Civic activist Ralph Nader has often talked about how Washington has become corporate occupied territory. This has been achieved primarily through the increasingly out of control influence of money on the electoral process. This has been aided and abetted by an unconscionable and irrational Supreme Court decision that unfathomably decreed that campaign contributions constituted 'speech' and that such bribes were thus unregulateable.
Yesterday, the US Senate's Foreign Relations Committee voted 16-1 to recommend Hillary Clinton's nomination for Secretary of State to the full Senate.
The lone dissenter was Republican David Vitter. The Louisiana senator cited that fact that the global foundation founded by former Pres. Clinton to address ills in the developing world accepted donations from other countries' governments. Vitter, who, last year, found himself embroiled in a hooker sex scandal, lectured the rest of the committee on the risk of impropriety, or even the appearance of impropriety. I suppose he should know.
In other words, donating money to the non-profit foundation of a public official's spouse represents a disqualifying potential corrupting influence. But donating money directly a public official's campaign coffers is nothing more than a selfless gesture and unimpeachable "freedom of speech."
3 comments:
I take it you're a fan of public financing of campaign. Here's my question: how do you determine what party and/or candidate meets the threshold for public financing? It's not an easy question, but what do people like the Green Party, Nader and of course yourself think should be some of the criteria?
To me, the most important thing is to ban corporate financing of campaigns. I think you should not be able to accept "donations" from anyone who is not eligible to vote for you. That would exclude corporations, businesses, unions and other organizations as well as individuals who live outside the jurisdiction in question.
Secondarily, electoral laws should be re-written to make the system less overtly biased against non-Democrats and -Republicans.
I am inclined to support public financing and would have to look more at how it's done in other countries as well as in some jurisdictions in this country. But I consider it far less important than the above two reforms.
Mark, the threshold should simply be that if a candidate somehow manages to obtain ballot status, they should be able to receive public financing. The rules are currently so corrupt that we should focus on not putting up more roadblocks.
Easier ballot access, proportional rep (or IRV), public financing and the disbanding of PAC's would go a huge stretch towards creating democracy here.
The problem is how do you get the foxes to make the rules of the henhouse more equitable for the chickens?
Post a Comment