Corruption and Campaign Finance

Here is a statement by the Campaign Legal Center on this week's House vote approving radical new limits on independent speech, in the form of "527" groups. Note the money quote:

During the 2004 elections, a number of 527 organizations spent millions of dollars in soft money on attack ads and partisan voter activities. Because of the Federal Election Commission's refusal to enact common sense regulations, these 527 organizations operate with impunity - creating enormous inequities as candidates, political parties and registered PACs play by one set of rules and the 527 groups play by another. By their own identification, 527 groups are in the business of trying to influence the outcome of elections.

Notice there is no mention at all of "corruption," which remains, even in the bastardized form of McConnell v. FEC, the only basis for regulation.

That's the money quote. Here's the humor quote:

We urge the Senate to pass the 527 legislation, to reject any "poison pill" amendments that would undermine existing campaign finance laws, and to put good public policy before short-term partisan interest.

Of course, this bill's only chance of passage in the Senate, and the only reason it passed in the House, is the Republican calculation that this bill is in their short term partisan interest.