Patterned on Lance and Papacy ─ Rotten-to-the-core wrong judged right

Graft open season closed a bit, temporarily 

Editing, commentary by
Carolyn Bennett

Because of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in “Citizens United,” legalizing graft, the buying and selling of public office to the highest bidder and bundlers ─ all in the name of “freedom of speech” ─ one of the states of these United States is experiencing severe breakdown in its restraints on graft in political campaigns. The Montana press reports:

Struck down ─ last month by a federal appeals court (Citizens United cited), Montana’s ban on partisan endorsements of judicial candidates

Ruled Unconstitutional─ earlier this year by U.S. District Judge Charles Lovell, Laws requiring attack ads to disclose voting records and the banning false statements known to be false in such ads

Removed ─ by the Supreme Court, Montana’s century-old, voter-approved ban on independent corporate political spending in state races

Struck down  ─ claiming them to be “an unconstitutional violation of free-speech rights,” last week by Judge Lovell, most of Montana’s limits on what people, political parties and political-action committees can give to state candidates

Destroyed ─ eighteen years of voter decisions limiting rot into the garbage bin: a judge rules legal illegal, illegal legal.

Breakdown

Vultures on carcass

In this tsunami of corruption, the Montana press last week cited a voicemail recording of Missoula’s state Representative Champ Edmunds saying money must rush in as the state judge’s ruling and pending ruling had left open “a limited window” for making donations “for any amount, for any candidate.”

This public official confirmed to the press his urging to circumvent Montana law, buy a contender for public office: “Right now,” this public servant said,

[t]here are no campaign-finance limits, so if you know of anybody that can write checks, you might want to give them a call.

M

ontana’s Department of Justice filed for a stay to stop or delay this dodging of law, at least in an election season, and yesterday; less than a week after Lowell threw law and common sense to the wind, “The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals intervened and reinstated Montana’s campaign donation limits (but for how long), telling the federal judge who struck down the limits that the panel needs to see his full reasoning so it can review the case.”

Back and forth justice

Lowell fired back with a 38-page document reinforcing his earlier ruling that the state’s check on graft curtails “effective campaigning.”

How ridiculous is this: a judge’s attempt to criminalize what is right and legalize what is wrong, especially in face of the well-published fact that tons of money ─ from in-state and out-of-state, hidden and revealed sources, from corporate and bundled sources ─ routinely flood (laundered or not) into U.S. political campaigns at all levels, and is by definition, corrupt and corrupting.

The Ninth Circuit held off responding to Lowell and, for now, has left Montana’s lawful limits in place as voters head into another Election Day.

M

y view is this.

It really does not matter, at least it should not matter what political party you side with, whether you are partisan or nonpartisan. 

What matters is having a functional not dysfunctional democracy, enabled and sustained by the citizenry (We the people, human beings clearly identifiable as human beings).

In a true democracy, a constitutional democracy, a representative republic, having the highest standards we can achieve or imagine ─ the process by which officials are put into public office must be clean, impartial, fair and just.

One person, one vote (not a cabal or nonprofit or NGO or corporate entity); each and every vote counts and is counted without prejudice, tampering or interference ─ human, electronic, or otherwise.

Justice and fairness characteristic of this true democracy I envision (and I am sure others do as well) is not come by at the point of a gun or bomb, under threat or coercion, by sale or purchase, by the weight of moneychangers’ influence, bags or bundles of money ─ on or off the floors of capitols and state houses.

Democracy worth its name cannot be bought or sold and any attempt to do so destroys every scrap of its possibility.

Sources and notes

“State asks to stay contribution-limit ruling” (October 04, 2012 5:52 pm • By MIKE DENNISON IR State Bureau), http://helenair.com/news/state-and-regional/govt-and-politics/state-asks-to-stay-contribution-limit-ruling/article_80f6ec6c-0e7e-11e2-af4e-001a4bcf887a.html

“Appeals court reinstates Montana campaign finance limits,” October 10, 2012, http://helenair.com/news/state-and-regional/appeals-court-reinstates-montana-campaign-finance-limits/article_96ca9cc6-1312-11e2-865a-001a4bcf887a.html

“Appeals court reinstates campaign finance limits” (AP foreign, Wednesday October 10 2012, MATT GOURAS), October 10, 2012, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/10477679

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