From Citizens United to Lobbyists United
Mark Hemingway with the daily bummer:
The DISCLOSE Act is the Democrats big legislative “fix” to pushback against the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision that eliminated a number of campaign finance restrictions on first amendment grounds. It just passed the House this afternoon — even with 36 Democrats voting against it. [...] "The language in question would exempt from disclosure requirements transfers of cash from dues-funded groups to their affiliates to pay for certain election ads."
So unions now get nearly unrestricted, undisclosed political spending. Further, the restrictions in the DISCLOSE Act only cut one way — against business [...] under the DISCLOSE Act if a company has more than $7 million in government contracts, it has no right to political speech. But public sector unions can spend millions of recycled tax dollars campaigning for Democrats, no problem. All this will likely do is make business spend more money on lobbyists rather than campaigns.
Now that's progressive.
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May '10
Re: From Citizens United to Lobbyists United
I've commented before on this sinister trend. Government works to restrict the free speech of government contractors while simultaneously growing so more businesses become government contractors.
May '10
Re: From Citizens United to Lobbyists United
Dem leaders, though, know it will never get through the Senate, so the whole exercise was just bone-throwing to their base. But they even screwed that up by tossing in the NRA exemption, which infuriated their base. In the long run, a win for the good guys (but a stain on the NRA).