David Obey: “today I am introducing the Let the Public Decide Campaign Finance Reform Act. Two developments over the last year have…”

“today I am introducing the Let the Public Decide Campaign Finance Reform Act. Two developments over the last year have demonstrated that for all practical purposes there are no longer any campaign finance rules in this country. One development is the series of court decisions which have resulted in special interest groups being able to get around virtually all limits of existing campaign finance law. They are allowed to do so by engaging in so called independent expenditures or by issuing promotion schemes which maintain the fiction that such groups are not involved in individual campaigns. The second development is the recent series of news stories involving large contributions of so-called soft money to both political parties. The result is that wealthy people and groups can skirt the intention of Congress to limit the amount of influence that wealthy individuals or organizations can have on the political process. Merely tinkering with existing campaign laws will have no real effect. It will do no good for instance, to pass feel good legislation which would cut the $5,000 limit on contributions by political action committees if companies who finance those political action committees can make indirect expenditures 20 or 30 times as large through other means. For me, the last election was the last straw on campaign finance. I honestly believe that this problem can only be addressed with a flat out elimination of all private money in general elections.”