Martin Frost and Tom Davis: An idea for fixing campaign finance

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.omaha.com/opinion/martin-frost-and-tom-davis-an-idea-for-fixing-campaign/article_10821ff3-d0a0-5ac8-8191-2fb710fc260f.html

Frost, a Democrat from Texas, served in Congress from 1979 to 2005. Davis, a Virginia Republican, served from 1994 to 2008. They wrote this for the Philadelphia Inquirer.

When we sat down to write our new book, “The Partisan Divide: Congress in Crisis,” we knew there was no more important issue than the current campaign finance debacle.

The system of unlimited political money — much of it “dark” money that doesn’t have to be publicly disclosed — is threatening the future of our democracy. And even the contributions that must be disclosed often come from just a handful of wealthy families who are not necessarily looking out for the interests of the average voter.

We each chaired our party’s House campaign committees. And we both spoke out against passage of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill in 2002. We predicted that the legislation, by ending fully reportable political party “soft money” (corporate, labor and large individual contributions), would inevitably divert big money to shadowy outside groups with narrow political agendas.
The U.S. Supreme Court in its 2010 Citizens United decision made this come true in spades. Prior to Citizens United, rich individuals could spend unlimited sums to buy political ads to attack candidates. Citizens United extended this right to corporations and labor unions.

FULL story at link.

[Nye Bevan]

1. "That could only be changed by a constitutional amendment..."

A long article stating the obvious. If you want to remove First Amendment protection from political speech intended to influence elections, a constitutional amendment is indeed necessary.

[brucefan]

2. I stopped reading at

" Democrat from Texas"

[11 Bravo]

3. Tom was my supervisor on the Fairfax County Board and later ...

on was my representative in Congress. (I also coached against him in many Little League games way back when.)
Every time I see him, I always remind him that he's the only Republican I have ever voted for.