Posted on 12/11/2003 6:38:18 PM PST by Commie Basher
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NEWS FROM THE LIBERTARIAN PARTY
2600 Virginia Avenue, NW, Suite 100
Washington DC 20037
World Wide Web: http://www.LP.org
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For release: December 11, 2003
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For additional information:
George Getz, Communications Director
Phone: (202) 333-0008
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High court's ruling is all-out assault on right to engage in politics, Libertarians say
WASHINGTON, DC -- The Libertarian Party, which is one of the plaintiffs that challenged the campaign finance law upheld on Tuesday by the Supreme Court, has denounced the ruling as an "all-out assault on the right of every American to engage in the political process."
"Why not just outlaw elections and get it over with?" said Geoffrey Neale, the Libertarian Party's national chair. "The Supreme Court has just given incumbent politicians the power to financially cripple their competitors and, in the process, award themselves lifetime jobs."
In a 5-4 ruling that shocked advocacy groups across the political spectrum, the Supreme Court endorsed key provisions of the McCain- Feingold campaign finance law. Specifically, the court upheld a ban on "soft money" contributions from wealthy individuals, corporations and labor unions, as well the law's prohibition on running certain political advertisements within close proximity to an election.
But Libertarians point out that McCain-Feingold was nothing more than an incumbent protection act in the first place -- and that the court's ruling was tantamount to outlawing political competition.
"Running for office and communicating a message aren't free," Neale said. "So making it illegal to raise money to buy political ads, and banning the ads during the period when they're most effective, is tantamount to outlawing the message itself. That's a crime against the First Amendment as well as an affront to the democratic process."
Incumbent politicians already enjoy powerful advantages, Neale pointed out, such as name recognition and the ability to attract news media, taxpayer-financed staffs and office space, and the franking privilege.
The so-called campaign finance reform act was merely an attempt to eliminate the only weapon that many challengers have: contributions freely given by individuals or groups that share their views, he noted.
Acknowledging that the stated goal of the legislation was to clean up politics, Neale said: "Justice Sandra Day O'Connor pointed out that 'corruption, and in particular the appearance of corruption,' is rampant in Washington -- and of course, she's right.
"But a free-flowing, robust political debate isn't the problem; it's the solution. The only way to dislodge an entrenched, corrupt politician is to allow competing candidates, and anyone else who so chooses, to publicly criticize them and offer voters a better alternative.
"By upholding McCain-Feingold, the Supreme Court has merely guaranteed that corrupt politicians will stay in office for a longer period of time."
In March 1992, the Libertarian Party signed on as a co-plaintiff in McConnell v FEC, the lawsuit spearheaded by Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell that sought to overturn the campaign finance reform law.
The party argued that the law would have a devastating impact on its activities by eliminating certain sources of revenue and imposing significant regulatory and administrative burdens.
For example, the law prohibits the organization from accepting donations of more than $25,000 from any individual; prevents it from taking money from organizations that are not "recognized political committees," so it cannot sell ads in its party newspaper to nonprofit corporations or incorporated businesses; and cannot accept funds for memberships or literature from its own state affiliates, unless they also comply with the law's onerous regulations.
However, the party was vindicated by one aspect of Tuesday's ruling, Neale added, when the court struck down the provision of the law banning minors from making contributions to political parties.
FWIW John Locke is one of my hero's, I have read every one of his treatists on the 2nd amendndment. I am a member of the NRA and do not even own a gun. I feel the same about the 1st amendment and all the rest. I just have this nasty habit of looking at the big picture, in the political landscape. I remember the political climate at the time. President Bush was under constant attack. I admit that I breathed a collective sigh of relief when he signed the damn thing.
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I say the same for the socialist Democrats and the Republican incumbent who is signing legislation to expand the federal government (outliberalling Clinton) and violate the First Amendment.
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How do you propose we accomplish this? I'm not disagreeing, just wondering how you see it coming together.
To me, if we continue to vote for Republicans when they stand in the middle of the road then that's exactly where they are going to stay. Think back to '92 and '94. Bush got whacked in '92 for being a centrist, the Contract With America was born for '94, and the GOP whipped the Dem's up one side and down the other.
But it was the lesson learned from Bush running the country from the middle and losing the support of the base that eventually cost him the election that changed the direction of the GOP. I just don't see how Bush and the Congress can bash the Constitution this way and then reasonably expect to maintain support from conservatives.
And Bush is at least as much to blame as anyone, and more so than almost everyone else. He got the bill he bargained for with McCain, and he signed it, just like he said he would. It's not that he's breaking his campaign promises that scares me, it's that he's acutally keeping most of them. And he's also pledged to sign the "assault weapons" ban back into law if it hits his desk. I believe him. If he helps take a bite out of the Second Amendment like he has the first, are you going to change your opinion of him?
C'mon, Jim. How did it even get on the calendar for the House? You know that if Gephardt had the power, and a bill that he didn't want to come to the floor for a vote came up, he'd have it buried.
The Democrats certainly offered more support than the Republicans, but the GOP'ers could have prevented this thing in its entirety. All it would have taken was a little bit of courage.
And Bush is really lacking in that area, truth be told. He gets a pat on the back for going after the terrorists halfway around the world, but that idea was supported by a massive majority of the population here at home. It was a simple decision, politically, for him to pursue that course of action. And tax cuts are a no-brainer as well. Not too many average working folks are going to decry a little extra take home pay.
Vetoing this CFR bill would have required him to go against popular opinion somewhat in order to do the right thing. When faced with that, he choked.
The more I think about this, the less respect I have for him.
I think that it's safe to say that our President's eyes have been opened to just how activist/liberal/and flaky our current SCOTUS has become.
Like Bush, I would have lost good money betting that the SCOTUS would have easily overturned the most egregious parts of CFR...and then suddenly they didn't. O'Conner bolted and gave the 5-4 victory to the Dark Side.
So the bad news is that CFR got ruled to be legal.
The good news, however, is that the SCOTUS today told all involved parties to this case that they wanted them to come back with evidence of damages of CFR against 1st Amendment rights. I think that it's safe to say that such damages can and will be shown by the NRA, Senator McConnell, as well as even the ACLU. So the SCOTUS may yet overturn this beast.
Other good news is that President Bush has now seen the SCOTUS' true colors. This sort of gamble will never be made again with the current SCOTUS justices.
And this may even gain enough public momentum to force Congress to repeal CFR on its own. That's what we need to pro-actively, positively work toward. Far too many Bush-bashers (not you) have taken this opportunity to pile onto the President. That's not productive, that's venting or agitating.
Reasonable people thought that the SCOTUS would overturn this thing. Who knew?! Well, now we all know not to trust them.
And that goes double for the idiots who are trying to force the Court to take a new 2nd Amendment case now, rather than wait until Bush can reshape the SCOTUS with some new appointees. Ditto for those trying to ram through anti-abortion cases with these Justices still in their robes.
We can't risk sending our other cases up there until after we change the makeup of this Court, something that isn't going to go our way if Dean, Hillary, Clark, or Gephardt weasels into the White House next year.
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