"We won’t be naive about modern political campaigning, and neither should you be — it’s all about the money."

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Politics to money and back
Lompoc Record commentary, April 30, 2015

A reader admonished us recently for singling out the Koch brothers’ big-money support of Republican candidates. That reader makes good points, and insisted that editorials should strive for balance.

Newspaper editorials are by nature and inclination inclined to offer one opinion over another, tending to reflect the perspective of the publication’s editorial board. We strive to achieve balance, but the primary mission is to express a particular view, which might demonstrate a lack of balance to those who disagree.

That letter set us on a journey of discovery concerning the modern version of campaign financing. There were a few surprises.

For example, while there may be a general perception of Republicans representing the party of wealth and power, the fact is that when it comes to spending by super PACs, the GOP runs a distant second. Does anyone reading this imagine that presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign won’t collect a mountain of cash? The same is true for Jeb Bush, who has already amassed more campaign money than other GOP hopefuls, and Bush is not yet officially in the running.

We won’t be naive about modern political campaigning, and neither should you be — it’s all about the money.

That fact was underlined five years ago in a federal court case, SpeechNow.org vs. Federal Election Commission, which gave birth to the new form of political action committee known as the super PAC.

Super PACs skirt normal campaign finance regulations, and can raise unlimited amounts of money from corporations, private groups, unions and individuals. That money can then be spent, in unlimited amounts, supporting candidates and causes.

That clearly gives those with deep pockets an edge when it comes to deciding who gets elected or what initiative gets passed, assuming of course that you believe financing makes a difference in political campaigns.

We’ll take a wild guess here and say money does matter. Why else would nearly 1,400 super PACs have been registered by late last month, and have filed receipts with the Federal Election Commission totaling almost $700 million, while reporting having spent nearly $350 million during last year’s mid-term congressional election campaigns?

Just for the record — and perhaps to appease that reader concerned about editorial balance — we did the research and learned that of the top 10 registered super PACs, five are considered liberal, four are deemed conservative, and one — the National Association of Realtors — considers itself ideologically neutral.

In addition, the Sunlight Foundation reported last week that liberal-leaning U.S. billionaires outspent their conservative-leaning counterparts in last-year’s mid-term congressional races by roughly a $65-million margin. Two donors — Tom Steyer and Michael Bloomberg — contributed a combined total of $90 million to their campaigning Democrat champions, while the top GOP contributor was investor Pat Singer, who gave $9 million.

Casino king Sheldon Adelson, who with his wife contributed more than $92 million in an unsuccessful effort to defeat President Obama’s re-election in 2012, was a relatively quiet contributor in the 2014 mid-term election cycle, giving only $5 million.

And here is just a tidbit of political irony for you — among the reasons liberal contributors said they tried to outspend conservative donors was their criticism of the Citizens United court ruling that opened the door to super-high-finance campaign contributions.

None of this takes into account the influx of so-called dark money from nonprofit organizations that don’t have to disclose who or what contributes. That’s a subject for another editorial — and we can guarantee a specific point of view.
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