No Full Disclosure

I was not really surprised, but I was still disgusted when legislation intended to blunt the effects of the Supreme Court's odious Citizens United decision allowing unlimited amounts of corporate money (some of it from multinational companies!) into political campaigns was unanimously blocked in the U.S. Senate by Republicans from even coming up for a vote. The bill, sponsored by Democratic senators Charles Schumer of New York, Russell Feingold of Wisconsin, and Patrick Leahy of Vermont, would require corporations (and, to be fair, unions, which also benefit from the Citizens United decision, though not nearly as much), to disclose the fact that they allowed money they have taken in to go to a political campaign. Under what's left of campaign finance regulation, Procter and Gamble could theoretically use the profits made from sales of toothpaste and pour that cash limitlessly into a campaign to have an incumbent legislator they don't like voted out of office. Dennis Kucinich, you're on alert.

Republican senators and their backers - not to mention my own Republican congressman, Rodney Frelinghuysen of New Jersey - charge that this law would put new restrictions on free speech and would impinge on the right of advocates for a candidate to get their message across, thus limiting free speech. This is preposterous. This proposed law isn't about restricting anyone from speaking. It's about restricting anyone from shouting too loudly and drowning out everyone else. As long as this bill remains on the sidelines, I would advise the unions to take advantage of the status quo and raise as much campaign cash as possible.

Incidentally, I'm not surprised that occasionally independent GOP senator Scott Brown of Massachusetts sided with his party against this bill. Brown, benefiting from both a fantastic stroke of luck and a lousy opponent, was elected to fill Ted Kennedy's unexpired Senate term two days before Citizens United was handed down, and as a newly entrenched incumbent, this should ensure that he gets elected to a full term in 2012 . . . and 2018 . . . and 2024. . . .

Republican capitalist and William McKinley confidante Marcus Hanna said it best when he said, "There are two things that are important in politics. The first is money and I can't remember what the second one is."