Parties and Their Complicated (Legal) Relationship To Their Candidates

   Do parties corrupt their own candidates? Sean Parnell of the Center for Competitive Politics asks, as have others before, and it thinks the answer is clear. And since he is sure of the answer, he questions why we bother with limits on coordinated spending by parties for the benefit of their own candidates.

Posting will resume tomorrow, Friday July 18.

A New Agency and Its Policy Choices

    Meeting for the first time, the Federal Election Commission elected its officers and looked at the challenge ahead.  According to the FEC press release, Chairman McGahn noted the matters of "policy" it would need to address. This is a correctly stated duty of the agency: but it is also the source of the ongoing conflict between the agency and its well-organized, litigious critics  who draw a line between the "law" the FEC must follow and "policy" judgments Congress has already made and that the agency is not free to vary.

Missouri Story -- Or More?

    Missouri’s repeal of its state campaign contribution limits is an interesting development all around.  The public had approved stringent limits, by initiative; those limits failed in court, to be replaced a legislative edition which was tested and survived in the Supreme Court in Nixon v. Shrink Missouri Gov' PAC, 528 U.S. 377 (2000).  Now a Governor, not a candidate for re-election, signed the repeal and will not face the voters over the decision.   The action was taken, the press reports, "without fanfare."

When (McCain’s) $400 Million Is Not Enough to Buy Attention

     Ken Vogel of Politico had a capital idea, which was to catalogue what he considers to be the "myths" on the subject of campaign finance that each of the Presidential campaigns have adopted.  One myth to add to this list:  "John McCain took public funding because he needed the money, facing the certainty that he would be out-raised and out-spent."

Also...

People Known to Gail Collins Who Care About Campaign Finance Reform  7/11/08

When Enough Is as Good as a Feast  7/10/08

A Promising Exchange with Hasen: One More Note on Davis and Public Financing  7/8/08

On Good Government and the First Amendment—and a Postscript on Public Financing  7/7/08

Something To Be Said for Davis?  7/3/08

SpeechNow Put Off for a While: a Damage Report  7/2/08

Money as Speech—or Is It the Sound of Incumbents Speaking?  7/1/08

Justice Alito for the Court, in Davis  6/30/08

Justice Stevens in Dissent, in Davis  6/27/08

Davis v. FEC—First Thoughts on the Demise of the Millionaire’s Amendment  6/26/08