David Harsanyi, The Denver Post:
Politics wasn’t invented to be clean, positive and reassuring. It was invented so that one group could beat the holy hell out of another. To do that, they need money. Lots of it.
All told, candidates for the presidency have raised more than $1.5 billion since January 2007. This staggering sum is bound to arouse dismay in all high-minded people. And remember, we’re not even counting those “independent” advocacy groups that are dredging the swamp for votes.
But before we get all moralistic about the state of the union, let’s put these numbers in perspective. Americans spend around $8 billion a year on beauty products. They spend more than $45 billion on lottery tickets a year and another $4 billion or so on pornography.
Groups of you may get together and splurge on any number of mysterious diversions, from science fiction conventions to NASCAR. A citizen can buy as much frivolity, bliss and camaraderie as necessary or partake in (nearly) any form of free association and expression without constraint.
Well, all but one: politics.
How sad, that the only area in which the (almost-)free, average American is forbidden from spending excessively is the democratic process. And not only are contributions limited, but contributors also are reported to the authorities, who then keep records of his or her activities.
These radical impositions on freedom all live under the heading “clean government.”
Well, that right there is one of the primary reasons I was so dispirited that the GOP, in its bumbling, neo-statist incarnation, sought fit to elevate John McCain as its current standard bearer — a man who, with the help of the ultra-liberal Russ Feingold, did his level best to gut the First Amendment.
The recent SCOTUS has rolled back some of the damage, but what will an Obama Court do?
And that is the question that, more than any other, keeps me telling myself that in pulling the lever for McCain I am pulling the lever for a chance at a judiciary not stacked with social justice activists.
And of course, showing my support for Sarah Palin, who has been unfairly treated — and has laid bare the classism and sexism from both sides of the political aisle, with the establishment feminist movement and our supposedly enlightened political pundits being some of the worst offenders.
Harsanyi continues:
Then there is so-called public financing. Since the creation of the system in 1976, no major presidential candidate had declined this money and the limits that come with it. None, that is, until Barack Obama broke his pledge this year, refusing to surrender a cushy monetary lead. Obama has raised around $600 million, so who can blame him?
That’s a lot of money. We may have 50 states, but only around 15 are truly in play. And even in those states, the majority of voters have decided whether to cast their support behind a Democrat or Republican. So $600 million targets a comparatively low number of voters.
Yet, even with all this cash, Obama has done us a favor by illustrating the failed promise of public funding. He has proven that small donors can get together and raise tons of dough. His fundraising is a reflection of excited supporters staking a claim in the process. Why should those voices be limited? Why should anyone’s voice be limited?
John McCain, one of the authors of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform bill, has undermined his own campaign by taking “clean government” public funding and allowing Obama to outspend him, in some places 6 to 1.
One of the promises of the bill was to stop the rich and powerful from wielding inequitable influence. So now, instead of giving to Joe Schmo’s campaign, the rich contribute to Joe Schmo’s presidential library and Joe Schmo’s wife’s charity and independent 527s that love Joe Schmo. So almost nothing has changed. Almost.
“In terms of corruption, the era of McCain-Feingold is the era of Bob Ney, Jack Abramoff, and, what was it, 70 or 90 thousand dollars in Congressman Jefferson’s refrigerator in his office,” Brad Smith, former head of the Federal Election Commission, told Reason magazine. “You could say that the era of McCain-Feingold is an era of corruption in American politics as great as we’ve seen since Watergate.”
Indeed. And sadly, the only people who didn’t see this coming were John McCain and, well, John McCain.
Many have noted that McCain’s crusade to clean up government — which brought about the current corruption of the system by way of the law of unintended consequences — was a direct result of his place in the Keating affair.
McCain has a tendency to attack his mistakes — though often by misstep. Let’s hope he realizes that McCain Feingold was another misstep, and, should he be elected, that there is no dishonor in admitting to championing a deplorable failure, one that negates an essential freedom.
I mean, it couldn’t hurt, right?
I have a hard time feeling bad for McCain about this topic.
oh. nevermind.
“That’s a lot of money. We may have 50 states, but only around 15 are truly in play. And even in those states, the majority of voters have decided whether to cast their support behind a Democrat or Republican. So $600 million targets a comparatively low number of voters.”
And we’re STILL only 2 points apart.
There’s hope for The Mav yet.
Ditto, JD. Ditto.
The topic is true, though… Porn is recession proof so put your 401k and IRAs into porn!!! (kinda like alcohol too)
My advice to y’all is to start drinking heavily…….
Yep, if I start my bender now I should be intoxicated enough to pull the lever on Tuesday and not have to remember any of it the next day.
Harsanyi is only scratching the surface when he writes, “[Politics] was invented so that one group could beat the holy hell out of another.”
It’s a lot worse than he thinks. In today’s media-saturated environment, it is impossible to pare the media’s role in generating our nation’s politics from the “pop-politics” that Harsanyi wants us to focus on.
But “the media” has been the release-valve for minority whinging ever since Christ left Chicago. Any student of local council and board politics will tell you, the medium of choice for a losing minority is always “the media.”
And I’m not talking “race” here: I’m talking Democracy. If ya can’t win a vote, no matter what your provenance is, you’ll counter by writing a letter to an editor, starting a blog, or, if you just happen to own a TV studio, making a new “news” show, instead.
Media lets the minority scream over the majority’s head.
The result is this year our nation’s minority caucuses are employing their megaphones expertly. Which means, those who are perpetually unsatisfied with the provisions accorded to voting minorities’ rights in everything from Robert’s Rules of Order to the U.S. Constitution, are on the cusp of running the country.
All this, only by shouting us down. Which is why I say Hirsanyi only scratches the surface here. He seems to be whistling-on with another campaign-funding piece while his profession burns.
* A two-to-one advantage in money,
* An adulating media with almost uniform flatter-focus coverage,
* Tinseltown in full Messiah mode,
* A tanking economy,
* An unpopular President of the same party as his opponent,
* Two justifiable wars that Bush fucked up for years and at hundreds of billions of dollars,
* A rudderless, theme-free campaign by his opponent
And this prick is only ahead by two points? See what a hard sell leftism is?
If McCain loses, CFR is why. Justice is served, the Maverick dies by his own sword.
If Obama loses the white man he should blame is David Axelrod or whomever convinced him to:
– break his promise to accept public financing under CFR
– disable address verification software on credit card donations below $200
– solicit contributions to the tune of $150 million dollars in a single month AFTER breaking his agreement to take public financing
– to book a 1/2 hour infomercial bumping baseball’s World Series when the polls heavily favor you in all battleground states, including two battleground states who have teams playing in said World Series.
This election is not a referendum on Barak Obama so much as it is a referendum on money in politics.
AngryDumbo, I tend to agree. However the reality I’m predicting is:
If Obama loses, we’ll be treated to four years of the media telling us that Americans are too racist to elect a black man. Meanwhile everything McCain does will be pounded worse than Bush ever got.
If McCain loses, we’ll be treated to four years of the press praising everything O does as the greatest achievements in the history of the world (even if they’re the exact same things McCain would’ve done), through genuine admiration or through fear of losing their licenses. But White people will still be racist.
With porn, though, there’s a Happy Ending. Politics only gets you disappointed and disappointeder.
With porn, though, there’s a Happy Ending. Politics only gets you disappointed and disappointeder.
Yeah. Because the best possible outcome of all this is that John McCain gets to President of the United States, and that’s not exactly a prospect that makes me wake up with sticky boxers.
The polls are less then five points apart.
Not good for Mr. Obama.
We’ll have to wait to see how effective the fraud is, and how successful the media and Democrats are at preventing enforcement after the fact.
I’d like to see people involved in the planning and execution of fraud sent up for years.
I tell a lie: I’d like them stood up for just a second.
If we continue to allow the election mechanism to be discredited, we have only ourselves to blame when it finally collapses. Shucks, we might end up electing a communist and nobody wants that, right?
True. We’re destined for either not so good or utterly horrible.
I’ll be in my bunk.
Not good for Mr. Obama.
I think if O! goes into election day without being up by at least 10, he loses.