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To: Zeev Hed who wrote (61157)	11/14/2000 12:04:51 AM
From: Bilow	Respond to of 93625

Hi Zeev Hed; Actually, I don't see why felons and illegal aliens aren't allowed to vote. But it is the law, and there is no doubt as to which party pushed through the relaxed voter registration that removed the barriers against them voting. Re McCain / Feingold campaign finance reform. I would guess that preventing independent issue advocacy would be against the right of free speech, and I wouldn't think it would have as much support as it seems to. As you know, the problem is that as CFR has moved forward, the political parties, and other agenda oriented groups have moved forward as well. There is no way that the laws are going to catch up with the desire of people (and corporations and unions and government employees and foreign countries) desire to get their messages out, at least as long as the limits are set so low compared to the available wealth in the nation. The effect is the same as putting in a law requiring that bread be sold at no more than a given price. If there is a market for it at a higher price, the transactions will take place. But by making the transactions against the law, you have the effect of perverting the law, not altering the transactions. These types of campaign finance reform all have the intention of preventing money from being spent to "educate" voters or "inform" them. There is so much issue advocacy in this country, and its wealth is so great that the limits they are proposing are way, way, way too strict. Instead, they should allow the TV channels to charge whatever they want for boring political advertising, provided that they charge all political ads the same, but trying to prevent people from spending money on politics is impossible. A man of your intellectual ability could undoubtedly think of ways to get around spending limits. I can. If I had to, I could create a new version of laundry soap, call it "Republic White Soap", and push advertisements for it on prime time talking about how it was going to cleanse the nation, etc. I could put advertisements on for "union label goods" and remind people to support their union. I could put together documentaries that showed the "facts" about local ecological issues. All these things are wonderful issue advocacy, and they cannot be stopped by campaign finance reform. Making them illegal won't stop them, they'll just change to avoid the law and put out new versions, slightly less efficient than the previous. In addition to limiting paid for advertisement, what about the effect of the media? They give free air time to candidates who do interesting things, or to candidates that they like, and do not have to balance things. At least with free spending, the other side can pay for ads. Freedom is a tough proposition. What is it about freedom in campaign spending that bugs so many people so much? The quid pro quos involved? One thing we could agree on is accurate and timely public records indicating who paid for what advertising, but that should cover all ads, not just obvious issue advocacy and political ads. Otherwise, you are going to see Green Peace making requests for campaign donations that just happen to mention environmental issues, and NRA ads that offer free training for the right to keep and bear arms. It's not a solvable solution, and McCain/Feingold doesn't solve it. The only fair thing to do is to get rid of all the spending limits and let them go at it. Then the parties would have enough money to do useful things like get out the vote drives, and maybe the Democrats in some of those rundown punch card precincts could upgrade their equipment. -- Carl P.S. I reserve the right to decide whether I think you're a Republican or not. (G)