David Bates Has A Right To Freedom of Religion and Free Speech Without Being Maligned By Democrat Hacks

By Rep Steve Vaillancourt

First a caveat.  I don't agree with Rep. Bates on the gay marriage issue.

However, like every other American, he has the right to both freedom of speech and freedom of religion.  If Democratic spokeshack Harrell Kirstein and  Peter Burling (who seems only too willing to crawl out from under his rock to offer an opinion no matter how ill-informed he may be), had their way, only members of their own party would be given freedoms of speech and religion.

Hey, Herr Kirstein, hey Comrade Burling, our forefathers fought for our freedoms so that we could all enjoy them, not just those who agree with us.

Burling is particularly misinformed when he says the GOP leadership has promised to "stay away from faith-based legislating" and deal with the budget shortfall.  I believe what GOP leadership has said, and both the Speaker, Senate President and Majority Leader restated this on my television show this week is that they would focus first on fiscal issues, not that they totally stay away from other issues.  Two years ago, Dems insisted that we could do a budget and deal with gay marriage at the same time.  They were right, and Republicans are right to say now we can deal with the budget and gay marriage repeal (which I will oppose).

To see Burling and Kirstein make fools of themselves nationwide is bad news for NH.  If you don't believe me, Google this topic and check out what a Las Vegas paper has to say about it.

This isn't the first time Ray Buckley's Dems have shown littler regard for free speech.  Remember how Buckley and then Speaker Norelli forced Rep. Tim Horrigan to resign for an innocuous comment he made regarding Palin last summer.  Free speech is for all; it's especially important to protect when we disagree with the free speaker, a concept Democrats ignore at their own peril.

CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM HAS FAILED: HOW DO WE BRING IT BACK?

Corporate lobbyists and campaign finance reformers now have something in common: They are  both anxiously awaiting a decision of the Supreme Court. The outcome could, in the opinion of one commentator, “loosen the floodgates of corporate money” into political campaigns. The corporate folks await such a decision with hope; their opponents, with naked fear. What no one is acknowledging, however, is that the “floodgates” already have been largely opened. Campaign finance reform has failed no matter how it is labeled, whether “McCain-Feingold” or the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act [BCRA].

One might as well say “So what!” to prevailing ceilings on corporate contributions  and the limited constraints placed on lobbyists and lobbying. Corporate money pours into campaigns through wealthy individuals and their families, lobbyists, corporate PACs, corporate-sympathetic or affiliated “527” groups, chambers of commerce, other corporate-based not-for-profit organizations, etc. So, for the most part, a Supreme Court decision that states that corporate “free speech” has been unconstitutionally limited by the BCRA would confirm what is going on rather than represent a major shift. It would appear be a radical change only in light of a long legal history that declared corporate contributions to be illegal even in the face of a reality that increasingly evolved to demonstrate otherwise.

So, the question to be faced is not one of: What do we do now that the “floodgates” have been opened? It is: How do we effect meaningful and effective campaign finance reform given that the BCRA failed long before the Supreme Court decision had been passed down? We can answer this question by taking a step back to notice the great irony of campaign finance reform. It pretended to get big money out of politics via legislation and language that recognized only money as the critical resource of political campaigns.  What about the value of peoples’ time contributed as political volunteers? Is politics with, by and for people or is it only about money?

I worked on the campaign finance reform [CFR] issue as a member of the Campaign Reform Committee of the Campaign for America during the ‘90’s. At the same time, I was working on a book to promote a grassroots, people-based politics, entitled WE THE PEOPLE: A Conservative Populism. By the time the book was published, I had developed an approach to CFR very different from that of the McCain-Feingold bill that became law as the BCRA. This approach was based on a contrary assumption -- that if we want a people’s House rather than the best Congress money can buy, we need to recognize that:

 (1) People rather than money are the most critical resource of political campaigns; and that…

(2) The minimum value of peoples’ time, represented by the minimum wage, can be credited as a tax incentive up to the total annual value of the time that people contribute to political campaigns.

The sticking point of effective CFR has been limits on campaign expenditures. Such ceilings have been declared as unconstitutional under the 1^st Amendment, as limits to political “speech.”  But what if such limits apply only to expenditures of money but not to expenditures of time? Then, total expenditures that include the imputed monetary value of volunteers’ time could be unlimited and so more likely to pass Supreme Court review. This is the basis of a new approach to CFR, one that brings American politics back to people and away from the corruption of big money. It also provides an incentive for people to participate in a political process that should be theirs but which has been largely taken over by political pro’s, careerists and media.

Other reformers, including Granny D and Rep. Jim Splaine here in NH, say that the only solution is public financing of campaigns. They are wrong on several counts. The three prime objections to public financing are: (i)  What economists call the “deadweight burden” of the subsidy provided to candidates is too high. A large percentage of those subsidized would run even without public funding; (ii)  Public financing would aggravate rather than reduce the high rate of inflation of the costs of campaigns; and (iii) Many people object to having their tax dollars used to help finance candidates they do not like.

Anyway, It’s high time to bring CFR back, high up on the public agenda as part of a larger strategy to reform Congress. The only NH candidate for Congress to do this is Peter Bearse.

Released by Peter Bearse, Ph.D.., Independent-Conservative Candidate for Congress, January 21, 2010