Tuesday, December 20, 2005

Pantagraph gives bit,fat wet kiss to LaHood

The Bloomington Pantagraph editorialized in favor of campaign finance reform, and gave a completely unwarranted free ad borderline corrupt Congressman Ray LaHood:

LaHood is among those who think lax campaign financing rules contribute to corruption in Illinois.

"To think that someone can write a check for $50,000, $100,000 or even $1 million to a state candidate is obscene," LaHood wrote in his column. "To think that a contribution can come directly from the coffers of a business that may in return receive state contracts or directly from unions that may represent state employees, well, that is just plain wrong."

For now, the most valuable tool Illinoisans have is the state's campaign finance reporting laws. Candidates must report all contributions over $500. The frequency of reporting increases as an election nears.


The anonymous editorial writer at the Pantagraph is just as naive and uninformed as are most of the editorial board members at the award-winning (snicker) Journal Star.

First: Campaign finance reform generally works in favor of the rich at the expense of the middle class and the poor. People and corporations that have attorneys on retainer and a staff of accountants can always find ways around restrictions on donations. If nothing else, they simply hand out bonuses to mid-level managers with implicit instructions their names had better show up on the donor rolls.

Second: Please, Mr. Pantagraph Editorial Writer, make note that one such campaign finance reform LaHood favors would subject owners of Web sites -- including bloggers -- subject to the same disclosure rules that purely political organizations face.

According to C-Net, the Federal Election Commission is under court order to finalize rules that extend a controversial 2002 campaign finance law to the Internet. Unless Congress acts, the final regulations will be announced by the end of the year and could cover everything from regulating hyperlinks to politicians’ Web sites to forcing disclosure of affiliations with campaigns.

In other words, if I continue to link to politicians' Web sites—which I do for both Democratic and GOP candidates—I’m subject to campaign finance rags and will have to file documents. All it takes it a complaint from a politician I've criticized. I'm already on record: I'm going to link to whomever I please and will not file one damn thing with the Fed. I'll blog from jail if I have to. Perhaps the complaint that sends me to the Big House will come from Ray himself.

LaHood joined with Democrats to vote against a bill that would exempt me and other bloggers from this blatant form of censorship targeting the burgeoning citizen media.

Third: LaHood is dirty. He's in no position to pontificate on campaign finance rules. This isn't the ranting of some pissed off blogger with an ax to grind; it's all a matter or public record. LaHood went on several foreign trips, some of which were paid for by a group that lobbies Congress. Then he went on local radio and said none of the trips were paid for by lobbyists. Then, an Associated Press article ran in newspapers all over America and the world about Congressmen earning frequent flyer miles on trips that were paid by these groups. The lead to this article was a quote from Ray LaHood. This article did not run in the Peoria media.

I can't help but think that is the editorialists at the Pantagraph had bothered to read a blog or two, they might avoid running editorials as ill-informed as this one.

Cross posted to Peoria Pundit.


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4 comments:

Anonymous,  9:29 AM  

"YAWN"

David 10:33 AM  

Most of this post is about Ray LaHood, and I will leave it to others to discuss that, but where you assert that: "Campaign finance reform generally works in favor of the rich at the expense of the middle class and the poor." you are simply wrong. Limits on giving levels the playing field and, as the 2004 elections made plain, encourages small donors to participate. Once soft money was purged from candidate's coffers, the total number of givers increased dramatically.

Nearly every other state has some limits on giving -- limiting individuals, barring corporations and unions, restricting PACs, banning regulated industries. The alternative is the free-for-all we have now, which the late Sen. Paul Simon likened to legalized bribery, where donors can and regularly do shower six- and seven-figure contributions on favored candidates.

As for this -- "People and corporations that have attorneys on retainer and a staff of accountants can always find ways around restrictions on donations." I won't bother to argue with that sort of paranoid cynicism; either you trust that people can be law abiding or you don't. But as for this claim: " If nothing else, they simply hand out bonuses to mid-level managers with implicit instructions their names had better show up on the donor rolls." Anyone who sees anything like this should file a complaint with the FEC. The FEC can and does prosecute this type of illegal giving with criminal penalties for both donors and recipients if they are deliberately evading contribution limits.

And a big thank you to Rich for providing space for this sort of dialogue!

Billy Dennis 9:01 PM  

You are confusing theory with practice. The theory is that contribution and spending limits levels the playing field. Given time, the big money donors will find loopholes and the regulators will find ways to allow loopholes. People with money will always be willing to spend some of that money to keep their hands on most of their money. It's human nature to try to improve one's lot n life.

David 9:10 AM  

Like I said, I can't argue with cynicism. By all accounts, the federal rules adopted after Watergate worked pretty well for the first decade, generally well for the second, and completely fell apart in the 1990's. That's why McCain-Feingold was necessary. But many laws, from the state's Telecom and Medical Practices Acts to the USA PATRIOT Act, have sunset provisions; they are written with the intent that they will be revisited. So it is with laws governing campaigns and elections. No system on this earth is perpetually perfect, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. The ultimate goal is to improve the culture of politics, and one way of doing that is to deny politicians the defense that their actions were techinically legal even if everybody agrees they were ethically wrong.

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