"We must get money out of politics, even if it takes a Constitutional Amendment." Reality time.

[merrily]

The first thing to know is that a great majority of all those polled want money out of politics, esp. anonymous money. The second thing is, after Citizens' United, getting money out of politics will indeed take a Constitutional Amendment. https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/558/08-205. Saying that is highly unlikely is understatement. As a corollary, a POTUS does not amend the Constitution.

This combination makes a no-brainer for a Democratic politician in a roll out of a Presidential primary campaign. The third thing to remember is that, so far, no New Democrat nominee for President, least of all Hillary, has shown any distaste for money whatever when it came to his or her own campaigns, either before or after Citizens' United.

1. "We must get money out of politics...."

The great majority of Americans polled want money out of politics. Democratic politicians rail against Citizens United, including, Obama in a SOTU, when Justice Alito suddenly and notoriously morphed into would-be President Whisperer.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/campaign-ads/264087-poll-majority-want-corporate-money-out-of-politics

http://billmoyers.com/2014/11/21/majority-americans-want-money-politics/

So, far, so good. How could any politician running for a Democratic Party Presidential nomination possibly go wrong running on "We must get money out of politics, even if it takes a Constitutional Amendment?" It's music to Democratic ears--unless those ears are located somewhere in the zone of reality.

2. "....even if takes a Constitutional Amendment."

Let's start with this: the last time a Constitutional amendment that was controversial was adopted was during the Eisenhower administration with a population that had been united by two wars in rapid succession, one against Nazism and the other against the Red Menace, both of which terrified Americans then.

By the 1970s, the nation was already so re-divided that a constitutional amendment ensuring equal rights for a majority of the US population failed to be ratified by the required number of states, although it did at least pass Congress. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Rights_Amendment

I will hazard a guess that polls circa 1970 would have shown a majority of people polled supported equal rights. But then, the propaganda machine on the right whirred and no one on the other side managed to pull the plug on it.

Recall how very divided the nation is now, how easy it is to faux filibuster now, and how little passed through the 60-vote cloture requirement during Obama's first term. Also recall that the incumbents in both Houses of Congress today are mostly Republicans. Thanks to the 2010 re-districting and the advantages of Congressional incumbency, that is unlikely to change any time soon.

With all that reality firmly in mind, let's look at what amending the Constitution of the United States actually requires.

The Constitution provides that an amendment may be proposed either by the Congress with a two-thirds majority vote in both the House of Representatives and the Senate or by a constitutional convention called for by two-thirds of the State legislatures. None of the 27 amendments to the Constitution have been proposed by constitutional convention. And a convention opens up the entire Constitution for amendment, which most people consider too dangerous, especially today.

Absent a Constitutional Convention, Congress proposes an amendment in the form of a joint resolution. Since the President does not have a constitutional role in the amendment process, the joint resolution does not go to the White House for signature or approval. The original document is forwarded directly to NARA's Office of the Federal Register (OFR) for processing and publication. The OFR adds legislative history notes to the joint resolution and publishes it in slip law format. The OFR also assembles an information package for the States which includes formal "red-line" copies of the joint resolution, copies of the joint resolution in slip law format, and the statutory procedure for ratification under 1 U.S.C. 106b.

http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/constitution/

My darling fellow citizens, if we cannot even get 60 votes for cloture in one House, and the supposedly more temperate House at that, how are we going to get a 2/3 vote in both Houses today?

Even faux originalist Scalia says that amending the Constitution is much too difficult.
http://nymag.com/news/features/antonin-scalia-2013-10/index1.html

3. Maybe an even more important thing: Before Citizens United, Congress thought it was perfectly free to limit money in political campaigns and in politics generally. What did we have then? Loads of laws leveling the proverbial playing field and shielding federal politicians from the evils of corruption in politics? Um, no. The laws and rules before Citizens' United were notorious lax and still are. After all, who writes and signs that stuff? Even McCain Feingold was voluntary.

New Democrat Bill Clinton was the first President to designate a re-election War Room within the White House. That didn't go well for those who would like to see money out of politics, though it may be that Gore was scapegoated for what I can only assume was Carville's brainchild. And, it was money from outside the country, too. Remember that SOTU mentioned above? The one where Obama mentioned that Citizens United allowed foreign money in campaigns? Trouble was, 1992 and 1996 were both before Citizens' United.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/scandal/inside/

http://www.nytimes.com/1997/03/04/us/gore-says-he-did-nothing-illegal-in-soliciting-from-white-house.html

See also, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_Room

There seems to have also been some kind of FEC immunity deal for Hillary, though it first came to my attention as I was wrapping up this post and I frankly state I don't know much about it.

http://www.paulvclinton.com/FEC_Complaint_20090502.pdf

Hillary's 2008 primary campaign, also before Citizens' United, raised plenty, including from foreign donors--until the Obama campaign publicized donations from China, whereupon Hillary's campaign returned them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillary_Clinton_presidential_campaign,_2008

New Democrat Obama famously said he would abide by McCain Feingold if the Republican nominee agreed to it. But then, the Republican nominee, ironically, McCain of McCain Feingold, did agree. However, Obama reneged, raising about 3/4 of a billion dollars in hard money alone. The DNC did, however, unabashedly file a complaint with the FEC that McCain was not abiding by McCain Feingold. Things like using his wife's jet for campaign travel were cited.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/dnc-to-file-fec-complaint-over-over-mccain-funding-controversy/

McCain paid the money and that was it. No highly publicized prosecution. John Edwards on the other hand, was prosecuted vigorously by Holder's D of J, while the Edwards' kids were grieving their mom's passing. That case arose because a rich woman doted on him enough that she write checks for antiques, knowing the money was really to house his pregnant baby mama.


And the above does not even touch soft money, where the really big donations live.

Bubba also raised big money from other nations, like the Saudis, for his Presidential library, as I suspect most recent Presidents have and Obama will. And, while Hillary was Secretary of State, foreign nations were very generous to the Clinton Foundation.


This post only skims the surface. Yet, I am not sure I can even sum up this post. Maybe the first two paragraphs of this post are the summation?

Bottom line for me personally, "We must get money out of politics, even if it takes a constitutional amendment" is problematic, to say the least. Maybe we'll hear exactly how Hillary plans to get 2/3 of each House of Congress to pass this and 2/3 of the states to ratify.

I've often posted that the 1% could care less whom we marry and which methods of contraception we use. However, the 1% will care plenty about this. A lobbyist has said the dollars spent to get favorable government action get the biggest bang for the buck of any dollar big business spends on anything. If the ERA couldn't pass, I am not optimistic about Americans defeating Koch Industries, ALEC and others on this one.

[Sherman A1]

1. K&R!

[Enthusiast]

2. Kicked and recommended a whole bunch!

Any candidate that expects my vote better voice their opinion on this issue and the other pressing issues. Seriously.

[merrily]

7. Hillary has voiced her opinion.

What she has said is the title of the thread.

I have my doubts about how she is going to deliver on that.

[JDPriestly]

3. Thank you. You provided a lot of facts that I did not know or had forgotten.

Especially about Hillary Clinton's 2008 campaign.

I'm supporting Bernie Sanders at this point. Thus far, I think he has the cleanest record in terms of the sources of his campaign funds and is the most credible on the issue of campaign finance and (too many ands, I know) the more likely than Elizabeth Warren to run.

But then, anything could happen to Hillary Clinton because she has taken the easy way out in the past in order to accumulate enough money to fund her campaign.

I think that Hillary Clinton needs more money than someone like Bernie Sanders does to run. That is because Hillary Clinton needs a lot of political and media and image advisers in order to maintain the slick kind of campaign she needs to compete with a charlatan like Ted Cruz or a person with personal assets and very rich backers like Jeb Bush.

I don't think Bernie Sanders needs that stuff. He is a crusty old, very smart, very down-to-earth guy. People naturally like him because he is so himself.

I think the only candidate who has said he is seriously thinking about running, the only one who could maybe turn around our campaign finance trap and defeat the money of the 1% is Bernie. And he may not have to win the presidency to do it although I think he would make a great president and of the likely contenders, the best president of the lot.

I hope Bernie runs as a Democrat. It would cause complete chaos in the money-run Democratic Party that we now know, and I think that would be a good thing.

[merrily]

9. AFAIK, whatever money Bernie has, he earned outside Congress or saved from his salary--

and it is not much.

If Bernie manages to raise money, I doubt that he will be hiring 200 plus advisors to tell him how to talk about the economic injustice without sounding like a "combative populist" or making the wealthy feel attacked.

I hope he runs, no matter what. Worse possible case, people will get to hear him.

[JDPriestly]

12. I agree.

[LuvNewcastle]

4. Excellent post.

About the only way that citizens can accomplish anything with regards to campaign financing is to withhold their votes for candidates who get money from the big donors. They would have to be prepared to lose some elections, but people have to be serious about changing our corrupt system and willing to pay attention to who is getting how much from whom.

Most Americans like to bitch about how the country is being run, but they either don't vote or they vote for crooked assholes who have little, if any, concern for the people they're supposed to represent. The truth is that the common American is to blame for most of the shit that is wrong with this country. There are plenty of ways we could change America significantly if we would quit waiting for a leader to come along and just do what we say we're going to do.

[merrily]

13. Thank you!

[RiverLover]

5. Great post. And this is exactly why we need to strongly support Wolf PAC's efforts!

To restore true, representative democracy in the United States by pressuring our State Legislators to pass a much needed Free and Fair Elections Amendment to our Constitution. There are only 2 ways to amend the Constitution. (1) Go through our Federal Government (2) Go through our State Legislators via an amendments convention of the states.

Wolf PAC believes that we can no longer count on our Federal Government to do what is in the best interest of the American people due to the unfettered amount of money they receive from outside organizations to fund their campaigns. We point to the failure of the Disclose Act as rock solid evidence that this would be a total waste of our time, effort, and money. We also point to the recent decision by the US Supreme Court to not even hear a case filed by Montana claiming it did not have to abide by Citizens United, as proof that state legislation is not a sufficient measure to solve this problem. We believe that we have no choice but to put an amendment in the hands of our State Legislators, who are not, at this moment in time, completely blinded by the influence of money and might actually do what 96% of the country wants...take away the massive influence that money has over our political process....

http://www.wolf-pac.com/the_plan

[demwing]

22. Then please donate to the DU for WolfPAC fund

Linked in this thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/127710200

thank you!

[demwing]

6. Kick for exposure / nt

[sabrina 1]

8. What if it became Dem Party policy to refuse to take huge amounts of Corporate money?

I see how difficult it will be to pass a Constitutional Amendment.

But If one Party runs on the poisonous effects of Big Money in politics, makes it a platform, and sticks to it, and REFUSES to accept over a certain amount, wouldn't that bring the issue to the forefront?

Then the OTHER party can be accused of NOT representing the people, unless they too refuse these obscene amounts of money.

First step towards that is to work on electing progressive/left members to the Senate and Congress.

Keep talking about how poisonous money is.

Every time they are on TV, make it a primary issue.

If they really wanted this, they could do it.

But we have to have the right leadership and some very creative thinkers to get the message across without that money.

Great post, btw.

[merrily]

14. Thank you, sabrina 1. Yes, of course, any politician can turn down money, if he or she wants to.

No one seems to want to.

McCain came closest--or so it seemed.

[sabrina 1]

16. It would be a very popular thing to do right now. But as you say, they would have to WANT to do it.

McCain came close to doing it? Hadn't heard that.

[merrily]

17. Obama promised to abide by McCain Feingold in 2008, provided the

Republican candidate did the same. McCain agreed to abide by McCain Feingold, whereupn Obama reneged.

McCain supposedly stuck with it, but did things like use his wife's private jet to fly to some campaign stops. The DNC complained to the FEC. The FEC allowed McCain to pay the money back somehow, but, while the Edwards kids were grieving, prosecuted John Edwards for NOT violating any campaign financing law. (I don't know the ins and outs of the FEC McCain settlement.) Meanwhile, Obama raised about 3/4 of a billion in "hard" money.

[Cosmic Kitten]

10. K&R

[sadoldgirl]

11. To me it is unimportant what she says NOW.

But she will need a lot of money, because most of the attacks
will be directed at her, and because there were/are too many
"Clinton issues".
So, yes, Bernie could get away with far less.

[merrily]

15. IMO, no Dem primary to speak of is a huge mistake, and that is one of the reasons I oppose the

anointing attempt.

[sabrina 1]

18. Good OP to read again, now that Bill Clinton has once again called for a

Constitutional Amendment though he doesn't say how that could be accomplished. THIS OP explains how little chance there is to get that done, making the newly revived meme, appear to be nothing but Campaign Rhetoric.

[marym625]

19. Great post!

Truly, great post!

Thank you!

[merrily]

20. Thank you, mary. I used to at least try to make them good.

[merrily]

21. OMG, Hillary just said it again.

I thought she had walked this back to making reversal a litmus test for nominating Justices. And again, reversal of Citizens by the SCOTUS (or by Constitutional amendment, however unlikely that is) would get us only to McCain Feingold, which is totally voluntary.