - ahh, the land of the free!

However, there is an offsetting force - many on the left can not speak of President Bush without mentioning John Ashcroft and the erosion of civil liberties. Although we are pessimistic that we will find intellectual consistency, an appeal to such types would be based on the notion that, if you are truly worried that Ashcroft is out to get you, registering your involvement with leftwing groups and candidates might not be something with which you ought to be comfortable. Extending that thought, one might implore citizens concerned about the erosion of their privacy rights to oppose legislation requiring political views to be registered with the government.

Just a thought.

TAPPED fascinates us with their link to this article. The authors propose a voucher system of "Patriot Dollars", were each citizen (of voting age? What about my kids?) gets an allocation, thus empowering the private citizenry to (collectively) have enough cash to outbid even the "special interests".

Very interesting. If I proposed a similar voucher scheme for public schools, I can only imagine the horror. And if I use my "Patriot Dollars" to convert to some Christian Right (or left) group with a political agenda, am I still a patriot? As with the parochial school debate, are tax dollars being used to support the promotion of religious views? Maybe such contributions should not be allowed - hah! Try to rally the votes for that proposal, and listen to the howls.

And I wonder - in the current regime, incumbents provide "constituent services" in part because each constituent is a potential voter, although we all suppose that big donors get a favored treatment.

In this proposed system, everyone will have a donation record. If a particular person has a history of supporting a Congressman's opponents, how much service might he get?

And again, if privacy is really an issue (rather than simply an anti-Bush talking point) do I really want the government to maintain a donations record of each voter?

Will it matter? The Dean Team has had succes with directed donations, encouraging, e.g., Deaniacs to contribute to the campaigns of important Iowans. The NRA and Planned Parenthood may well adopt this tactic as a means of displaying their clout

On to the Big Finish - Mickey linked to the same Everett Ehrlich article, which seems to describe how the internet changes everything.

MORE: Changing circumstances will probably render this post irrelevant. From Drudge:

Frustrated with the lack of domestic support, left-leaning website moveon.org has apparently been reaching beyond American borders to generate cash revenue over the Internet!

The provocative international fundraising strategy threatens to embroil the presidential candidacies of General Wesley Clark and former Vermont Governor Howard Dean. Both men are named on international fundraising websites suggesting donations to moveon.org.

Moveon.org, which has been running ads critical of the Bush Administration, has named an "International Campaigns Director."

It is not clear how much money has been raised from foreign sources, but political websites from London to Portugal have been directing their citizens to stop the American president George Bush by donating to moveon.org.

Developing...

Comments

[Emma]

As a resident lefty (and card-carrying member of the ACLU) who likes McCain-Feingold, let me see if I can step into the breach and make our position cohere.

The issues, as you have already identified them, are two: 1) free speech, and 2) political corruption. In the pre-Mcain system we had the first, but sadly, also the second. You argue that in the second we will lose the first, probably not actually achieving the second. And yet despite this liberals are happy with the deal. Why?

There are three things at work here. The first is that the speech ain't free--it's damned expensive. Although free-marketers like to downplay the tyranny of the market, tyranny it indeed is. The second is that it ain't just speech. We see far, far too close a correlation between lawmaking and donor interest (Dems are equally guilty). The third is something the McCain foes hesitate to acknowledge: the airwaves belong to the people. The hammerlock of the old rules depends on control of the airwaves. Money would mean far less to politics if every candidate were allotted free air time. And money would thereby influence politics far less.

So from my view, this is the heart of why McCain is so important--it means that the former system can be regulated (even liberals are sensitive to certain forms of waste). I don't particularly want publicly-funded elections. I want candidates to receive free air time. Limiting what is allowed on our publicly-owned airwaves is consitutional. And it's long overdue.

[John Thacker]

"[T]he airwaves belong to the people...
I don't particularly want publicly-funded elections. I want candidates to receive free air time."

Umm. Even begging the question of which candidates (like would everyone who signed up for the CA recall election get free airtime?), if the airwaves belong to the people, and you want the people to give the air time to the politicians, aren't you proposing that the public fund the candidates?

"The first is that the speech ain't free--it's damned expensive."

Exactly. So by restricting the ability to get money to pay for speech, you're restricting speech, aren't you, by your own argument.

Even worse is the possibility of "loophole" closure. Newspapers, TV stations, and other media are exempted from these rules. (But not necessarily small independent people who self-publish, like blogs. Hmm, empowering the rich and connected at the expense of the ordinary person. Is that the kind of thing that you really want to do, Emma?)
Suppose the NRA does operate a newspaper and TV station. What then? Are you going to close that "loophole" by having the government discriminate based on viewpoint who can and can't own a TV station? Or determine what's a "real" newspaper or TV station?

Color me skeptical. I don't understand why many liberals seem to believe that giving the government and elected representatives more power is going to lead to less corruption. When the government decides who can and can't operate a TV station or newspaper, corruption naturally occurs. The greater the power of the laws, the greater the donor interest. You're preposing to massively increase the possible benefits of corruption, by increasing tremendously the favors that the government can hand out. It's reasonable to worry that this could end up increasing corruption. There's a reason that civil service reform decreased corruption-- politicians had fewer plum jobs to hand out as a reward to supporters. But the right to operate a TV station; now there's a plum indeed.

[Emma]

if the airwaves belong to the people, and you want the people to give the air time to the politicians, aren't you proposing that the public fund the candidates?

Socrates would be displeased. The airwaves are owned by the people, but not even a nut like me would make the argument that the people have even an iota of control over them. But they should. Re-legislating that would be a great first step. I'm not advocating that we seize the Fox studios--just that it's not unreasonable to ask broadcasters to reserve time for political ads. They're getting stinking rich off public property, so making them slightly less stinky wouldn't cause the downfall of media. You'd still have print and the internet to spend your dough.

I'm not entirely sure what this means: "by restricting the ability to get money to pay for speech, you're restricting speech." Look, we've always had the constitutional right to legislate the flow of money--that was established long before M-F. So what's your argument?

Are you going to close that "loophole" by having the government discriminate based on viewpoint who can and can't own a TV station?

Not at all--I'm all for the NRA becoming a media outlet. Provided, of course, that we don't loosen laws about what media outlets are allowed to do regarding advocacy. You can print opinion, but you can't fund attack ads, organized get-out-the-vote drives, et al. Go for it.

I don't understand why many liberals seem to believe that giving the government and elected representatives more power is going to lead to less corruption.

This is the talk radio approach to debate. Set up a straw man that the liberals aren't actually arguing, and then crush it. Example: liberals don't agree that invading Iraq when and how we did was a strategicly sound decision, so we "are for the terrorists."

In this case, you won't find a single liberal who wants to give "elected representatives more power." And it's disengenuous to argue against that: conservatives have the power. Why in the hell would liberals stupidly support a law that actually strengthens incumbancy in the long run? And why, I wonder, if conservatives are in power, are they so dead-set against this law. In all other aspects of legislation, they seem fairly happy to solidify their advantage.