McCain Feingold - a total joke?

[The Vorlon]

MoveOn is running a ton of ads slamming Bush, Citizens United is running a bunch of ads slamming Kerry...

Good to see McCain Feingold is working so well.....

I am sure all the ads that the NRA and the AFL/CIO run will also be non-partisan...

I was having a few second thoughts about tossing out the 1st Amendment, but heck now that we know this election cycle will be squeeky clean compared to 2000 I feel sooooo much better...

[MarkDel]

Vorlon,

Yes, you are right. McCain/Feingold is a TOTAL JOKE and was doomed to be a TOTAL JOKE ever since the Supreme Court decided to trample on our First Amendment rights by ruling this law constitutional.

[© tweed]

It is a joke, I guess, but its intent is correct.  I do believe in intent of the law over the letter of the law, so I don't think that McCain-Feingold's intent was to have money pouring into certain groups freely.

Do you understand what I'm saying?  McCain and Feingold didn't want the system beaten like it is being beaten about now.

[angus]

if it is, then it certainly isn't a very funny one.

[zachman]

I support restricting financial contributions to individuals only, and banning all radio, television, and pop-up political ads.

I hope McCain and Feingold keep fighting for changes.

[zachman]

Television ads are bad for the system.

[© tweed]

Television ads are bad for the system.

I don't see that as true.

[angus]

here's another one:  an illegal law.

"Hearts in the right place, brains in the wrong place is my take on McCain Feingold"  Mine too.

Atlas shrugged:  capitalist propaganda  

[zachman]

Television ads are where candidates effect the most typical audience. Voters shouldn't be persuaded by television ads on how to vote. Pop-up internet political ads are fair but can be the harshest attacks.

[angus]

Television ads are where candidates effect the most typical audience. Voters shouldn't be persuaded by television ads on how to vote. Pop-up internet political ads are fair but can be the harshest attacks.

Yes, and benevolent dictatorship is the most efficient form of government.  And smoking is bad for you.  And booze destroys your brain.  And guns kill people.  Sovereignty lies within Man, not within the State.  Internalized values are generally thought to be of a higher sociological order than enforced ones.  That is the current Western socioscientific thinking.  Perhaps you disagree.

"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."

[zachman]

Yes, campaign finance reform restricts freedom of speech, but that is not a bad thing. Television advertising makes the most politically uneducated make decisions, and that is bad for democracy. Getting rid of television advertising would drasticly lower the production budget of campaigns.

[angus]

Everything you say is true, at least the objective parts.  It is on the normative propositions that we disagree.  I guess that's always the case.  Probably more so intrapartisan than interpartisan.  I'd just say be careful what you wish for.  You might get it.  Economic equality probably seemed like a fantastic idea to the Bolsheviks.  Virtue probably seemed like a noble goal in Iran in 1979.  That sort of tyranny would never happen here though.  Not in the USA, right?

[zachman]

Freedom from paid propaganda on the television is a worthwhile goal.

[angus]

Freedom from paid propaganda on the television is a worthwhile goal.

It is a worthwhile goal.  And this freedom already existed before the McCain-Feingold Act was passed.

[ncjake]

Yes, campaign finance reform restricts freedom of speech, but that is not a bad thing.

?

[StevenNick]

It is a joke, I guess, but its intent is correct.  I do believe in intent of the law over the letter of the law, so I don't think that McCain-Feingold's intent was to have money pouring into certain groups freely.

Do you understand what I'm saying?  McCain and Feingold didn't want the system beaten like it is being beaten about now.

I disagree.  I think McCain-Feingold has a negative intent.  It seeks to take the political voice away from the American people.  Campaign finance reform is an affront to the first amendment.  It blocks the one type of speech that the first amendment was most intent on protecting.  Do you really think Madison was trying to protect Larry Flynt's right to take and publish pictures of naked women?  I'm not so sure.  But I am sure that the first amendment is meant first and foremost to protect political speech.  Everybody should have the right to donate as much money to a campaign as he or she sees fit.  I refuse to accept the McCain-Feingold as anything more than an attempt to restrict my first amendment rights.