Here's a terrific editorial from the Wall Street Journal about the absolute failure of campaign finance reform.All three of the contenders are avowed believers in ever more restrictive and convoluted campaign finance laws. They are also proving, with their every decision, why those laws have become a national farce...
If you don't like how this looks, send your complaints to the three candidates. They were all proponents of fund-raising rules sold as a way to "cleanse" the system. Send your complaints as well to the good-government types who pledge allegiance to the idea that money is the root of political evil. They have had their way since the Watergate era, passing reform after reform.
Yet in 2008 the role of money is more important than ever, only by means less accountable and transparent. To run for President nowadays means devoting a large share of your time to creating a fund-raising "machine." Scores of good potential candidates won't run because they can't stomach the endless wheedling required to raise campaign cash in $2,300 chunks.
If the goal was to make campaigning cheaper, that didn't work either. In the early 1990s, a respectable presidential primary campaign needed $20 million. Mr. Obama had raised more than $230 million by the end of March...
Not that we agree that the virtue of a donation is inversely related to its size. The stakes of a presidential race are high, and those with money and a motive cannot be kept on the sidelines in a free society (if it's to remain a free society). Whether as individuals or through unions or other organized groups, citizens have a First Amendment right to support their candidate – and they will find a way to do so.
Increasingly, they are turning to 527s and other independent political groups not covered under McCain-Feingold's 2002 restrictions. Between 2002 and 2004, spending by 527s more than doubled to $653 million, according to the Center for Public Integrity and the Center for Responsive Politics. At least $177 million of that came from 52 individuals who donated more than $1 million each. Total spending by independent political groups is expected to approach $1 billion by the end of this election.
The King Canutes of reform are outraged. Their answer is to stack new regulations on top of the current malfunctioning regulations they said would solve everything. Fred Wertheimer at Democracy 21, the godfather of this mess going back to the 1970s, now denounces the 527s, which he says create "enormous inequities."
Maybe he's referring to George Soros, his billionaire ally and fellow supporter of McCain-Feingold. Today Mr. Soros and his friends conduct a fleet of liberal 527s so broad that it is nearly untrackable. The reforms that were sold in the name of minimizing the influence of "fat cats" has made one of America's richest men among the most powerful in politics. The very reforms championed by Mr. McCain could help Mr. Soros defeat the Arizonan this year.
Another unsavory result has been deterring nonprofessional candidates from giving political lifers a run for their money. No one can realistically contemplate running for office without a team of lawyers to navigate the campaign laws. This year, to complicate matters further for the benefit of incumbents and insiders, those insiders are politicizing the Federal Election Commission that is supposed to enforce all of these rules. The FEC has been left without a quorum indefinitely, thanks to a Democratic charade over one of President Bush's nominees...
The Founding Fathers would have had no trouble detecting the absurdity of having political actors determine what does or doesn't constitute free political speech. The First Amendment was written precisely to deny politicians such control. The Supreme Court has nonetheless upheld the idea of limiting campaign contributions on grounds that it would reduce "corruption." But after 30 years of contrary evidence, the Justices should revisit that fanciful notion. Money is required in modern America to amplify political speech. Attempting to limit or ban money merely gives the advantage to those best able to game the rules, or to the news media that can make nonfinancial "contributions" via endorsements.
If this campaign proves anything, it is that more reform on the post-Watergate model will only compound the McCain-Feingold-Clinton-Obama folly. The rules themselves are the scandal, empowering the powerful and making it harder for voters to judge the indebtedness of candidates to individuals or interest groups.
The better path is more simplicity and transparency, so office seekers can raise whatever amount they can from whomever they want so long as it is reported immediately on the Internet. It's time we reclaimed politics from the reformers who ruined it.
