Defend This, McCainiacs

Ryan Segar has a terrific article at TCS about one piece of legislation we're better off without...

The war on free speech continues in Congress. The crew that did its darndest to repeal the First Amendment back in 2002 -- Sens. John McCain and Russ Feingold and Reps. Chris Shays and Marty Meehan - is back, and now its looking to clean up the mess left by the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act.

That mess: insidious "527" groups, like MoveOn.org's Media Fund and the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, of course.

The problem, it seems, is that there are still just too darn many independent groups allowed to go shooting their mouths off about any darn thing any darn time they want -- and they can accept pretty much any amount of money from pretty much anyone.

There should be a law.

And there will be, since free-speech looks to have no defenders left in Congress. In 2002 some conservative stalwarts --people who believed that money and speech couldn't be distinguished, since it takes money to make speech heard -- tried to hold out against the McCain-Feingold mania to get money out of politics.

But this time there are far fewer brave souls.

Last week, a bill was introduced in the Senate that would force 527s to register with the Federal Election Commission and restrict the groups' ability to raise and spend money.

The bill enjoys the support of Trent Lott, who had been one of 41 senators to vote against McCain-Feingold. Now, however, he's decided that any money given by wealthy individuals is "sewer money."

And why is this money so dirty suddenly?

"It was an unintended consequence of McCain-Feingold. Instead of going to the parties, rich people are putting money into these 527s in the dark of night," Lott told the Sun Herald in Biloxi, Miss.

In other words, some of those rich people might be trying to throw out incumbents.

McCain is even more blatant about the incumbent-protection angle. As The Washington Times reported last week, "McCain said lawmakers should support the bill out of self-interest, because it would prevent a rich activist from trying to defeat an incumbent by directing money into a political race through a 527 organization."

Understand, I appreciate McCain's service to his country, and even more so his often blunt manner of speaking, which is rare for a politician. Some of his policy views are okay by me, some are not. I think he's a terrific leader and a good man.

But on this issue, he's dead wrong. And I'm sick of his crusade against money in politics.

As Willie Sutton once observed, he robbed banks because that's where the money was. People spend money on politics because it matters. Winning elections is important. We spend plenty of money on things that aren't so important in the grand scheme (see music, movies and sports), so people choosing to expend cash to influence politics is not some terrible omen we should dread.

McCain's intentions may be good (although that quote tends to make me doubt it), but his legislation is basically a tool to protect incumbents. For a guy who's a political maverick, he's doing a whole lot to help perpetuate the power of the two major political parties.

Yeah, rich people financed MoveOn, the Swift Boat Veterans, and God knows how many other 527 organizations. But their charges only stuck when they had some air of legitimacy to them. You can't bar negative campaigning, much as some people would like to do so.

In the end, the solution to misinformation is the correct information, not some misguided attempt to suppress free speech. I'd just appreciate it if a few more McCain fans acknowledged the error of their hero's ways.