People unhappy with the Citizens United v. Federal Election Committee decision protest outside the Supreme Court in Washington, DC. (Courtesy of UnitedRepublic.org )
This year, Mitt Romney is doing what was thought to be impossible during the primaries: he’s consistently raising more money than President Obama, who had previously set a lofty goal to raise $1 billion.
That goal was always a bit of a pipe dream for Obama, but it was virtually a given several months ago that Romney would be outspent. I personally remember in the primaries talking about how the only way Romney was able to win in the primaries was with an overwhelming money advantage, and that because he wouldn’t have that in the general election, he wouldn’t be able to win then either. I wasn’t alone in making that argument.
When I first heard in May that Romney had out-raised Obama in May, I was pleasantly surprised. It was reassuring to me after reluctantly coming to support Romney after the primaries.
I was similarly thrilled to hear he had done it again in June and July, and he appears to have done it again in August.
Naturally, the Obama campaign has blamed this on Wall Street, Super PACs and the Citizens United decision, but those are largely peripheral to the issue at hand. Obama’s big money in 2008 came largely from Wall Street, and now that he’s gone full “Occupier” this election, the Wall Street money is drying up. Besides, further reform to campaign finance laws wouldn’t do a darned thing.
Campaign finance laws are a case study in unintended consequences and loopholes. Money always finds a way into politics, and it often comes with ridiculous restrictions like the “Eight Magic Words.”
Money could be spent only on issue ads, not on ads in support of a candidate, and ads in support of a candidate were defined as ones using any of the eight magic words: “vote for,” “elect,” “support,” “cast your ballot for,” “Smith for Congress,” “vote against,” “defeat,” “reject” or any variation thereof.
Needless to say that this restriction was easily worked around, such that advertisements could be seen to a reasonable person as being in support of one candidate or another and not use any of these words or any like it.
Why bother with a restriction this useless and laughable? Wouldn’t it be easier to just let the money be spent in clear support of a candidate, instead of this wishy washy “issue ad” designation that fools no one?
The Citizens United decision two years ago created the idea of a Super PAC, which is similarly ridiculous. Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart did a tremendous job of criticizing the idea of how there can’t be “coordination” between a candidate and a Super PAC earlier this year, and how useless that law is.
The definition of coordination as it stands now lets people who are definitely affiliated with a campaign run a Super PAC without any legal trouble. There is no way the former deputy press secretary of the Obama White House is not in step with his reelection campaign, for example.
All this does is let politicians get away with horribly negative advertisements and still be able to claim they had nothing to do with it, which is a laughable assertion. We can’t hold politicians accountable for the ads run by former staffers.
“Banning” Super PACs wouldn’t solve anything either, because another entity even more laughable than Super PAC would pop up in its place. It’s a pointless endeavor to try to stop money in politics, and every effort to do so makes the whole process of running ads and raising money for an election all that more absurd.
The only real solution would be to get rid of laws regulating this process entirely. Sheldon Adelson, for example, will find a way to donate tens of millions to Romney without any trouble. Why force him to do it in some roundabout way when the end result is the same? Why not let that money go directly to Romney instead? What use is this pointless distinction?
The free speech implications of campaign finance law are hard to avoid either. Regardless of what the Occupy Wall Street folks say, money is speech. When you buy a Pepsi, you are actively saying that Pepsi is better than Coke. What purpose is a boycott of Chick-fil-A if not voice dissatisfaction with the groups their CEO donates to? Showing support of a product through purchasing that product is free speech.
Protecting free speech in politics is far more important than in any other realm, and limits on spending on political candidates clearly infringe upon that fundamental right.
Campaign finance laws trample on first amendment rights and they are ludicrously ineffective at their stated goal.
Keene is a junior majoring in political science, economics, and public policy.
