Stop Corruption In Campaign Finance

 This subject has been a topic of heated debate since the birth of democratic self-governance. The funding of political campaigns in a free democracy is in fact a form of free political speech and it is protected as such. However corruption, unethical, illegal and immoral campaign funding is not protected by the Constitution or Bill of Rights and if we the people ever intend to run our country again, we have to stop the abuses that dominate campaign financing today.

Touted as the bi-partisan silver bullet that would end all campaign finance abuses in a single shot, the 2002 McCain-Feingold sought to remove all invisible, below radar, under-the-table big corrupt special interest money from the political arena. It wasn’t bi-partisan really and the bill instead, led to the biggest fat cat special interest campaign bonanza in world history in the following 2004 election cycle. Combined, two candidates spend over a billion dollars seeking a $400,000 per year job, most of that money coming from a handful of fat cats through 527 organizations not controlled by the FEC at all, all of them seeking favor in Washington DC.

Three well known America-bashing socialist billionaires spent more than $100 million of their own money in their effort to unseat George Bush. No matter how you feel about George Bush, you can’t feel good about three men buying any candidate’s way into the oval office, especially if they are America-bashing socialists.

Let that be a lesson to ya… Never ask a politician to define what is or isn’t acceptable campaign practice, no matter which side of the aisle he sits. It’s like asking a bank robber to establish acceptable bank security measures and then sentencing limits for convicted bank robbers.

Liberals say they want big corporate money out of the system claiming that big corporations fund Republicans. We’ll get to how true that is (or isn’t) in a minute. Conservatives want big union money out of the system and there’s no getting around the fact that almost every union campaign dollar goes to Democrats, despite the fact that about 50% of union workers actually privately vote Republican.

But neither of these issues are really the biggest problem with campaign finance today. At worst, there should be limits to how much these organizations can donate and by what methods. As long as we can see where the money is coming from, where it is going, and limit the amount of involvement they can have in the campaign process, it is a manageable problem. Both should have a right to support their interests politically, since government has a say in regulating how they operate today.

The BIG corruption comes in a few other areas that most prefer not to talk about. None of these issues should be partisan, though like everything else today, they are. In no particular order, they are as follows…

• Corporate campaign funding

If you study corporate campaign contributions in detail, you will learn that big corporations invest in both political parties equally. These are business people who understand how the system works and how to win in that system no matter what happens at the polls. They buy favor in both candidates so that no matter who wins, their interests are protected. There is some slight variation between which corporate groups tilt to either side. But they all support both sides and at the end of the analysis, the net effect of corporate campaign funding is a big fat net zero… If you don’t believe me, go look at where corporations invest in politics for yourself.

• National funding of State office campaigns

Both House of Representatives and Senate offices are “state” offices, allegedly held by a vested resident of the state, supposedly elected by their constituents in that state, representing the interests of that state and the people who reside there. So why do we allow campaign money to cross state lines in state office campaigns?

Today, New York has a Senator who was not from New York - whose only interest in New York was the power New York’s senate seat offered her. Had there been a California seat open at the time, she’d be a resident of California today. Her campaign was funded largely by donations from outside of New York, namely California. If it is true that money buys favor in American politics, (and it is), then California bought favor with the New York Senator and by doing so, elected the Senator of New York. State seats should have to raise campaign money only in the state they seek to represent…period. This goes for all state seats. I pic

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