Who Should be Able to Donate Money to Political Campaigns?

Media Lobbyists Financing Campaigns


Reading this article about lobbyists and super PACs raising money for presidential hopefuls got me thinking about campaign finance reform.  Here is my solution:

1. Only registered voters should be permitted to donate to political campaigns or to spend money advertising on behalf of a candidate or issue.  Corporations, labor unions and professional associations are not registered voters.  Groups like the AFL-CIO, NRA or Planned Parenthood are not voters and should not be allowed to donate money.  Only voters should have the right to donate.  If members of these groups believe strongly enough in a candidate or issue they can write their own check and donate.  This also eliminates the circumstances whereby an idividual member disagrees with the group leadership on issues and candidates and does not want to support them.
2. Some dollar limit should be imposed on individual voters' donations.  We could debate that amount forever.  I suggest $5000 per donor per candidate or issue.  This would eliminate the huge sums of money spent on mudslinging and negative attack ads.  Candidates would be forced to spend their money more wisely and efficiently.
3. Unrelated to campaign finance reform, but campaign reform nonetheless, is the negative advertising.  When I coached youth sports I had a rule for my assistant coaches when dealing with kids.  Before you could criticize a player, you had to compliment him.  I would revise that rule to apply to political campaigns as follows.  Before you attack your opponent, you must tell me something about yourself.  This will force candidates to spend time explaining why they should get your vote, instead of why the other candidate should not.  It will turn the campaign into one of the choice of the better candidate, instead of the lesser of two evils.

Live to Fight Another Day

Cop Slams Teen Age Girl

Did this policeman handle the situation correctly?  No.  The police officer reacted badly, but he was reacting to the girl's action.  Surely there was some other method available, even though this girl was told my multiple authorities to leave the room.  But if this girl had done as she was instructed, none of this would have happened.

Many people are quick to blame cops for any use of force, excessive or otherwise.  There are cops who use too much force at times.  But if this young girl had simply stood up and walked out of the classroom with the officer, there would be no video to watch.

The lesson to be learned is do what police tell you, and if things go very wrong, you will have your day in court to tell the judge.  The key thing in that statement is you will live to fight another day.

If you obstruct police authority, things will not go well for you and you will lose that battle on that day.  In some cases we have seen people die in police altercations, though not in this case.  But the lesson remains valid.

However, if you do as you are told, there will be no use of force by the officer, and you can tell the authorities how wronged you were, and let the process work that out.

Breaking rules and/or laws does not give you permission to not follow police orders given in a lawful manner.  Get up and leave the room, and you won't get body slammed.  It cannot be worth it to aggravate the situation thereby causing an escalation of force required for the officer to remove you.

Nobel Prize Economist Says Growth is Key

Pro-Growth Economist Angus Deaton Echoes JFK

Economic growth is key to getting out of poverty.  High taxation and high regulation inhibit growth, and therefore lead to more poverty and greater inequality of income.

Conservatives have argued this for years.  Ronald Reagan was criticized for his "tax cuts for the wealthy", but lower tax rates led to higher tax revenues and greater economic growth.   Those tax cuts were followed by a long period of economic growth.

President Kennedy also argued for lower taxes to provide for higher growth.  At the time the highest tax rate was 90%.  That rate has already been proposed anew by candidate Bernie Sanders.

Many people on the left repeat the theme of "trickle down economics" when referring to this lower tax for higher growth meme.  In fact, trickle down has never been an accurate description of what occurs here.  What does happen is tax payers are allowed to keep more of their income to spend as they wish versus sending it to the government to spend.  When people have more money to spend or invest they do so.

There are several factors the impact the economic engine that we can control.  Taxation is one, and regulation is another.  Reducing both would be a good step toward growing the economy and raising the economic position of many, including lifting them out of poverty.