Jesse Walker finds that the first people to be hurt by campaign finance reform could be the people who have supported reform the most:
Say you've spent years crusading against the role of money in politics, all in the face of a judiciary that insists your program would injure freedom of speech. Finally, just as you decide that political cash might do the body politic some good, the Supreme Court embraces the arguments you spent all that time advancing. As ironic endings go, it's not exactly O. Henry material. But it's not bad for the gray columns of The New York Times.
I think the irony is jucier than Mr. Walker does, but that might be just a matter of taste.
There have always been rich people willing to fund liberal and even radical causes, and the intersection of big money with the left should not come as a surprise. But the drive to depose Bush has spread this appreciation for high finance to formerly skeptical realms. This doesn't mean that every Democrat has changed her mind about the role of money in politics, nor that many who did change don't see such spending as a necessary evil to be abolished once the right people are in charge. But they've still been put in the unfamiliar position of defending the intervention of multimillionaires in public life, while establishment Republicans have found themselves taking the even less sustainable stance that Soros' funds are sinister in a way that Richard Mellon Scaife's are not.
Fewer financing sources means fewer participants in the political arena. Not so hard to understand, is it?
Posted by Walter at December 17, 2003 08:22 AMThe difference is that Soros' money is completely unaccountable. Soft money to political parties is spent in accordance with the wishes of leadership and the staff of the DNC and the RNC. The leadershp of the parties is elected by the national committees. The national committees are elected by the state committees (mostly). The state committees are elected by the the local committees. All of this is laid out in state and federal law. Moveon.org money is spent in accordance with the wishes of ?
The BCRA basically made it necessary for large contributors to circumvent the only accountable and legally organized bodies in the political arena, the parties.
As a citizen it's the scariest and most ill-advised piece of legislation I've seen in a long time. The only people who support it are people who don't understand it and the demogogues who are taking advantage of them.
As a Republican, it's great. Hard money is our sweet spot as a party, and the BCRA also doubled hard money contribution limits.
But as a citizen...
Posted by: Andrew at December 17, 2003 01:07 PM