The Daily Top Five

December 19, 2006

1. Brad Smith goes off the sarcasm scale as he takes on the New York Times (yet again) and their editorializing on campaign finance reform.

This weekend the New York Times once again grabbed its Thesaurus of invective to tackle the issue of campaign finance reform. Next time, we suggest they grab a copy of the First Amendment, too. Surely a reasonably important newspaper such as the Times must have a copy of the First Amendment lying around somewhere.

[snip]

The Times: People are running ads that are "obviously partisan."

The Constitution: It is so obviously unconstitutional to limit ads merely because they are partisan that, well, we don't even have a case to cite.

[snip]

There is a lot of other nonsense in the Times' editorial -- there always is -- such as the belief that if only the FEC had a "blanket regulation controlling candidate-oriented advertising" all this mess could be avoided. We suppose it could, if the First Amendment were not a part of the Constitution -- but we'll spare for now any detailed analysis of the silliness.

Unlike Brad, I think I am to the point of giving up on the Times, the only worthwhile thing they publish on a regular basis is the Sunday crossword puzzle.

2. Getting in on the campaign finance editorializing about editorials, Bob Bauer (with a little less sarcasm) also takes on the NY Times, but also discusses this Washington Post Editorial on 527s.

Both the Post and the Times seem to agree that the law on this can be made clear to the advantage of readier, more effective enforcement. The Times assumes that we are there already, frustrated in this goal only by the recalcitrance (and worse) of the FEC. The Post, considering the emerging "test" for 527 regulation, restates it in fragmentary form (omitting to mention the $1,000 threshold for achieving political committee status) and wishes for "clearer guidance in the form of specific regulations that could be tested in federal court." Some days ago, Rick Hasen asked why the FEC did not promulgate regulations rather than proceed with a case by case adjudicatory venture that left only vagueness in its wake.

In all of these views are found an expectation—easily taken for a fantasy—that we can have clear, enforceable rules that guard against certain kinds of "influence"—the influencing of public views about particular candidates. The analysis employed by the FEC in the settled cases is not too different from one it tried out, in 2004, in proposed but abandoned rules. Then, too, in various drafts and proposals, the FEC toyed with the notion of what it meant by a "major purpose" of influencing federal elections, and it tried to bolster this sweeping but ambiguous construction with bits of regulatory straw—like the $1,000 threshold for political committee status and the PASO test (does the communication "promote, support, attack, or oppose" a candidate). It put this effort aside for the simple reason that, overwhelmed by partisan conflict in a Presidential election year, it could not produce a credible outcome or clear, timely guidance.

The FEC then did what editorials and commentators now do: it just "called them as it saw them," dispensing frontier justice on its sense of what the facts of the particular case justify. Since everybody knew that these organizations were not playing by the same rules as other "political organizations," it was assumed that they should be made to pay some price.

3. Last week, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals issued a ruling in a series of slave reparations cases. Anthony Sebok has this column at FindLaw, concluding:

It has always been obvious that the slavery compensation litigation has always been as much about education and politics, as about the underlying legal claims that motivated the suits. It seems to me that if the plaintiffs were to win on the legal theory left standing by Posner, then the litigation's message will be deeply estranged from its original moral and political source. In a case like this, then, victory at any price may not be worth it.

4. Despite its strength, the American economy is rarely discussed in the media, being overshadowed by Iraq and other more negative news. But even when the economy is discussed, some basic mistakes are made, as Don Boudreaux points out. Responding to this editorial chastising the Bush Administration for not providing enough jobs for the victims of Hurricane Katrina, Boudreaux writes:

Creating jobs is absolutely no challenge. Indeed, that's a chore that even government can do well. Jobs are all around us, super-abundant. (Persons who doubt this truth should call me: I have an endless number of household chores that I'm happy to assign to anyone who calls.) Katrina herself was positively brilliant at creating jobs.

What's not so abundant is real income.

And while in market economies most of us earn our incomes by performing valuable services for others -- that is, while in market economies each of our incomes is closely linked to the jobs we perform -- it's important to remember that the jobs are not the good; the incomes are the good. And real income -- genuine purchasing power -- is not created by make-work programs. If workers in such programs do get more purchasing power, it's because the money they are paid is really a disguised forced or charitable transfer of purchasing power from persons who created it to persons who perform make-work jobs.

What I find terribly troubling is that we as a nation and the Bush Administration is still struggling with the Left's baggage of having to coddle so many people who seem unwilling to help themselves. As Boudreaux pointed out, there are lots of jobs in post-Katrina New Orleans, one need only start working--some one will pay you for your goods or services if they need them.

5. So Laura Bush had a skin cancer surgery, big deal right? Well the White House Press Corps seems to think that failing to disclose her health matters is some sort of grand conspiracy and are whipping up a good whining about it. James Joyner has it right, the First Lady's health has no bearing on the commonwealth, unlike her husband. But for some reason the Press Corps thinks they should have an open door into the lives of any and all White House residents. Good for the White House and Tony Snow for putting the smack down on the nosy busibodies.

Driving into work this morning the talk radio hosts wondered if the White House Press Corps will get into a snit about it. They didn't think so, I did and well for a change I was right.