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So what can be done about the SCOTUS decision? [View All]

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dsc Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-24-10 10:53 PM
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So what can be done about the SCOTUS decision?
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First, let's be sure we understand what it did, and did not, allow.

Federal campaign law has, since Watergate, limited individuals to $2400 in donations per election (primary and general both count) so you max out at $4800. Seperately people are limited to $30,400 to the federal campaign committees. Corporations, and labor unions, since 1907 have been banned from giving at all to any of the above. All of those rules still are in place.

Under Buckley v Rodeo, individuals were permitted to spend unlimited funds on their own campaigns. Thus Perot could spend millions of his fortune to run for President in 1992 and again in 1996. That case still stands.

What happened under Citezens United is that corporations and labor unions are now permitted to spend as much as they wish, whenever they wish, to run independent campaigns. Any direct regulation of such spending has to be within the confines of the first amendment.

First, what we can't do. We can't just reban the contributions or repass McCain Feingold.

We can do some regulation of corporations. One we could make shareholders agree to the spending. Depending on the margin required this could be a fairly simple requirement or a very onerous one. It would seem that at the very least, the same opt out provisions that are required of unions should be required of corporations. Two, we could ban federal contractors from running federal campaigns, as we currently ban federal employees from contributing. Three we could refuse to exempt such spending from taxes. Four, we could ban foreign owned companies from engaging in such spending just as we forbid foreign citizens from doing so now.

None of this ends the problem and nothing short of a Constituional Amendment will solve the problem.

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