Homocon

Whatever.

This is the problem I have with pro-regulation people -- the whole "Not in my backyard" mentality. They argue for regulating campaign finance and "in-kind" contributions because they're convinced that large corporations and evil McHitlerBurtons are destroying our precious political system, but should they host their own political opinion site and make money off of ads and traffic, especially political ads and political traffic, while endorsing candidates and issues, well, that's a different story and just ignore the fact that they exist, mmm-kay?

It doesn't work like that.

McCain-Feingold is terrible lawmaking, pure and simple. As Mickey Kaus stated in a column for Slate, McCain-Feingold isn't just about limiting corporate money during campaigns, it's about wanting "to limit the speech of individual citizens who may be rich (or, as in the case of bloggers, may be making money on their politically oriented sites -- ed.), as their rhetoric about leveling playing fields and "curbing the influence of money" suggests."

Stifling political speech simply because money might be attached to it is a Bolshevik's dream, until the Bolsheviks start peddling political influence of their own, and then watch out! A lot of Conservatives have been complaining about McCain-Feingold since day one, and now some Liberals on the net only just appear to be realizing that "the wingers" have a point. While restrictions on campaign spending by profit-making corporations can be defended (as these corporations get money from commerce with people who may not agree with their political views, which is why there was such a stink during the 2004 election over Unions who use their member dues to contribute to political campaigns), restricting political speech across the board just because the individual speaker has cash in his pocket is nonsense, and dangerous nonsense, at that -- yet this was always going to be the end result of a law that naively believed it could ban money from politics.

But perhaps the McCain-Feingold law is less naive than we'd like to suppose.

A March, 2003 Wall Street Journal Op-ed states that "Since 2003, when the Supreme Court upheld it, McCain-Feingold has failed spectacularly in its stated goal of reining in fat-cat donors. Yet its uncompromising language has helped to gag practically every other politically active entity--from advocacy groups to labor unions. Now the FEC is being asked to censor another segment of society, the millions of individuals who engage in political activity online."

Captain's Quarters had this to say back in March of 2005: "While McCain and Feingold protest that their lawsuit only targets paid advertising, their action and the decision points out that they are being dishonest about it. The decision (the decision by Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly in Shays-Meehan v. FEC) forces the FEC to regulate unpaid communications, including the Internet. How exactly do they propose on doing that? By going after those sites which repeat the candidates' positions -- or link back to them -- and declaring them in-kind contributions, the only way possible to regulate it."

In October of 2004, Reason Magazine warned that "Now it is official: The United States of America has a federal bureaucracy in charge of deciding who can say what about politicians during campaign season . . . America now has what amounts to a federal speech code, enforced with jail terms of up to five years."

What the Supreme Court has done (by upholding the McCain-Feingold Law)," says David O'Steen, the executive director of the National Right to Life Committee in Washington, "is make it possible for these guys to set limits on how and when they're criticized."

Still think it was naive?

179 Republicans voted in favor of the Online Freedom of Speech Act (thank you, and bless you -- the other 38 who opposed the motion can eat the kickin' side of my boot), while 143 Democrats voted to quash it, even though the bill was co-presented by Democrat Harry Reid. Interestingly enough, Markos "Screw 'Em" Zúniga can only be bothered to thank the meager 46 Democratic representatives who had the foresight to vote "yes" to keep Internet speech free and clear from governmental regulation . . . you know, along with those 179 Republicans!

Typical.

Nancy Pelosi defends her opposition to the Online Freedom of Speech Act by claiming that there wasn't enough time alloted to debate such an important piece of legislation, and that the lack of time wouldn't have allowed for amendments to be added. Yo, Pelosi -- #1) there's nothing to debate about free speech, and #2) Paul Wellstone's parting gift to all Americans was his amendment to the McCain-Feingold Act, which made a bad law even worse -- we don't need no stinkin' amendments!

If the Democratic party wasn't so eager to regulate the hell out of everything, and their ignorant Dkos base didn't make "Corporate Money is the root of all Evil" their rallying cry, we might have seen a different outcome to this sorry state of affairs. But the DP are eager to regulate the hell out of everything, and no, you can't change the stripes on a socialist tiger, so here we are.

My only hope is that a changing Supreme Court will strike down McCain-Feingold as unconstitutional. Look for Zúniga to not thank the Republicans again.

OFF TOPIC:

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