The regrettably large and record-breaking amount spent on political campaigns in 2008 totaled $5.3 billion. More than $2.4 billion of said spending came from the Obama vs. McCain presidential race alone, according to Politico.
Money in politics isn’t anything new. Mark Twain famously satirized the subject, saying, “We have the best government that money can buy.” That wouldn’t be the last time the “if we did not laugh we would cry” mentality would be used on this subject.
Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow is a Super PAC created by comedian Stephen Colbert to poke fun at one of the worst Supreme Court decisions in history and the floodgates of corporate money it unleashed.
It started in the late 19th century when a slew of different court decisions, based on the 14th Amendment, led to corporations being classified as people under the Constitution. These cases granted corporations all the rights that the founding fathers intended for human beings (real, living, breathing human beings.) Later on in 1976, Buckley v. Valeo established that money is speech. Which, again, is apparently something the founding fathers had intended when they granted people freedom of speech. Either way, these events would be the foundation for what comes next.
Flash forward to 2010 and the conservative non-profit Citizens United is suing the Federal Election Commission over an anti-Hillary Clinton ad Citizens United ran in 2008. Long story short, Citizens United won on a 5-4 vote in the conservative-dominated Supreme Court. This decision led to the creation of Political Action Committees and Super PACs, which translates to unlimited amounts of money in politics.
This means someone like billionaire Sheldon Adelso gets to spend $21 million supporting Newt Gingrich through a Super PAC, according to CBS. Would it not seem that he is able to have more speech because he has more money? Huffington Post reports his net worth at $21 billion. This means his donation of $21 million is the equivalent of someone who makes $21,000 donating just $21. No one would agree that $21 million worth of speech is equal to $21 worth of speech.
This is where Stephen Colbert and his Super PAC come in to point out how ridiculous and potentially damaging to our democracy these Super PACs really are.
Candidates themselves cannot be affiliated or coordinate with their supporting Super PACs. That would lead to too much corruption, but Stephen Colbert points out they can do almost anything else. His Super PAC was, at one time, run by close friend Jon Stewart of The Daily Show and his staff at the Colbert Report.
This is similar to the way Mitt Romney’s supporting Super PAC is run by his former aids. This makes perfect sense because how would his former aids ever know what his goals were, what he had planned during his campaign, or anything else aids learn about someone after spending years working for them in an attempt to get them elected as president? Isn’t it obvious how this limitation gets rid of all thoughts of coordination and corruption?
Coordination is the least of the American public’s worries when it comes to Super PACs. Two aspects that truly are worrisome are the expected return on investment and public disclosure.
When a person (a.k.a. a corporation) invests in something like a stock, bond, treasury bill, or let’s say a candidate, they expect a return. Since Mitt Romney’s Super PACs have collected more than $30 million in donations from Wall Street, it is reasonable to think that, if elected, Romney would be doing a lot of favors for Wall Street. This will more than likely include favors for million-dollar Romney donor John Paulson, who is famous for making billions betting on the failure of the sub-prime mortgage market.
It is important to know what candidate owes favors to whom when they go into office. That is why disclosure is so vital to this new process of unlimited donations. The problem is Super PACs only have to report quarterly. So if a candidate receives tens or hundreds of millions from Wall Street, the coal industry, the military industrial complex and oil companies, the candidates don’t have to report it until the next quarter or after the election is already held.
This disclosure process is also meant to prevent illegal donations such as donations from foreign companies and individuals. The sad part is the FEC has documents showing that Super PACs have no trace of huge 6.4 percent segment of the hundreds of millions of donations.
Super PACs, for good reason, are highly criticized. Citizens United and the conservative Supreme Court that handed down that decision have effectively sold democracy to the highest bidder. Those with more money get more speech, influence and favors. The best part of it all is that with such great disclosure standards, at least the public will remain blissfully unaware of this whole process.
