Public Financing, Integrity, and Mixed Emotions
Barack Obama has opted out of public financing for his presidential campaign.
I greet this event with mixed emotions. On the one hand, Obama said that he would accept public financing and the limits that go with it. He is a supporter (or so he says) of public financing. Thus there is a question of integrity. It is simple political tactics–one might say politics as usual rather than “change.” On the other hand, I regard public campaign financing as a very bad idea, and I hope its time is passing. Obama’s action, I hope, will help underline the problems.
I view public financing as an effort to limit free speech. I know the arguments in favor, in particular the idea that “ordinary” people get more say when you limit the contributions of the rich. But I simply don’t think that is a function that government can or should perform, and I think the history of campaign finance “reform” amply demonstrates that. In effect we have taken the power from those who have money, and given it to those who know how to manipulate the legal system.
So while Obama has broken a promise, I hope that some good will come of it. The best good, in my view, would be complete elimination of public financing of elections, and also the end of the choking of free speech by attempting to regulate the money. Of course, that is way too optimistic, but I too can dream, can’t I?
I was similarly disappointed in how Obama has handled this. Being naturally pessimistic, I think this is just one of many slow slides into politics as usual. What particularly bothered me was his reasoning that he would have no way to combat the 527 (I think this is the right number) groups from the republican side unless he could raise more cash than allowed by the public financing.
Does he really think that his ideas are that shaky that he has to spend 10’s of millions of dollars more than he would have had to defend himself? He won his party’s nomination on what I thought was a message of change and what he believed was substance in his new political approach. Now it seems like he’s turned coat and really believes that it has more to do with tactics and not message anymore. Too bad.
I certainly don’t want to excuse Obama. He’s getting by with this because the issue is too obscure, and also because McCain has a number of flip-flops as well. I liked McCain in 2000. I’m much less happy now. None of which excuses Obama–I’m disappointed.
But at the same time, I think public financing of campaigns was a miserably bad idea and I would be glad to see it die. So perhaps some good will come of it.
Incidentally, I have been very busy trying to work with hosting and fix problems with web sites, so I haven’t blogged as much, but I also think Obama should get on board with some version of the town hall idea. That would be another good indication that we’re really looking at new politics. Otherwise, it begins to look like the regular team of political manipulators are taking over and it truly will be politics as usual.