Brad at The Unreprentant Individual writes about this article by James Carville and Paul Begala wherein the two former Clinton advisors make this proposal to fix what’s wrong with our political system:
First, we raise congressional pay big time. Pay ‘em what we pay the president: $400,000. That’s a huge increase from the $162,000 congressmen and senators currently make. Paul, especially, has been a critic of congressional pay increases. But he is willing to more than double politicians’ pay in order to get some of the corrupt campaign money out of the system. You see, the pay raise comes with a catch. In return, we get a simple piece of legislation that says members of Congress cannot take anything of value from anyone other than a family member. No lunches, no taxi rides. No charter flights. No golf games. No ski trips. No nothing.
And when it is campaign time, incumbents would be under a complete ban on raising money. You read that right. No president or member of Congress could accept a single red cent from individuals, corporations, or special interests. Period.
Challengers, on the other hand, would be allowed to raise money in any amount from any individual American citizen or political action committee. No limits, just as the free-market conservatives have always wanted. But here is the catch: Within 24 hours of receiving a contribution, the challenger would have to report it electronically to the Federal Election Commission, which would post it for the public to see. That way, if you want to accept a million dollars from, say, Paris Hilton, go for it. But be prepared for voters and reporters to ask what you promised her in exchange.
The day after you disclose Paris’s million bucks, the U.S. Treasury would credit the incumbent’s campaign account with a comparable sum?say 80 percent of the contribution to the challenger to take into account the cost of all the canap?s and Chardonnay the challenger had to buy to raise his funds as well as the incumbent’s advantage. So if Paris gave the challenger a mill, the Treasury would wire $800,000 to the incumbent. It couldn’t be much simpler. You might even call it the flat tax of campaign laws.
The penalties for violation would be swift. If an incumbent accepts so much as a postage stamp, he loses his seat. If a challenger doesn’t report contributions, he loses his shot. If you cheat, you are out on your ass.
As I mentioned in my comments to Brad’s post, there are several problems that I see with this proposal, but the most fundamental one is the fact that it calls for public financing of campaigns, effectively using taxpayer’s money to finance candidates that they don’t agree with and forcing them to support ideas that they are opposed to. It means that if I give $ 1,000 to say, the John Shadegg for President campaign (not that he’s running for President), I would also, automatically, be giving $ 800 to Hillary Clinton, or whoever the Democratic opponent would be. This is, from my point of view unacceptable. I don’t want the opponent of someone I support to get any money at all, and the fact that they would get it by default makes it worse. While the Carville-Begala proposal limits itself to incumbent Congressman, it is not too much of a stretch of the imagination to see the day when it would apply to all campaigns, or the day when private donations would be outlawed completely and all campaigns would be publicly financed. It is this later result, I contend, that Carville and his ilk would prefer to see.
The other problem with the “Carville-Begala plan” is the fact that it ignores what the real cause of all the corruption and insanity that surrounds running for national office in this country actually is. We live today in a nation where the Federal Government has much more power than the Founders intended it to ever have. It has control over trillions of dollars that are spent each year. It has the power to promote or hinder a corporation’s business plans. It hands out favors on a regular basis. Given all of this, given the stakes that are on the table in Washington every day Congress is in session, it is not at all surprising that we have the system we have today.
If you want to change the atmosphere in Washington, then the fundamental factors that led to the existence of men like Jack Abramoff — or for that matter James Carville and Paul Begala — will have to be addressed. Until then, we’re all just tilting at windmills.
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