Bunker Mulligan "Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry." ~Mark Twain

Richard L. Hasen is the primary gatekeeper on the FEC’s rulemaking process regarding BCRA and internet communications. He has an analysis of the Constitutional aspects of this case. I can only offer my personal views.

The real issue in my mind is whether the Congress is really interested in true campaign finance reform. Campaign finance reform. Of course, this is how Congress generally sells something they want to keep hidden just a bit. Make it about money going to politicians, but don’t actually do anything about money going to politicians.

Restricting campaign spending doesn’t eliminate the money going to politicians. Instead, it limits money going to everyone else. Politicians can still collect money from just about anyone willing to give it to them. That’s the real problem.

The Proposed Rules regarding internet communications are now posted on line at the FEC’s site, and the comment period is open until 3 June 2005.

The Commission also seeks comment on whether bloggers, whether acting as individuals or through incorporated or unincorporated entities, are entitled to the statutory exemption. Can on-line blogs be treated as ‘‘periodical publications’’ within the meaning of the exemption? See 2 U.S.C. 431(9)(B)(i). If not, why not? Is the media exemption to be limited to traditional business models, meaning entities that finance operations with subscriptions or advertising revenue? The Commission also seeks comment on whether on-line forums qualify for the exemption.

Any restriction at all on blogs is an attack on free speech. Period. Exemptions for traditional media are an affront to free speech as well. Congress and the FEC have absolutely no authority to regulate what discourse gets published in a newspaper. Giving them an exemption is a backhanded way of implying that the government could restrict them if it chose to do so. The same is true for blogs, and television, and radio. Any mention of media in any way carries this same implication. Let me reiterate: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

How much clearer can you get?

William Randolph Hearst made a fortune with bias. Bias in the media isn’t necessarily bad. There simply must be options. Blogs provide that. Fifty years from now historians will note how the current media lean and how they’ve handled policy issues. And what bias they brought to their reporting. Blogs are quite open about their leanings already, and provide a much more trustworthy perspective than do traditional media if only because you know the shopowner and what he stands for.

If Congress wants to eliminate the influence of Big Money™ in politics, they need to do something other than pass laws on how that money is spent. Instead, they need to limit how that money is collected. Once again, I propose that the only true campaign finance reform law which makes any sense at all is to limit donations to candidates and political parties to individual American citizens. No groups of any kind are allowed to donate.

What incumbent has the guts to propose such a thing?

Time for all who write and read blogs, and depend on them for some kind of sanity check during any election, to read the proposed rules and offer comments.

All comments must be in writing, must be addressed to Mr. Brad C. Deutsch, Assistant General Counsel, and must be submitted in either electronic, facsimile, or hard copy form. Commenters are strongly encouraged to submit comments electronically to ensure timely receipt and consideration. Electronic comments must be sent to either internet@fec.gov or submitted through the Federal eRegulations Portal at http://www.regulations.gov.

If the electronic comments include an attachment, the attachment must be in the Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) or Microsoft Word (.doc) format. Faxed comments must be sent to (202) 219–3923, with hard copy followup. Hard copy comments and hard copy follow-up of faxed comments must be sent to the Federal Election Commission, 999 E Street, NW., Washington, DC 20463. All comments must include the full name and postal service address of the commenter or they will not be considered. The Commission will post comments on its Web site after the comment period ends.

And don’t forget to write to your own senators and congressman. BCRA needs to be repealed. The First Amendment must be enforced. And offering exemptions is a violation of those rights. I recommend writing to those in Congress and offering your own solution. And copy those folks on any communication you send to the FEC.

Swarm. It is the only thing they understand.

**** UPDATE ****

Ryan is being accosted by those who think BCRA is a good thing. Unfortunately, they can’t say why.

The purported reason for BCRA (McCain-Feingold) was to get big-donor money out of election campaigns. Worked beautifully, didn’t it?

Let’s go back and ask why that law was necessary. Was it because Dubya won the election in 2000 riding a wave of huge donations? After all, the Republicans get all those rich folk to donate to them. People like George Soros? In 2000, Bush received money from donors that averaged $300. Gore’s donors gave an average of $800.

No, I guess that wasn’t the reason.

Perhaps the reason for BCRA was to prevent anyone other than politicians and their campaigns from buying air time. Well, of course all television, radio, and news media were exempt. That was the first red flag I saw. If only networks and local stations could provide campaign information, money had to be passed under the table or people like McCain had already figured they would get good press. And, of course, incumbents can always get air time.

My view of McCain-Feingold at the time was that the two major political parties and the incumbents had already figured out how to work their way around the law or none of them would have supported it. I didn’t then know about John McCain’s “non-partisan, non-profit foundation (which also happens to berate the President for not pushing ratification of the Kyoto Treaty). How many other career politicians have such a foundation?

Most politicians are honest, sincere people. But they’re politicians. They like their perks, and that means getting reelected. And they like control over that.

That is what BCRA was really all about. Control of the “election dialog.” Most of us understood that at the time. And recent events have done nothing but add emphasis to that view.

At first, McCain and others made noise about wanting to do something to do away with the freedom people have to form 527 organizations. Of course, the only one of those that had any real impact on the last election was the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. And they certainly weren’t “big money” folks. They barely scraped together enough money to put together their first television ad. So, that reason is a non-starter.

But wait. The Swifties got up a head of steam because of the blogosphere. And, by the way, bloggers were behind the downfall of Dan Rather’s fake memos.

Loss of control.

So, the FEC are convinced they must do something to rein in blogs. I wonder who convinced them.

There is a lot of information floating around on the topic. Ryan Sager has made it his mission. I hope to provide some information and analysis myself. And there is a copy of the first draft of the rules to be considered by the FEC over at Redstate.org. You might want to compare it to the one they released after the blogswarm. And Hugh Hewitt, a lawyer who has dealt with such things before, has some powerful advice for all who read and write blogs.

Right now, all I can do is point you in the right direction for keeping tabs on this issue. And if you think this is a partisan endeavor, think again. We are all in this together. People like John McCain are more concerned with their own staus and power than they are with our rights. And you can rest assured, the FEC commissioners are not making their judgements in a vacuum. They have plenty of help from Capitol Hill.

They need to hear from all of us. I will post any comments I submit to them. Feel free to post any you submit in the comments. As soon as the minutes from Thursday’s meeting and the resulting rules proposals are posted on their site, I’ll let you know. There is some concern on their part right now. The Ex parte communication from U.S. Senators John McCain and Russell Feingold and U.S. Representatives Christopher Shays and Marty Meehan linked on the site has never been available any time I’ve tried to access it.

So much for open government. As Glenn Reynolds said, “In fact, I told somebody that we should sleep soundly, because we have the word of two senators that nothing will come of this. And if you can’t rely on the word of two senators…you’re in Washington!”

Ryan Sager is the go-to guy on hypocricy on the Campaign Finance Reform front. Once again, this time at Tech Central Station, he his trying to follow the money in the push for “reform” by people like John McCain. I have to say, again, that I once admired John McCain. No more.

When blogs are being looked at by the FEC, and assurances that we aren’t being targeted don’t appear to be very heartfelt, you must be concerned about what the final outcome will be. And what is the final result the “reformers” want.

That’s because campaign-finance reform is not a “movement” as its proponents have claimed, it is a lobby — funded and orchestrated by eight very liberal foundations which fooled Congress and the American people into believing that the front groups they set up were grassroots organizations.

I don’t care whether the groups are liberal, conservative, or Martian. The First Amendment gives a guarantee of freedom of speech to individuals, not groups, or foundations, or 527s. Yet those are the groups which want to limit an individual’s rights.

I’ve still not heard back from my “representatives.” Time for another message, and one to the White House for good measure.