I’ve never been a fan of Tom Delay, and I’ve not paid much attention to his current travails, but the bits and pieces that have caught my attention have done the unthinkable: they’ve caused me to feel a twinge of sympathy for him. It’s an unpleasant feeling; I recently had it for Geraldo Rivera, when the New York Times smeared him.
Let’s see: Ronnie Earle doesn’t even represent DeLay’s district, but under Texas law that doesn’t matter. He’s brought this matter before three grand juries so far, and with less than stellar results:
The first grand jury refused to indict.
The second one indicted DeLay for breaking a 2003 law in 2002 — dang that Constitution and its “no ex post facto” laws.
Now, the third one indicted DeLay without seeing a key piece of evidence. Apparently, they took Earle at his word that his dog ate it or it was in his other pants or something. Now Earle’s office is saying they can’t find that, but in the time-honored tradition of Mary Mapes and Dan Rather, they’re offering a “similar” document, using the “fake but accurate” argument.
Like I said, I’ve never liked DeLay. Actually, I never had much of an opinion of him, but what little I knew was unfavorable. But I dunno if I’d want to see ANYONE treated like this. Because if one whackjob prosecutor in Texas can do this to one of the most powerful men in the country, what chances do the rest of the people in his jurisdiction have?
Hmmmm.
@ Chris
“What you said was DeLay “hasn’t ever done anything that other Republicans *and* Democrats haven’t also done.” If what you meant was that he’s never been convicted of anything, that’s a very different story.”
What I mean is that, so far as I’m aware of, every single charge brought against DeLay has been shown to be common practice in the House. That of course doesn’t mean that it isn’t illegal. It doesn’t mean that it may not be unethical. But it’s a pretty silly thing for people be charging DeLay with if they’re doing the same things.
Sheik,
You state that Corporations would still be allowed to “speak” and “lobby” and to “educate their employees and stockholders.” OK fine. In today’s world, if one interest “talks” and another interest “contributes”, I ask for your arguments as to which has influence.
You have missed my main point – that however done – if you limit or prevent effective corporate participation, over time, taxes and regulation will grow. If taxes and regulation grow, you will have fewer corporations, and those you have will be smaller and less profitable. Now one can argue that less corporations, and smaller ones at that, is a good thing or not; but it is a difficult argument that downsizing will not occur. I still await your attempt.
By what logic, by the way, makes “healthy” an involvement of 20 million by Soros while a like amount by GM “skews” the whole political system? Is a $ 10M contribution by a Saudi individual to a library somehow, then, healthier than Microsoft? (Microsoft had long avoided political contributions until anti-trust action forced them to get involved – you figure it out).
Past efforts at campaign finance reform have largely failed. Where there is a will, and a need, there is a way – I give you the Keating five. Or, if you have a corporation, say Tyson Foods, and a candidate, say Clinton, you can easily get by with a brokerage agent that allows allocations sufficient to allow candidate to grow $ 1,000.00 into $ 100,000.00, all known odds to the contrary.
Or you will get cash in brown paper bags like the Chinese did, or like the UN.
The fact is that is costs $10M to $60M to run for the US Senate. Given this, the Senators run an almost annual shakedown called a tax bill. First, proposals are floated that would gut certain business sectors, and then lobbies are forced to contribute to mitigate the damage. Sometimes, it is less the “evil corporations” seeking to buy influence, than it is the Congreemen themselves who shake them down. Our US tax code is thousands of pages long and it is the congress that made it so.
I maintain that corporations should be allowed to defend their interests and that, if money is the language of politics, why make corporations speak a different language?
New laws will only beget new ways to get by them.
If you think that talking only will work, then you are probably too naive’ for this discussion.
Hmmmm.
“I maintain that corporations should be allowed to defend their interests and that, if money is the language of politics, why make corporations speak a different language?”
I have to agree. If you limit the political participation by corporations then you’re going to get corporations that will look for ways to enter the political arena through individuals. Heck that’s how they do it now through lobbyists. I could easily see a corporatin cutting a $10 million check to a lobbyist so he could then make the donation for them.
And I still think it could be unconstitutional to limit corporate free speech in this way.