Perhaps lost in the outrage over the SCOTUS campaign finance decision are the real nuts and bolts of the issue.
It's true that the decision was a blow against the 1st Amendment. It is a slippery slope, as it seems successive courts make more and more outrageous decisions allowing the government to enact more and more restrictions on the actions of citizens. It doesn't look like it will be too long before the court declares the Constitution itself to be unconstitutional, as decisions like this fly in the face of the plain language of the document.
But lets look at what McCain-Feingold and other campaign restrictions actually do. The idea of campaign finance reform is to lessen the impact that campaign contributions have on the campaigns. The restrictions have varying degrees of success, as these are government actions with all the clumsiness that implies. But suppose these things are successful, and it becomes even harder for candidates to raise cash. Candidates who can't raise cash have to rely on others to spread their message. Some of these others are party bosses, influential people in the established political parties who can bring a candidate to prominence just with an endorsement. And the rest are members of the press.
Until the press is restricted in coverage of campaigns, (could happen the way things are going) press media outlets will play a large part in the public perception of candidates, as they already do. The ability to raise and spend cash in a political campaign is the most effective way to circumvent a press which doesn't pay attention to a particular candidate. In other words, if you can't get the press coverage you need, you can raise money for advertising and get the word out yourself.
Making it harder to raise money makes the established press that much more powerful.
Behold, serendipity. In an unintentional effort to illustrate my point, Talkleft posted this article yesterday:
ABC News has pulled its reporters from the Kucinich, Sharpton and Mosely Braun campaigns, according to this Kucinich press release:
This appears to be another instance of what Kucinich criticized at the debate, namely the media trying to pick candidates, rather than letting the voters do so. In a democracy, it should be voters and not pundits or TV networks who narrow the field of candidates.
And campaign finance reform makes it more difficult to circumvent the press.
Posted by Walter at December 11, 2003 04:52 PM