The American people have become very disgusted with the current “cash-and-carry” political system in Washington and are demanding a sweeping solution to this problem.
But as long as our officials (including “reformers”) continue to take money from political action committees (PACs), they will never have any credibility with voters on campaign finance reform.
It is widely known that PACs give money to politicians for only one purpose–to influence legislation. If our elected officials believe that they can take their money and then vote against them, they are deceiving themselves as well as their constituents. The fact is, if an elected official takes special-interest PAC money, he or she is obligated to do whatever that interest wants. Thus it is highly doubtful that any politician who accepts donations from PACs would ever support campaign finance reform legislation that threatens the very existence of those PACs.
The campaign finance reform bill of Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Russell Feingold (D-Wis.) is political gimmickry; it includes virtually none of former California Gov. Jerry Brown’s proposals for campaign finance reform outlined in his 1992 Platform in Progress. These proposals included:
– Limiting individual campaign contributions to $100.
– Banning of all PACs.
– Providing free television and mail to all qualified federal candidates.
– Raising the voluntary taxpayer checkoff to $25 for the public financing of campaigns.
– Rolling back congressional and White House salaries.
– Imposing 12-year term limitations, and,
– Installing a binding none-of-the-above option on the ballot.
If the so-called reformers are serious about cleaning up the current corrupt campaign finance system, why haven’t they incorporated these provisions into the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform bill?
