You’re right, and I overstated the case about so-called Super PACs. They can operate in favor of a candidate, as long as they do not coordinate with the candidate’s campaign itself.
However, I don’t see how eliminating their ability to support a candidate is any different than limiting their ability to support political causes. Who needs a Romney PAC when you have a PAC in support of Pro-Life Legislation, Gun Rights, anti-Minimum Wage, anti-SSM, etc.
I can’t see how we can legitimately restrict people and organizations from speaking out about policies they favor. What are you guys afraid of? Don’t you trust people to make up their own minds? I do.
BTW… I think the real advantage the right has is right wing talk radio. I can’t imagine any PAC having the influence that Rush/Hannity/O’Reilly et al have on the electorate.
But is the only issue here “corruption”? You’re OK with the speech and how it might sway people one way or another, but you’re not OK with how that speech can act as a corrupting force on our politicians? And I mean corrupting in the literal sense-- an actual quid pro quo based on getting specific speech out there.
I have two sets of concerns. First, I am concerned that politicians will become beholden to those who finance their campaigns, either in a quid pro quo way, or with the fear that if they take a position that is contrary to that of their donors, the donors will decide to back someone else. Second I am concerned that the extent to which money has entered politics it is no longer possible to run for office without courting the support of a very small number of wealthy individuals, and so those individual possess what amounts to a veto over which candidates can effectively run for office.
I admit that I don’t have all the answers. The best solution that I see to preventing the problems I have outlined above is to limit the amount of money that can be spent by individuals so that all individuals have a close to equal chance of being able to influence the political process. I understand that it can’t be prefect there will always be individuals who have greater or lesser influence in our political system but I think it would be a step in the right direction. I also have a hard time feeling concerned about the possibility that if we prevent billionaires from spending millions of dollars on campaigns their concerns will be under represented in the political sphere.
So I wish to turn your question back to you, John. What proposals would you make to avoid the corrupting influence of money in the political system, and the emergence of a plutocracy. Or do you consider my concerns entirely groundless. Ideally I would rather work with you to come up with a solution than to argue against you.
I am of the opinion that is “brass tacks” because you think it is such a telling point in your favor. Clearly, I don’t agree so now you want to make my refusal to agree as being the telling point in your favor.
Were we arguing trade policy, would you insist that my argument must rise or fall depending on whether or not I could give you specific and exact numbers for the import quota of jute from Cameroon or Upper Volta?
Oh, for crying out loud. If you don’t want to debate the details that’s fine. There are plenty of other folks interested in debating the actual subject rather than debating what size and shape the table is going to be that we will sit at when we debate.
So, a person should not be able to take out an full page ad in a major city newspaper advocating a position? A person volunteering time could rake up more in-kind amounts than that pretty easily. The entire point of advocacy through free speech is to influence legislators, and others.
I think it’s a fool’s errand to try and root out money from politics when our system is so juicy and ripe with goodies for the picking. You’d be better off limiting the number juicy and ripe pickings in the first place. On top of that, you have that pesky 1st amendment, and unless we’re willing to scrap that and craft a new one, I can’t see a way to limit spending on speech that doesn’t cross the line and infringe on 1st amendment rights.
My preference would be to up the ante on enforcement of actual corruption, and shine a light on exactly how much money is being spent by whom. Beyond that, it’s up to We the People to elect uncorrupted individuals to office. Ensure that we have a free press, ensure that laws are enforced and ensure that everyone who wants to know who is funding what can get that information. Limit money spent on campaigning and you just give a huge advantage to the incumbent. Either that, or you have to keep elected officials off the talk shows and out of the public spotlight, which would be even worse.
I’d be OK with outlawing Super PACs from explicitly supporting a given candidate. After all, if it’s OK to limit money given to campaigns, it should be OK to limit money spent campaigning as explicit proxies. But… I can’t see limiting money spent on issue advocacy. That, to me, flies in the face of the 1st amendment. And as I said upthread, you don’t need a Candidate X Super PAC if you have a Super PAC that advocates for all the issue that Candidate X supports. Are we really going to say no individual or group can spend money advocating for issues dear to the heart of that group? Be it the Sierra Club or the Club for Growth, let them duke it out in the public sphere and let We The People decide. Don’t patronize me by saying I can’t be exposed to more than X amount of speech about any given subject from any given individual.
I’m also not convinced that billionaires are literally picking candidates. Does the guy win because he was chosen by Mr. Moneybags, or does he get Mr. Moneybags endorsement because Mr. M sees him as having the best shot at winning for the party he favors in the first place? The public sphere is wide open and ready for your side to make it’s case. Instead of trying to limit the other side’s ability to make its case, better to get your act together on your side, and make a better case to We The People. We elected Obama, and we can elect other folks not backed by Mr. Moneybags.
OK, I’ve had my dinner and a gin and tonic over which I sent the little grey cells into random patterns and I’m ready to suggest a more definite proposal. I’m no policy analyst and there are probably holes in this that you can drive a truck through, and after these are pointed out I’ll probably end up filibustering my own bill, but here goes.
There shall be three types of organizations Political organizations and issue organizations, and media organizations.
Issue organizations shall be able to get money however they see fit and run any ads that the feel like whenever they feel like (subject to current fcc restrictions noise ordinances etc.) However no mention of any candidate or political office can be mentioned. So you can go ahead and say that a fetus is a person, and global warming is a lie, and we need to keep guns out of the hands of everyone, but you can’t say, that representative Smith hates these things, or even that people should write their congressman about these things. all they are allowed to do is promote ideas and specific legislation. Nor are these organizations allowed to engage in any political activities such as voter drives, election polling etc.
Political organizations are allowed to support what ever candidate they want in whatever way they want, except that no individual is allowed to donate more than $3,000 a year in cash or in kind to any individual political organization, and no more than $15,000 in total. An individuals time upkeep and transportation is not counted towards this total, so the Koch brother’s can take a private jet to the Republican convention eat at a 5 star restaurant and give a speech without having any of that count against his $10,000. However if he says that it required 30 buses and catering for 2,000 to feed and transport him, he’s likely to get flagged.
Defining media organizations is where I’m not sure how to proceed. Obviously legitamate media organizations should have the right to report whatever they want about candidates and issues, and wealthy individuals should have the right to own and run them. As I said I’m not looking to shut down Rush Limbaugh or Fox news, and I might even be OK with Hillary the Movie . However I don’t want to Soros and the like running around gobbling up News Papers and TV stations to the point that in order to get elected a candidate must have a TV station in their pocket. Nor do I want Warren Buffet to write a book on the evils of the Scott Walker just so that he can put out thousands of hours of ads “promoting” it. I’m open to suggestions.
ETA: looking at John’s last post I don’t think we are as far away from eachother as we looked.
If it didn’t matter, why did you insist upon it in the first place? If it were not significant, then was it me who described it as being the “brass tacks”? No, that was you, saying that it was the single important question, setting aside my other points as petty and unimportant.
For that matter, if all of this isn’t true, if the Republicans do not reap a major and undeserved benefit from wealthy donors, why fight so hard to keep something you don’t really need?
(Now, this is not to say the Dems are pure as the driven snow on these things, the subservience of some Dems to that portion of Wall Street most anxious to keep the casino running is repulsive. Sordid. Happily for me, I am too radical to be a Democrat, so I have the advantage of non-partisan aplomb in my scolding.)
But to underline my primary point here: if there is no unjust advantage in fundraising for the Pubbies, why do they fight so hard to keep it? You could, I suppose, offer the explanation that it is high and pure civic virtue, protecting the pristine purity of Lady Liberty.
But if you do, could you post pics of you keeping a straight face while you do it?
One other important part of my plan that I meant to add, is there can be no coordinating between political and issue organizations. So having an issue ad extolling the evils of global warming followed immediately by a political ad saying that Ted Cruz wants to microwave the world like a burrito, should be investigated.
Of course, one should consider the possibility that one might be wrong. I have this on good authority from people with much more experience than I, so there may well be something to it. Well, then, what about that, suppose I am wrong, and campaign finance is insignificant in terms of partisan power, that it doesn’t matter.
Now that is a worrisome prospect, a fearful opportunity for the Forces of Darkness to perform political jiu-jitsu and totally outsmart their Dem nemesis! All they would have to do is throw their whole weight behind strict and stringent campaign finance reforms and they would have the Dems neatly trapped and totally claim the high ground. After all, they wouldn’t be giving up anything, because I’m wrong! Hell, they could even adopt the Mace Plan…let’s see, where is that now…ah!
God, sure hope they don’t figure that out, what a disaster! You guys, promise you won’t tell them, right? C’mon, it would ruin me with my lefty friends, I would never get a date to the Trotskyite Ball…
