As the GOP corruption scandals have unfolded over the last year, many (including me) have urged Democrats to get serious about truly reforming America's political system by pushing public financing of elections, instead of offering relatively tiny changes to lobbying/ethics rules. And now, in a major new announcement, some of the most senior and powerful Democrats on Capitol Hill are launching a big push for passage of such a proposal.
Reuters reports that senior Democratic Reps. David Obey (WI) and Barney Frank (MA) will "offer legislation this month requiring that general elections for the 435 House seats be financed purely with public funds." In his statement announcing the push, Obey said, "You can talk all you want about nibbling at the margins about ethics and House rules and all the rest, but unless we deal with the nexus between politics and money, damned little is actually going to change over time."
He's absolutely right, of course. The way lobbyists and Big Money interests are able to corrupt our political process is by buying access with campaign contributions. The real problem afflicting our political system is not the (albeit disgusting) tactics of these Big Money interests or the loose rules governing those tactics, but the fact that our laws force politicians to rely on campaign contributions from these interests in the first place. Address that problem and give politicians an alternate way to run for office that allows them to be independent of corporate campaign cash, and you've gone a long way towards giving ordinary Americans their government back.
Republicans, of course, are clearly frightened of public financing. They have built their power by trading legislation for campaign cash from Big Money interests. And their reaction to the Obey-Frank proposal shows their fear. A senior House Republican aide had nothing to say except "This is exactly the wrong place to go...What's wrong with people just choosing candidates to give money to?" The fact that the GOP apparently sees nothing wrong with a system that allows people like Jack Abramoff "choosing" to siphon hundreds of thousands of dollars to candidates in exchange for legislative favors shows just how out of touch and politically tone deaf that party has become. And that's one of the big political reasons why pushing public financing is so important for Democrats: because it makes the GOP defend the current corrupt system that polls show Americans want radically reformed.
The fact is, under our current process, campaigns are financed by a tiny minority of very wealthy interests - not by a large swath of the public giving small contributions. In exchange for those massive contributions, Big Money interests receive all sorts of rewards. That is what our current system is really all about - paying to play. And that is what public financing would prevent.
Make no mistake about it - public financing of elections is a very mainstream proposal. The conservative state of Arizona, for instance, passed a public financing system for state elections. So did the moderate state of Connecticut, after a corruption scandal ravaged the government there. And mainstream newspapers like USA Today have correctly endorsed the concept.
Let's be clear - a handful of House progressives have long been pushing for public financing of elections. For instance, Obey (who I used to work for on the Appropriations Committee) has been pushing public financing proposals for years. And Massachusetts Rep. John Tierney (D) has a terrific public financing bill already introduced in this Congress. For too long, these proposals have been ignored by the political Establishment and the media. But clearly now there is a good chance the bills will generate a lot more attention, and have a lot more juice behind them, thanks to the DeLay/Abramoff scandals. That is, if Democrats as a whole step up to the plate and get serious.
The critical question, then, is this: will the Democratic Party establishment have the guts to take up this cause as its official position? Or, will it be content to offer nibble-at-the-edges proposals which do nothing to attack the real problem, and whose distinctions are easily blurred by the Republicans?
Right now, there are some powerful Democrats who may feel threatened by clean elections - Democrats like Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) who has risen to his current position by creating his own operation to rake in corporate campaign contributions. Public financing of elections would threaten that operation because it would (at least partially) divorce political power from the ability to shakedown Big Money interests for cash.
This is the big question facing the Democratic Party, especially with polls showing the public sees both political parties as equally corrupt. The only way for Democrats to really put corruption on the front burner as campaign issue in 2006 is to offer bold proposals that clearly contrast with the GOP, and that would seriously change our pay-to-play system. Get in touch with your Member of Congress today and tell them to co-sponsor the upcoming Obey-Frank legislation and co-sponsor the current Tierney legislation.
Whether the party embraces the courageous efforts of these lawmakers and supports public financing will be a very public indication of whether the party is serious about regaining the majority.
ADDITIONAL READING: For those who would like to read more about the concept of public financing of elections, see this article from campaign finance reformer Nick Nyhart, and this backgrounder from Public Campaign.