Big Money Screws Young People

Last night I had an exciting opportunity to join an org called Forward Montana for their latest forum The Naked Truth. A unique thing about Forward Montana is as a membership organization they poll their members for what issues or candidates etc.. that they are interested in. What gets them all hot and bothered? And one of the major things that their membership wanted FMT to address was this idea bout corruption in politics.

So the Naked Truth brought together David Sirota’s best selling author of Hostile Takeover, David Donnelly of the Public Campaign Action Fund, and state Rep. Diane Sands who is leading the charge for publicly financed campaigns for elected judges in Montana.

And let me tell you it was some hot naked truth!

Now everyone knows that where there is free pizza and dollar off drinks life is pretty good. Mix in some serious political action and you get a pretty sweet evening.

We all know that I’m a complete political idiot who gets unusually turned on by campaign finance issues and FEC law but beyond that – the people there were genuinely engaged in these issues.

Rep. Diane Sands talked about proof vs. perception in judges overseeing cases on the Mt. Supreme Court. As it turns out - 63% of the cases that went against the Supremes’ last year in the state were with people who had contributed to the campaign of those judges. The statistics don’t show that those dollars had any influence – lets be clear – but she was right on

“…it isn’t the result that matters – the perception to the public is that those dollars do matter.

One could ask - how can I bring up a case for that judge – I supported his opponent. Or how can I bring that case in front of this judge – I wasn’t a contributor or how about I can’t afford to be a contributor.

Most notably she said that publicly financed campaigns for judges (or for anyone, really) helps the folks who don’t have any money to self fund their own campaigns.

“Young people know they can’t run for office because they don’t have a Rolodex of 100 people who can give $5,000 contributions.” she said

They have a facebook account of 200 people and a myspace account of 100+ folks (minus Dashboard Confessional… cause seriously they aren’t going to give) and each of those people can give maybe at max $25-50 right? And that’s if you put them on a monthly payment plan over the course of the campaign. So of course there are like… hardly any young candidates. Of course!

David Donnelly told us a great story about a young mom who worked as a waitress in a local bar in Maine (the first state to pass publicly financed elections). She worked her ass off to get off of welfare and take care of her kids. She always had an opinion when the regulars were talking politics and they said “you should run for office!” She of course said – hell no I can’t afford it! I’m not a millionaire. Maine passed publicly financed elections and wouldn’t you know it… she won a seat. When the state house in Maine went to re-evaluate the welfare in the state – she could provide a unique prospective that, let’s face it, few else could.

I talked to David Donnelly before the event quite a bit – we shared stories about our favorite people in Congress who are on the front lines of ending political financial corruption and I’m batty that my Rep is actually putting her money where her mouth is after a campaign that was all about how big money controls congress. He told me

“this is THE issue that leads to all other issues.

Care about the environment – well we can’t fix it because big oil gives more money than god to office holders. Batty about ending the war? Can’t stop it because every military contractor company gives buckets to people like its water. And David said it isn’t just about issues that we see like health care being inefficient because big-pharma is paying off Reps –

“its more about the issues we don’t even see. There are companies,” he said, “who pay lawmakers not to even TALK about specific issues.” So its the ones that we don’t even know we need to fight for…

When he goes into schools to talk about issues about corruption, David says he starts out by asking us to think about an issue that has NOTHING to do with politics. Most say something like – well, my textbook we use – or what days of the week we go to school – or what time we go to school. What of course most of us on here know – is that those issues are all political. And politics really does effect our daily lives at that micro level. Once young people get that it becomes a matter of – wtf can we do about it? How can we level the playing field so that we make a difference?

David Sirota agrees.

“Without solving this – we compromise all of our other issues.

His book Hostile Takeover addresses that it is a bi-partisan problem. It isn’t just that Republicans are bad on this issue Democrats are too. He acknowledges that

”we have two parties… the Money Party and the People Party.” Hostile Takeover

Sirota says it’s a matter of who is raising. In Washington the reason you have all these lobbyists who have so much power is because they bundle money for a given candidate. They have 10 clients and each of them give the maximum donation that you can give to a given candidate. A politician can very easily make $300,000-500,000 in political action committee money alone all because they are clients of a lobbyist who wants to have power.

And when the lobbyist goes to the member of Congress to talk to them about an issue – who do you think they take the meeting with? The lobbyist or the single mom who brought her kid to DC to talk about more money for research on leukemia?

Sirota says this effects young people the most. With public financing people like us can become bundlers. With a cap of $5 contributions we can recruit our myspace and facebook friends to give $5 and raise thousands of people we know to support the candidates that matter to us. WE can become the power players and WE can make a difference and be listened to – WE can be on the Kitchen Cabinet of a candidate. He said:

“its about changing the issues sure – but its also about changing the whole job description of a candidate.”

Can you imagine what the country would look like if the voters mattered more than the money to communicate to voters did?

Sirota described it as this vicious circle that candidates are stuck in where they have to be beholden to special interests to raise more money to get votes and continue to pass laws that screw people over because they need money to get their votes.

Several years back the Supreme Court passed the law that said that money equaled free speech. That you giving your dollars to a candidate was your way of speaking out for or against a given candidates. The ACLU now backs them up and stands up against campaign finance reform.

I’m a big believer in that being complete bull shit. If money equals speech – then more money equals more speech. So essentially Halliburton has more free speech than I have. And there is no way in hell you can say that the framers really intended someone like me to have less rights than Dick Chaney. But THAT is the culture we’ve become. The Culture of Corruption… and it applies to all of them.

But the day isn’t done with the passing of laws that level the field. Donnelly says the movement itself must mobilize activists and organizations at the same time. What happened when we pass the laws and nothing happens? So

“building an info structure at the same time gives us the tools to do the hard work we need in a system that isn’t stacked against us.

We can build that info structure - and we can take charge in our own states locally. City council races are getting more and more competitive as our cities begin to expand and with publicly financed elections at that level we can begin to look at how it works before we spread it to our states.

It makes me crazy because I see so many people - friends, non-friends, even my grandpa who would be great in an elected office. Who would really serve the interests of their constituents. But there is no way that they could compete against a self funding bank executive. And it isn’t on our side either - Diane Sand quoted a republican member of the Montana house who stood up for this bill saying “If you HATE the trial lawyers this bill is for you!”

I really think this is an issue we’re going to see more of a focus on. Since the democrats have completely forgot to fix corruption and pass actual lobbying reform its our responsibility to hold our members accountable. I have a lot of hope that things can change for the better particularly with people a lot smarter than me working on this.