A Case for Public Campaign Funding

            An e-mail message from the political party I am registered with informed me that it had come to their attention that after several requests, there had not been any donations associated with that e-mail address.  If they were wrong, then they apologized.  However, if they were correct they wanted to know why there hadn't been any donations?  Further, they wanted to know, what would take to get me to make a donation? There were several responses to choose from and I chose to tell them I was supporting the party in other ways and that frost warnings for Hell might break me out of donating slump.

            To say that I’m conservative in my spending and donating habits is not completely true.  I don’t have any spending habits and for a very long time I haven’t donated money to anything other than contributions to my wife’s charitable attitude towards our descendants.  If you listen closely, you can hear me squeak when I walk by.  So when a political party, candidate, or other entity asks me for money they are generally wasting resources.  Wasting resources is one of the reasons for my prohibition on campaign donations. 

            Quite a while back, I made a couple donations of twenty-five dollars each.  For me those were major monetary transfers.  After the checks cleared, the requests for more money ramped up so much that my twenty-five dollar checks could not have funded the effort for more than a few months.  It didn’t matter that there wasn’t any response to the requests.  The requests started to include warnings that each one was going to be the last and that model was repeated periodically for years.  Once you’re in the database as a contributor, the files never seem to be purged of deadbeats.

            When the money isn’t being wasted on ineffective mailings, what is it being used for?  Swift-boat style attack ads or misleading spin-speech?  I don’t like that stuff coming from campaigns that I don’t agree with, why would I fund that garbage for an issue or politician I support?  I know, I know, because it works.  That’s not good enough for me because I don’t have money to throw around like that.  When I consider what I could have done with those two donations of twenty-five dollars each, it really grates on me what the recipients did with them.

            Consider for a moment what could be done with the millions, maybe billions of dollars, of campaign war-chest money if it were to be spent on something other than political indulgences.  A lot of the problems the politicians and campaigns claim they are going to fix could get fixed with the campaign donations and without any additional tax money being spent.  It is all relative to how much money you have to spend.  If you have lots of money, then you can have fun spending on whatever you want including spending some of it on politics.  If you spend lots of money to get things to go your way, then the people who don’t want that to happen – including people with less money -- will use up their limited resources trying to match your contributions and/or you’ll out spend them so much that they will eventually give up and you win.  It’s a game for the super rich and it is good source of income for professional political advisors, for many professional political campaign organizers, and, most certainly, for advertisers. 

            Politicos say that public funding won’t work for political campaigns.  One claim is that there wouldn’t be enough money to run the campaigns.  I agree that there wouldn’t be enough money to run the campaigns the way they are run now.  However, if campaign funding was severely limited, then perhaps, the campaigners would have to stick more to the facts and the issues.  Even if a campaign wanted to run a negative attack, the limited funding might tend to force the attack to be a more truthful negative attack since there wouldn’t be funding for the big shotgun-blasting-mud-slinging-see-what-sticks type of negative campaigning that we have to endure now.   

            Wouldn’t it be nice to have a few nights during the month proceeding the election when the candidates and the campaigns spent some time describing the issues as they see them and telling us what they intended to do to make things better?  You could have some paper and a pencil ready to take some notes for comparisons.  After you did your comparisons, you could decide how you wanted to vote without all the confusion and frustration that we go through every election cycle now.  With the money you saved by not having to make political contributions to save the shade trees on your street or enrich some political candidate’s campaign advisors, you could go out to eat after you get done voting.  You might even have money to contribute to a truly worthwhile cause where they used your money to accomplish something.

SOUTH DAKOTA ELECTED OFFICIALS SUPPORT GOLIATH WHILE CITIZENS SUPPORT DAVID

The following guest post is a public news release:

SOUTH DAKOTA ELECTED OFFICIALS SUPPORT GOLIATH

WHILE CITIZENS SUPPORT DAVID

Citizen Protest Against Private Foreign Companies Use of Eminent Domain

(Rapid City, SD) South Dakota elected officials including Senator Thune, Representative Noem, Governor Daugaard, and the SD Legislature continue to support TransCanada, a foreign corporation, over South Dakota landowners. Even after the Presidential permit for the proposed Keystone XL pipeline has been denied, TransCanada continues to move forward with eminent domain court proceedings against local landowners.

This Saturday, February 25, 2012 at noon, citizens of South Dakota will come together at Main Street Square in downtown Rapid City to protest TransCanada’s continued bullying of landowners and our elected officials who continue to repeat false statements about the proposed project. Citizens will speak up against their elected officials ignoring their constituents. Members of groups supporting this action include Occupy Rapid City, Dakota Rural Action, and SD Peace and Justice. We believe the Davids of our country should be represented when the Goliaths, like TransCanada, do not play fair.

While a construction project will bring short-term jobs, long-term growth for SD depends upon the health of our soil and water and the families who have spent their lives as stewards of these resources. Why would private property rights be given away to a foreign company that has not proven they can care for the land, its resources, and water?

Dakota Rural Action, a grassroots organizing non-profit, recently introduced HB 1111 into SD Legislation. This bill aims to create an even playing field for both landowners and private organizations and define a clear process for good faith negotiations where eminent domain is used as a last resort in the development of railroads and large transmission pipelines for hydrocarbons. Unfortunately, the bill failed on the House floor last week with a 35 to 35 reconsideration vote.

“According to The New York Times, the company has at least 34 eminent domain actions against landowners in Texas, and 22 in South Dakota.2 And their threats to landowners in Nebraska3 helped spark massive public opposition and a special legislative session that were key in the decision to consider a different route.” -Credo Action

South Dakota landowners have proven and earned their right to private property rights over multiple generations through their responsible stewardship. Why are we letting the Goliaths continue with condemnation proceedings on a project that offers little public benefit? 

For More Information:

Clay and Mary Ellen Uptain

Occupy Rapid City

605.341.0724

dcu777@rushmore.com

occupyrapidcity.org

Jessica Miller

Dakota Rural Action

605.716.2200

jessicam@dakotarural.org

dakotarural.org

Jim Peterson

SD Peace & Justice

petersen100@cs.com

1. "Keystone XL Pipeline: Texas Farmer Wins Temporary Restraining Order Against TransCanada," Huffington Post, February 14, 2012
2. "Eminent Domain Fight Has a Canadian Twist," New York Times, October 17th, 2011
3. "TransCanada Keystone XL Eminent Domain Threat Letter ," Dirty Oil Sands
4. "Texans rally against Keystone XL oil pipeline easement," LA Times, February 17, 2012

Free Speech and the Influence of Money on Democracy

If you like to pass along false rumors and innuendos about the President -- any president -- and the President’s policies, you can be reasonably confident you’ll never be called out for it by a member of your own political party.  In my opinion, the Republicans excel at this ability, but the Democrats cannot be far behind with this flawed sense of party loyalty.  The news media helps to perpetuate the concept, by ignoring any responsibility for fact checking much of what it passes along to the public.  Nothing new here I suppose, but there are some journalistic accounts of the media exercising its supposed position as “watchdog for the public.” 

The lure of advertising dollars has corrupted the “eye of the public” function of many media outlets in the world today.  The need to maintain large readership/viewership numbers in order to entice advertisers is too strong a need for corporate media businesses.   Unfortunately, the general public has been all too willing to let this undesirable development come about.  Reporting the news is more about money than journalism.  

While we’ve been sleeping, the people that benefit the most from this situation have been quietly solidifying their power over our society.  Numerous examples exist of this constant struggle to promote favor for the few at the expense of the majority.  Some of these examples include eliminating protections for workers and the public safety.  Alarm at this development is small since only a minority of people is able to relate to the overall negative trend.  Far too many people belong to the group of trusting voters who believe their political candidates will become their trusted representatives in power once they get into office.  The truth -- for those willing to seek it -- is less than encouraging with regarding elected representatives and who they represent when they get into office.  Representing the people in public office is more about money than civic duty and protecting the interests of the public.

The Tea Party claims to be an organization that evolved from public dissatisfaction with the political process in this country.  That may or may not be true, but regardless of the virtue of the party’s origins, some observers believe that the Tea Party has been co-opted or corrupted by powerful moneyed interests.  The two major parties seem to be controlled by the people within them that are more concerned with continuing their careers than with promoting ideology to benefit the public welfare.  

Assume for the sake of discussion that you are qualified in everyway to hold an elected office.  What are the chances that you could win an election to an office outside of the state you live in?  Then ask yourself how much money has to do with your answer.   Now ask yourself, who controls the money?

The press and other news media used to hold the upper hand with its ability to gather information and report that information to the public and the public had to rely on them for news information.  Now days many people carry camera phones and other small recording devices.  This is a scary development for entities that would like to filter, disguise, or block knowledge of their activities from the prying eyes of the public.   Even without the official press doing its job, in some ways it is harder today to hide questionable activities from the public.  Some of the responsibility for exposing these questionable activities has been taken over by people involved in demonstrations of public dissent.   Organized dissent worries those entities that don’t want close public scrutiny of their activities. 

Motivated opinion comment/letter writers continue to send their opinions to newspapers and other media outlets in the hope that those letters will be posted and read by others.  Some of those comments and letters do get posted or published and the Internet has made it easier for people to make public comments.  However, compare the impact of any single letter or comment writer’s efforts with the impact of well funded groups or large corporations.  Both are expressions of free speech, but are they equal?

24 hours to stop Keystone XL

Dear Friends,

The Senate could vote as early as tomorrow on a plan to greenlight construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline!

Despite President Obama's rejection of the Keystone XL Pipeline a few weeks ago, Republicans in Congress are once again engaging in hostage-taking, and some moderate Democrats appear to be playing along - so this bill could have enough votes to pass, and force this pipeline down our throats.

To demonstrate a massive, urgent, grassroots backlash, three dozen groups have organized a 24-hour petition drive to the Senate.

Help us get 500,000 signatures in 24 hours against Keystone XL. Click below to sign the petition:

http://act.credoaction.com/campaign/kxl_24hours/?r_by=34968-3451380-SeEQOxx&rc=confemail

Occupiers attend Oglala Lakota Nation sponsored Rally on XL Pipeline

Yesterday was a very interesting day.  It started out the same as most Saturdays.  I read the paper and some other things online.  Several people called on the phone and we talked about the stuff we usually talk about.  Then at about eleven thirty, I went down town to join the other Occupy Rapid City protesters for what has become our standard activity for mid-day Saturday.

One of the Occupiers is a semi-retired professor and writer, Elisabeth Cook-Lynn.  She is a very interesting lady.  She told me that she intended to go to the Mother Butler Center at one o'clock for a gathering organized by the Ogalala Sioux Tribe Vice President Tom Poor Bear to discuss stopping the Keystone XL pipeline.

Marvin Kammerer had told me earlier during our phone conversation that he intended to go to that gathering and asked me if I would like to go.  Since Elisabeth had reminded me, I decided that I would go.  Several other members of Occupy Rapid City decided to go check out the gathering at the Mother Butler Center.

What an experience that turned out to be.  People were still arriving when I got to the gymnasium at the Mother Butler Center at about ten minutes after one.  A table was set near the door with some documents that looked like there were there for anyone that was interested, so I helped myself.  Next to that table was another table with jewelry on display and for sale.  The kitchen appeared to be in operation also.  The middle of the gym had several rows of chairs that would provide seating for around a hundred people. 

Behind the chairs, was a large drum and several drummers were seated around it.  A podium and tables were arranged near the west end of the gym which allowed for an open area in front of the chairs for the audience.   About ten people were seated at the tables, facing the audience.  It looked as though if everyone were to sit down, the audience seating would be at full capacity.

A friend of Marvin's that I recognized was at the podium, Alex White Plume.  He proceeded to introduce several of the people in attendance and to explain what the gathering was for.  He then introduced his cousin who opened the gathering with a prayer in Lakota.  Many of the speakers spoke in the Lakota language for a portion of their speeches.  

                  Figure 1 Vice President Tom Poor Bear seated and Deb White Plume speaking

Several members of the tribal council were in attendance.  Vice President Poor Bear introduced the grandson of Chief Red Cloud, who is a chief himself.  Chief Oliver Red Cloud was the first speaker to address the assembly.  The senior attorney for the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, Steve Emery, was one of the speakers.  He was followed by several people with special knowledge about the various aspects of the pipeline project, such as the potential for pollution, emanate domain proceedings, ongoing legislation, employment claims, tax revenue considerations, and more. 

There were people there from several states including Colorado, Minnesota, and Nebraska; there may have been more states represented, but those are three that I remember hearing mentioned.  There were several ranchers and farmers that were being directly impacted by the plans for the XL pipeline to cross their property.  Two ranchers, John Harter from the Winner area and Paul Seamans from Draper South Dakota talked their personal involvement with emanate domain proceedings.  There were environmental activists that were concerned about the impact of Tar Sands mining and refining.  There was a young musician there that had written songs about the Tar Sands and Pipeline.  She sang two of her songs and accompanied herself on the guitar.

All this was interspersed with music.  At one point, the speaker, Steve Emery, introduced his Auntie, Madonna Thunderhawk.  He invited her up front and then invited everyone to come up and shake hands with her or give her a hug.  It didn’t take that long to do and everyone appeared to enjoy the opportunity.

Figure 2 Steve Emery speaking and seated to the right Chief Red Cloud, Alex White Plume, and an un-named participant

Marvin was asked to speak and it appeared to me that he didn't know they were going to do that.  He had been taking some notes when others were speaking.  His notepad was an inch and a half by two inch piece of paper he had in his pocket.  Marvin really shines in settings like that and he said he had quite a bit to say.  He spoke for about thirty minutes and during that time he had the audience applauding, voicing their approval, and emotionally involved.

I'm glad I went.  Unfortunately, I did not take notes while I was there and just the two pictures.  For anyone that was there, if my memory is off a little in my account, please forgive me.  Forgive me too all those wonderful people that participated in this event and that I should have identified in this article.  Apparently, the Rapid news media didn't consider it news worthy event.

Corporate Influence

The January 23 issue of High Country News includes an article entitled Billboard corporations use money and influence to override your vote.  The Editor’s Note column on page one is headed with “An era of increasing corporate power” and you can read the editor’s comment online under the title Billboard corporations and other big industries make their own rules. 

Another example of corporate power and influence on government can be seen in the 2012 session of the South Dakota legislature a bill to undue what some people believe was a legislative mistake gets tabled in committee.  HB1098 would have restored state permitting power on uranium mines and reversed last year’s legislation. Cheryl Rowe, Lilias Jarding, and Rebecca R. Leas wrote letters to the editor of the Rapid City Journal expressing support for this year’s proposed bill.  Other opponents of last year’s legislation from the area near where the uranium mining would take place also testified before the committee.  However, one of the bill’s main sponsors decided that the bill needed to be “refined” and that she would resubmit the new bill next year.  

The following article is taken from the West River Electric February 2012 issue of the “Cooperative Connections” magazine, page 15:

It is worth it to do a little research into the reversal of the so called ban on incandescent light bulbs.  For another explanation of whether or not there is a ban on incandescent light bulbs plus lots more information on the topic look here.  One article referred to this recent US Congressional activity as a victory for the US Tea Party.  Was it in fact a victory for the Tea Party or was it an example of the effectiveness of political influence capabilities of Koch Industries?

Okay, ignore my inference to right-wing conspiracy and ask yourself some questions. 

1.  Who benefits the most from the examples of political influence listed above?

2.  Do you like looking at the local scenery that you can see through bill boards or would you prefer to just look at the scenery without the bill boards? 

3.  Is it worth the risk of polluting our drinking water in order to make it easier for Power Tech to mine for uranium in the Black Hills?

4.  If you can save money and help the whole world save energy by changing to a light bulb that is more efficient, why wouldn’t you?

5.  Who benefits if you don’t change to the more efficient light bulb?

I would like to read you answers.