How To Achieve Real Campaign Finance Reform

[g5000]

A lot of people have wasted a lot of energy for a very long time trying to reform campaign finance. The Supreme Court has handed down decisions intended to limit campaign cash, but in recent years they have chipped away at previous rulings.

Congress has passed a bunch of campaign finance laws over the decades, the one most familiar to people being McCain-Feingold.

Yet, despite all this effort, each election cycle sets a new record of spending.

And the re-election rate of incumbents has been unchanged for at least six decades.

For the House, incumbents who run for re-election are returned to DC at a rate of 98 percent.

98 PERCENT!

Senators are re-elected at a rate of 80 percent.

Reelection Rates Over the Years

Few things in life are more predictable than the chances of an incumbent member of the U.S. House of Representatives winning reelection. With wide name recognition, and usually an insurmountable advantage in campaign cash, House incumbents typically have little trouble holding onto their seats.

www.opensecrets.org

Campaign finance reform has been one of the biggest failures of American politics.

That is because reformers have been treating the symptoms instead of the disease.

 

[Winco]

Didn't trump campaign on this?
Then Abused it.

I think he did......What you say?

 

[g5000]

Pretty much everyone, Left and Right, agrees Donald Trump is 100 percent transactional in all he does.

Well, why does anyone give a politician money?

They expect something in return. They either want the politician to do them a favor, or they want the politician to keep doing what they are doing and don't want that politician replaced.

Campaign donations are transactional. Call me Captain Obvious.

As I showed in the OP, efforts to limit the cash side of the transaction have been a tremendous exercise in futility.

That's because campaign cash is not the disease. It is a symptom of the disease.

The disease is the long running consolidation of power at the federal level. Since FDR, we have been taking power away from the states and concentrating it in Washington, DC. more and more and more.

This makes that power so much easier to capture. It's one stop shopping!

I don't believe it is a coincidence the more power we give our federal officials, the more money we have seen flow to them.

Correlation-causation is not always a fallacy.

So what happens if we decide to go crazy and remove the ability of politicians to do favors for special interests?

What happens is we remove the incentive to give those politicians money. What would be the point of giving money to someone who can't do what you want them to do?


Presto, instant campaign finance reform done the way it should be done.

It has long baffled me how the rubes insist on giving the federal government more power over our lives, and then shortly later they are bemoaning the sudden surge of cash going into the coffers of incumbents.

See: Obamacare.

The ones who want to make government bigger want their cake and to eat it, too. But the world just does not work that way.

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

The disease is the long running consolidation of power at the federal level.

Wrong.

The disease is the long running consolidation of power at the state level, the parties’ control of state politics and state government – what manifest at the Federal level is merely a reflection of that.

And campaign finance reform has failed because it’s been focused on the Federal level, not the state level.

Indeed, any type of political reform – finance or otherwise – can only be accomplished at the state and local levels.

The ‘tyranny’ of the Federal government is a myth, the false notion that there’s some nefarious plot to take power away from the states and concentrate it in Washington, DC – that the people are helpless victims at the mercy of the big, bad Federal government.

However much a cliché, it’s nonetheless true: the people alone are responsible for the good – or bad – government they get; and bad government starts at the very local level, so does its reform.

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

It has long baffled me how the rubes insist on giving the federal government more power over our lives, and then shortly later they are bemoaning the sudden surge of cash going into the coffers of incumbents.

See: Obamacare.

The ones who want to make government bigger want their cake and to eat it, too. But the world just does not work that way.

Exactly.

 

[OKTexas]

A lot of people have wasted a lot of energy for a very long time trying to reform campaign finance. The Supreme Court has handed down decisions intended to limit campaign cash, but in recent years they have chipped away at previous rulings.

Congress has passed a bunch of campaign finance laws over the decades, the one most familiar to people being McCain-Feingold.

Yet, despite all this effort, each election cycle sets a new record of spending.

And the re-election rate of incumbents has been unchanged for at least six decades.

For the House, incumbents who run for re-election are returned to DC at a rate of 98 percent.

98 PERCENT!

Senators are re-elected at a rate of 80 percent.

Reelection Rates Over the Years

Few things in life are more predictable than the chances of an incumbent member of the U.S. House of Representatives winning reelection. With wide name recognition, and usually an insurmountable advantage in campaign cash, House incumbents typically have little trouble holding onto their seats.

www.opensecrets.org

Campaign finance reform has been one of the biggest failures of American politics.

That is because reformers have been treating the symptoms instead of the disease.

So why not just limit campaign donations to the area the politician represents. Let politicians learn to manage limited resources, maybe they'll learn how to run government more efficiently.

.

 

[22lcidw]

A lot of people have wasted a lot of energy for a very long time trying to reform campaign finance. The Supreme Court has handed down decisions intended to limit campaign cash, but in recent years they have chipped away at previous rulings.

Congress has passed a bunch of campaign finance laws over the decades, the one most familiar to people being McCain-Feingold.

Yet, despite all this effort, each election cycle sets a new record of spending.

And the re-election rate of incumbents has been unchanged for at least six decades.

For the House, incumbents who run for re-election are returned to DC at a rate of 98 percent.

98 PERCENT!

Senators are re-elected at a rate of 80 percent.

Reelection Rates Over the Years

Few things in life are more predictable than the chances of an incumbent member of the U.S. House of Representatives winning reelection. With wide name recognition, and usually an insurmountable advantage in campaign cash, House incumbents typically have little trouble holding onto their seats.

www.opensecrets.org

Campaign finance reform has been one of the biggest failures of American politics.

That is because reformers have been treating the symptoms instead of the disease.

Repeal the 17th Amendment and that takes care of the Senator problem. The House is another issue. At the same time of the 17th amendment repeal term limits on House member can be instituted.

 

[Care4all]

The money flows to local and state elections too! It'll just double the state level buy outs and corruption....if the federal cash flow is limited.

 

[frigidweirdo]

A lot of people have wasted a lot of energy for a very long time trying to reform campaign finance. The Supreme Court has handed down decisions intended to limit campaign cash, but in recent years they have chipped away at previous rulings.

Congress has passed a bunch of campaign finance laws over the decades, the one most familiar to people being McCain-Feingold.

Yet, despite all this effort, each election cycle sets a new record of spending.

And the re-election rate of incumbents has been unchanged for at least six decades.

For the House, incumbents who run for re-election are returned to DC at a rate of 98 percent.

98 PERCENT!

Senators are re-elected at a rate of 80 percent.

Reelection Rates Over the Years

Few things in life are more predictable than the chances of an incumbent member of the U.S. House of Representatives winning reelection. With wide name recognition, and usually an insurmountable advantage in campaign cash, House incumbents typically have little trouble holding onto their seats.

www.opensecrets.org

Campaign finance reform has been one of the biggest failures of American politics.

That is because reformers have been treating the symptoms instead of the disease.

Germany spent less on it's whole 2017 federal election than one senate race in the US. Why? Because it has a proper electoral system where money doesn't have anywhere near the impact it does with FPTP.

 

[g5000]

Wrong.

The disease is the long running consolidation of power at the state level, the parties’ control of state politics and state government – what manifest at the Federal level is merely a reflection of that.

And campaign finance reform has failed because it’s been focused on the Federal level, not the state level.

Indeed, any type of political reform – finance or otherwise – can only be accomplished at the state and local levels.

The ‘tyranny’ of the Federal government is a myth, the false notion that there’s some nefarious plot to take power away from the states and concentrate it in Washington, DC – that the people are helpless victims at the mercy of the big, bad Federal government.

However much a cliché, it’s nonetheless true: the people alone are responsible for the good – or bad – government they get; and bad government starts at the very local level, so does its reform.

So it is your ignorant opinion that federal power has not massively expanded and usurped power from the states since the Great Depression?

Really?

Wow!

 

[g5000]

So why not just limit campaign donations to the area the politician represents. Let politicians learn to manage limited resources, maybe they'll learn how to run government more efficiently.

.

That would be yet another failed treatment of the symptoms instead of the disease.

"Bob, the chairman of the committee who has oversight of our business is from Ohio. We need to establish an office there or move our HQ there."

 

[g5000]

Repeal the 17th Amendment and that takes care of the Senator problem. The House is another issue. At the same time of the 17th amendment repeal term limits on House member can be instituted.

You might want to look into the history of the 17th Amendment and why it was readily accepted across the country.

I actually created a topic about the reasons to repeal or not repeal it. The Republican motives are not pure.

Levin: Repeal the 17th Amendment

In keeping with the idea I proposed in a topic about Mark Levin's proposed constitutional amendmeent that each is worthy of a topic alone, I decided to start with one that I believe will be the least emotionally-laden. Hey, I can dream, can't I? Levin proposes returning the election of US...

www.usmessageboard.com

 

[g5000]

The money flows to local and state elections too! It'll just double the state level buy outs and corruption....if the federal cash flow is limited.

Returning power back to the states would make it much harder to completely capture that power.

Right now, it's one stop shopping. Much easier.

But even better would be to ban that power to begin with. For example, the power to put deductions, exemptions, and credits in the tax code.

That is not a power that cannot go to the states. That is a power which needs to be banned.

It is by far the most abused power and causes us all to pay much higher tax rates, and is the biggest contributor to the federal debt.

 

[22lcidw]

You might want to look into the history of the 17th Amendment and why it was readily accepted across the country.

I actually created a topic about the reasons to repeal or not repeal it. The Republican motives are not pure.

Levin: Repeal the 17th Amendment

In keeping with the idea I proposed in a topic about Mark Levin's proposed constitutional amendmeent that each is worthy of a topic alone, I decided to start with one that I believe will be the least emotionally-laden. Hey, I can dream, can't I? Levin proposes returning the election of US...

www.usmessageboard.com

I know what the current law has done. Democracy spouted at every chance possible with totalitarian legislation passed as mandates.

 

[g5000]

Germany spent less on it's whole 2017 federal election than one senate race in the US. Why? Because it has a proper electoral system where money doesn't have anywhere near the impact it does with FPTP.

Germany has a more federalist system than we do.

Also, a lot of the power over the German people has been usurped by the EU.

 

[g5000]

I know what the current law has done. Democracy spouted at every chance possible with totalitarian legislation passed as mandates.

We need to take that power away from the federal government.

 

[frigidweirdo]

Germany has a more federalist system than we do.

Also, a lot of the power over the German people has been usurped by the EU.

It's not about federalism. It's about the electoral system. And no, power of the people has not been usurped by the EU. Germany IS THE EU.

 

[g5000]

It's not about federalism. It's about the electoral system. And no, power of the people has not been usurped by the EU. Germany IS THE EU.

The central government of the EU is in Brussels.

Germany can't so much as export beer without satisfying EU rules and regulations.

That's why the UK left the EU.

You are comparing apples to oranges.

 

[frigidweirdo]

The central government of the EU is in Brussels.

Germany can't so much as export beer without satisfying EU rules and regulations.

That's why the UK left the EU.

Do you even know how the EU works? Doesn't look like it.

And no, it's also not why the UK left.

Zero out of two, not bad.

 

[g5000]

Do you even know how the EU works? Doesn't look like it.

And no, it's also not why the UK left.

Zero out of two, not bad.

I know exactly how the EU works.

A member of the German Bundesrat has almost no say on the rules and regulations regarding the commerce of beer between the member states of the EU.

A member of the US Senate actually writes the rules and regulations regarding the commerce of beer between the American states.

The biggest reason Britain left the EU was economic. The central government in Brussels was not delivering the promised prosperity.

Batting one thousand.