"Money is the mother's milk of politics." ( RUSH )

The former treasurer of the state of California, Jesse Unruh, now deceased, is credited with the following statement: "Money is the mother's milk of politics." This is so true

My friends, what is the current campaign finance structure? I want to do something regarding campaign finance reform because it sadly and unhappily looks like it's going to pass in the House and then go to the Senate. I think it's time to review just exactly what's on the books as being proposed so that we can actually go to square one and know what it is we're talking about. You can hear me outline some highlights of the bill's provisions in the audio links below, and play a an old EIB parody of the song Copacabana that does the same.

There is momentum behind CFR now generated by Enron mania that has brought fear to the surface. People who would otherwise vote against this don't have the guts to, and that's silly because there's not a public clamoring for this, and Enron is not something that the people are worked up about anyway. But members of Congress, unfortunately, are influenced more than they should be by the media.

As far as members of Congress are concerned, Enron is all that's going on in your mind, when it's not. As such, it probably will pass, and the president has sent notice to members of his party and Congress that he may indeed sign this. I don't pretend to know why, other than during the campaign he said he was in favor of some campaign funding reform.
There is an aspect to all of this that has not been discussed recently. I've always been of the belief that those who are in favor of campaign finance reform actually don't want this thing to be passed, because then it goes away as an issue, and they no longer have a platform. They've had more mileage out of this issue than the world's oldest traveling circus. It's McCain's signature issue.

We frequently say that the Democrats really don't want to solve any of these issues, they'd rather have the issue during an election, just like the economy. Tom Daschle opposes the stimulus plan not for any reason other than he wants the economy to lag so he can use it as an issue to help Democrats win the election in November. Well, this logic could be one of the reasons Bush is going to sign CFR. Just take the issue off the table and trust and hope that when it eventually gets tested at the Supreme Court, it gets thrown out. The only problem is when that happens - guess who'll be back? The old campaign finance reform team, and they'll try another way.

The current system that we have is the result of campaign finance reform, put in place following Watergate. We were going to clean up politics because of Watergate. But money is like water. It will find its way to where it's going to go, no matter what obstacles you put in its way. If you've ever had a leak in your house, if your bathtub has ever overflowed, you know that water can get places you didn't think were possible - none of them good. Money is the same way.

Do you know that before Watergate there was no such thing as soft money? Do you know that after Watergate, with campaign finance reform, there was no such thing as soft money? Soft money was invented by creative souls as a way around the current campaign finance structure. So whatever we come up with, the same thing will happen again. There will be routes found for money to get to politicians and parties, despite the existence of whatever new laws there are banning certain kinds of money in certain situations. It's going to happen, folks. Just wait and see.

I've always been of the belief that those who are in favor of campaign finance reform actually don't want this thing to be passed, because then it goes away as an issue, and they no longer have a platform. They've had more mileage out of this issue than the world's oldest traveling circus. It's McCain's signature issue.

I do not agree with Rush on this. Policians love one thing even more than they love hearing themselves speak. They LOVE credit. They love to trumpet loud and long, how they are the saviors of the middle class, how they accomplishe blahblahblah that no one else in political history had been able to do.

McCain for example will get JUST as much mileage out of a CFR bill signed into law as he has in championing it. And the press will line up to give him the platform on which to thump his chest.

There is a way to do it - make the contributions taxable on a sliding scale with the maximum rate being 50%. With the maximum rate being applied every time the money changes hands, so direct contributions by small donors effectively escape the tax. And with the maximum rate applied to all contributions other than by individuals living in areas where the election would take place (big-time implications on that one).

I came up with this while in law school and working as a volunteer on California's then Proposition 9, which was California's first post-Watergate campaign campaign contribution reform (it was disclosure only). And I ran it by my father, who was then Unruh's chief hatchet man, to work out the bugs. Pop felt that the taxes raised this way should be used to provide matching funds for the untaxed contributions so none of it would be kept by the treasury save for administrative purposes.

The elected officials he checked it with all said it would work but had no chance of ever being adopted, because they and all the special interests would oppose it.

Which is pretty much the story for campaign finance and other reforms. The presidential line-item veto enacted by the congressional GOP majority under Gingrich/Lott was deliberately written to be flat-out unconstitutional as well as unworkable.

IMO political reforms in campaign finance and other fields, such as the line-item veto, can only come from outside the normal political process.

On Wednesday night, the House of Representatives amended the Constitution of the United States, and stole a huge piece of our liberty. The Founders never meant for the Constitution to be amended by a simple majority, yet that's what happened. Imagine if this had happened during the debate over the Equal Rights Amendment! What a hue and cry there would have been.

This bill was passed while much of America was sleeping and under the cover of darkness. This is when cowards come out of their caves and do their handiwork, when nobody is around to see them shred the First Amendment. If this was being reported as it should be - and if the media didn't stand to gain so much power from this bill - people would be outraged.

The House decided, among other things, that you and I (and any groups that we belong to or contribute to) should no longer have the right to criticize or question congressional candidates in paid ads 30 days before a primary election or 60 days before a general election.

Of course, most people don't start paying attention to elections until two weeks prior. It's just people like us, the junkies, who pay attention to it all the time. So exactly when most people are paying attention is when you can't exercise your free speech rights. I get so fed up with people talking about the "big money" in politics. Why do the NRA, or NAACP, Sierra Club have no right to join together and speak? We spend more money on advertising diapers in this country than we do on campaigns!

For years I've been saying that this bill, given the deceptively feel-good name "campaign finance reform," was nothing less than an assault on your First Amendment rights. Some of you said I was crazy, but you were wrong - and proponents of this bill proved it. Yes, the House rejected a Dick Armey amendment to this bill that stated simply that nothing in the bill could violate the First Amendment. They rejected that, which means they know that they're in violation of the First Amendment.

Again: in the last 60 days before a general election, and the last 30 days before a primary, you cannot run an ad about an opponent or a challenger. The political class now has succeeded in placing themselves in charge of the electoral process, guaranteeing, for the most part, their own reelection. My friends, that's not what the Founding Fathers had in mind when they dreamed up this Constitution and this country. That is not American in any way.

Money is like water. It'll find its way wherever it wants to go, no matter what obstacles you try to put in its way.The money in politics, supposedly such a huge scourge, is not going to be reduced at all by this bill - and I will apologize if I'm wrong about this. I will apologize if there's one less dollar in politics after this reform than there was before it. Instead, all that will happen is that the same editorialists who misinformed you in 2000 about George W. Bush being a frat boy, a dim light bulb, a man who couldn't lead anyone anywhere, will now be able to mislead you with a freer hand.
((((((RUSH)))))))

To understand the flow of money in political campaigns, conduct the following experiment.
Place a tube of toothpaste on the bathroom floor with the cap off. Stand on the lid of the john, and then jump on the tube. The toothpaste will, of course, squirt out the nozzle.
Now, repeat the experiement with another tube of toothpaste with the cap screwed on tightly. The bottom end of the tube will blow out.
No "reform" known to man, much less a "reform" passed by incumbents who are concerned about remaining incumbents, will even stop the flow of money in politics. One way or the other, political money will flow, just like the toothpaste. The best we can hope for is a reporting system -- who gave how much to whom -- with jail terms and removal from office for anyone who receives unreported money from any source.
Then the press, and interest groups like NRA, etc., can get out the word on who received money from whom, and the elections will decide the matter.
But, that would be a reform with real teeth in it. The "Incumbent Party" doesn't want a reform with teeth in it.

Congressman Billybob

Phil & Billybob on air in the mornings.

Billybob on the Net, weekly.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday night begins considering a bill that would impose the biggest overhaul of the nation's campaign finance laws since the Watergate scandal a generation ago.

Largely opposed by Republicans, campaign finance reform gained new life on Capitol Hill following the collapse of Houston-based energy giant Enron Corp. , which critics say lavished campaign contributions on lawmakers to gain access to Capitol Hill and influence policy.

The legislation being considered in the House would ban unlimited "soft money" donations to national political parties, and place new restrictions on broadcast attack ads.

"I'm cautiously optimistic," said Rep. Martin Meehan, a Massachusetts Democrat, who is a chief sponsor of the bill along with Rep. Chris Shays, a Connecticut Republican.

Shays said no one can say for certain what will happen to the bill, but added: "I'd rather be us than them. We should win it. I think our cause is just."

House Republican leaders argue the Shays-Meehan measure would amount to an unconstitutional infringement on speech.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican, also warned rank-and-file members last week that passage of the measure could cost them control of the chamber, a position Democrats rejected as unfounded.

CLOSE VOTE

"I think it is going to be a close vote," John Feehery, a Hastert spokesman, said on Monday. "I think Shays-Meehan right now has the upper hand."

"There is no doubt something will pass. But the question is what will it be and will it be able to win final approval from the Senate," said another House Republican leadership aide.

The 435-member House has an hour of debate scheduled for Tuesday night. Then members are expected to pass a rule governing voting on the legislation, set to begin on early Wednesday. The proposed rule would permit votes on up to 20 amendments and three alternative bills.

Among the amendments Republican leaders may offer as possible "poison pills" to scuttle the measure is one that would increase the limits on regulated "hard money" donations, and prohibit soft money to state as well as national parties, said the aide, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Soft money refers to donations made to national or state political parties that are unlimited in size. Hard money refers to donations made specifically to a particular candidate or a party. Hard money donations are limited by U.S. law.

Those limits were imposed in the mid-1970s after the Watergate scandal that forced out President Richard Nixon.

In the 2000-2002 election cycle, the Democratic and Republican national committees raised about the same amount of unregulated soft money -- $250 million by Republicans, $245 by Democrats. Republicans pulled in far more regulated hard money, $466 million to $275 million for Democrats.

The bill's proponents said they may offer to push back the effective date of the legislation until after November's congressional vote to win over undecided House members.

Scott Harshbarger, president of Common Cause, one of a number of citizen groups lobbying for the bill, said: "We are making it clear to House members: 'You are going to vote for the people or for Enron."'

Enron made more than $6 million in donations to politicians since 1989, most of it in soft money.

The House begins consideration of the bill just hours after former Enron Chairman and CEO Kenneth Lay is scheduled to appear before a congressional panel examining the collapse of the firm, the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history.

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