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Wednesday, January 04, 2006
First things first
The recent excitement in Washington over the Abramoff indictment and apparent cooperation with the prosecution is all well and good, but before we all get too far downfield on this, it is important to go back to the root causes of this kind of corruption. In a word it all comes back to money, specifically campaign money. We now see that big corporations seeking favor with Congress and elsewhere are willing to lavish favor on staffers and members alike in the effort to curry influence. Well there's a surprise.
If we want a government that is truly looking out for the people we have to elect a Congress that is not beholding to big money interests. This means we have to demand from our current representatives that they do the people's work and enact real campaign finance reform. This means that the foolish talk about symbolic speech in the form of contributions must end once and for all. We Democrats have to include a plank in our contract with the American People in 2006 that promises to return the government to the real electors in this society... the people. This means that we recognize that corporations are not "people" in the sense the founders intended and are not procted by the 1st Amendment guarantees of free speech. There is no such thing as corporate speech. If a corporation seeks to influence the government it can do so by its deeds and its actions. It can encourage its constituents, the employees, customers, suppliers, stockholders and other that make it up to vote in the interests of the enterprise. What it cannot do is bribe our representatives and corrupt our freedom.
The Democratic Contract for America in 2006 should include a pledge to enact real reform of campaign finance that includes the banning of corporate money from all federal elections. Individual contributions should be limited to a sum that most can afford like $250-500. This because nobody's voice should be louder than anybody else's. All the nonsense of the conservatives about free speech... is just that nonsense. We all have the right to petition our representatives but we do not have the right to own them.
As a corollary, there should be a limitation on the money that is spent in advertising in the mass media. This will naturally reduce the cost of campaigns and the opportunity for scandalous influence peddaling. You won't hear any of this on TV or in the big chain Newspapers or on radio because the political money stream flows right into their pockets. Wonder why they won't get behind this kind of a movement? Hmmn. We can have any kind of limits and any kind of access that we want, they are our airwaves and it is our government, we have got to make them do our work.
If we want a government that is truly looking out for the people we have to elect a Congress that is not beholding to big money interests. This means we have to demand from our current representatives that they do the people's work and enact real campaign finance reform. This means that the foolish talk about symbolic speech in the form of contributions must end once and for all. We Democrats have to include a plank in our contract with the American People in 2006 that promises to return the government to the real electors in this society... the people. This means that we recognize that corporations are not "people" in the sense the founders intended and are not procted by the 1st Amendment guarantees of free speech. There is no such thing as corporate speech. If a corporation seeks to influence the government it can do so by its deeds and its actions. It can encourage its constituents, the employees, customers, suppliers, stockholders and other that make it up to vote in the interests of the enterprise. What it cannot do is bribe our representatives and corrupt our freedom.
The Democratic Contract for America in 2006 should include a pledge to enact real reform of campaign finance that includes the banning of corporate money from all federal elections. Individual contributions should be limited to a sum that most can afford like $250-500. This because nobody's voice should be louder than anybody else's. All the nonsense of the conservatives about free speech... is just that nonsense. We all have the right to petition our representatives but we do not have the right to own them.
As a corollary, there should be a limitation on the money that is spent in advertising in the mass media. This will naturally reduce the cost of campaigns and the opportunity for scandalous influence peddaling. You won't hear any of this on TV or in the big chain Newspapers or on radio because the political money stream flows right into their pockets. Wonder why they won't get behind this kind of a movement? Hmmn. We can have any kind of limits and any kind of access that we want, they are our airwaves and it is our government, we have got to make them do our work.
