NewsTrust - Campaign Reform - Most Recent Stories: Opinion (Mainstream)

Actually, Americans do care about corporate campaign cash

Wed, 10 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Washington Post - By Katrina vanden Heuvel - Nov. 10 (Opinion) - In Sunday's Post, former congressman and head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Martin Frost said that corporate campaign money is "something the average voter couldn't care less about" and that Congress should "leave campaign finance reform to the wine-and-cheese crowd." That's an obscene and false statement. It's exactly the "wine-and-cheese crowd" that the American people are concerned about -- wealthy Washington special interests that get to buy access and influence with politicians, drowning out the voice of everyday Americans.

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Campaign finance ruling's likely impact overblown

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Los Angeles Times - By Stephen R. Weissman - Jan. 28 (Opinion) - Media coverage and commentary have vastly overstated the likely impact on federal election campaigns of the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, which ruled that corporations have the same right to free speech as individuals. It has also obscured the extent to which members of Congress from both parties had previously opened the door for corporate and union financing in federal campaigns.

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Editorial: Adjust state laws after election ruling

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Minneapolis Star Tribune - Jan. 27 (Editorial) - Reduced to their ideal core, Minnesota political campaigns are conversations between candidates and voters. State campaign laws -- some ancient, some devised after Watergate showed how the conversation could be distorted by big money and unscrupulous players -- have worked fairly well to keep candidates and voters in control of their exchange.

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Campaign-spending case will be a big test for Chief Justice Roberts

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Seattle Times - By E. J. Dionne - Sep. 08 (Opinion) - The full impact of what the U.S. Supreme Court could do in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission has only begun to receive the attention it deserves. Will the court use a case originally brought on a narrow issue to bring our politics back to the corruption of the Gilded Age?

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Stung By FISA, Group to Drop Money Bomb

Thu, 07 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - Aug. 07 (Opinion) - Stung by the recent passage of legislation to expand government surveillance powers, two prominent liberal bloggers are teaming up with right-leaning libertarians on a new political action committee to combat perceived threats to civil liberties. Trevor Lyman, who worked on behalf of the presidential campaign of Representative Ron Paul, spearheaded Mr. Paul's "money bombs" in which thousands of supporters made nearly simultaneous online donations. After those efforts on behalf of Mr. Paul resulted in record fund-raising drives, he is now offering his company's services to the "Strangebedfellows" - named for the left-right coalition - and their effort to raise money for the new AccountabilityNowPAC.

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Corporations pay plenty for conventions

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Seattle Post Intelligencer - By Amy Goodman - Jul. 24 (Opinion) - "It's totally prohibited to give unlimited contributions to political parties. It's totally prohibited for a corporation or a union to just go right into its treasury and give money to political parties. Yet, under an exemption that was created by the Federal Election Commission, which essentially is made up of representatives of the two major parties, all of this money can be given if it's given through a host committee under the pretense that it's merely to promote the convention city."

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Real change happens off-line

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Christian Science Monitor - Jul. 01 (Opinion) - By contrast, Internet activism is individualistic. It's great for a sense of interconnectedness, but the Internet does not bind individuals in shared struggle the same as the face-to-face activism of the 1960s and '70s did. It allows us to channel our individual power for good, but it stops there. This is great for signing a petition to Congress or donating to a cause. But the real challenges in our society - the growing gap between rich and poor, the intransigence of racism and discrimination, the abuses from Iraq to Burma (Myanmar) - won't politely go away with a few clicks of a mouse. Or even a million. Millennials are poised to lead us all to reject the hyperindividualism and isolation that has dominated our recent past and recognize the deep interconnectedness and mutual responsibility that is our present and future.

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Risks involved with public financing

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Seattle Post Intelligencer - By Justin Nelson - Jul. 01 (Opinion) - As we move forward, one clear lesson of the past few elections cycles is that a public financing system at any level must give sufficient incentives for the candidates to opt in. As the Washington Legislature continues to debate public funding for judicial candidates and other offices, it would be wise to keep that lesson in mind.

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Electing Judges - With Cash

Wed, 30 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Christian Science Monitor - By Cody Corliss - Jan. 30 (Opinion) - Now that a judge can be more open about his or her beliefs, money is flowing into judicial campaigns as never before. The 2006 judicial campaign season was the highest spending on record, according to Justice at Stake, a nonpartisan monitoring group. That year, business interests gave $15.3 million to judicial candidates while attorneys kicked in another $7.4 million. Third-party interest advertising accounted for another $8.5 million. One can only imagine that 2008 will be another record year.

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Poll-obsessed media focus on strategy over substance

Tue, 11 Dec 2007 13:10:06 -0800

Seattle Times - By Peter Hart - Dec. 11 (Opinion) - The more fundamental problem for the press -- and for American democracy -- is that the media's overreliance on polls encourages a kind of political conversation that prioritizes strategic consideration and tactics over substance.

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Dialing for Dollars

Wed, 24 Oct 2007 08:08:04 -0700

Newsweek - By Anna Quindlen - Oct. 24 (Opinion) - Public financing for election campaigns may not be a panacea, but it's got to be better than what we're doing now. (...) "I've never seen a search mechanism for any organization that's worse than that for the leadership of the United States of America," says Rauh, who came from the private sector. His answer is a voluntary public-funding plan for federal elections.

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Honesty in Elections

Wed, 31 Jan 2007 00:29:42 -0800

New York Times - Jan. 31 (Editorial) - On Election Day last fall in Maryland, fliers were handed out in black neighborhoods with the heading "Democratic Sample Ballot" and photos of black Democratic leaders -- and boxes checked off beside the names of the Republican candidates for senator and governor. They were a blatant attempt to fool black voters into thinking the Republican candidates were endorsed by black Democrats. In Orange County, Calif., 14,000 Latino voters got letters in Spanish saying it was a crime for immigrants to vote in a federal election. It didn't say that immigrants who are citizens have the right to vote. Dirty tricks like these turn up every election season, in large part because they are so rarely punished. But two Democratic senators, Barack Obama of Illinois and Charles Schumer of New York, are introducing a bill today that would make deceiving or intimidating voters a federal crime with substantial penalties. The bill aims at some of the most commonly used deceptive political tactics. It makes it a crime to knowingly tell voters the wrong day for an election. There have been numerous reports of organized efforts to use telephones, leaflets or posters to tell voters, especially in minority areas, not to vote on Election Day because voting has been postponed.

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Crushing Competition

Mon, 01 May 2006 03:02:45 -0700

Wired - By Lawrence Lessig - May. 01 (Opinion) - Soon after ReadyReturn was launched, lobbyists from the tax-preparation industry began to pressure California lawmakers to abandon the innovation. Their opposition was not surprising: If figuring out your taxes were easy, why would anyone bother to hire H&R Block? If the government sends you a completed form, why buy TurboTax?

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