It's Not About What You Think It's About

("it should be illegal to criticize us")

THC ran across this piece at Hodak Values via Professor Stephen Bainbridge's blog, reporting on the Senate blocking a vote on President Obama's nominees to the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC).  The twist is that it is Democrat Senators led by Chuck Schumer and The Cherokee Princess, Elizabeth Warren, who are doing the blocking which is, well . . . interesting, in light of the uproar over Republican Senators blocking another Obama nominee.
 
The nominal issue is the refusal of Obama's nominees to agree to require public corporations to disclose spending on non-profit groups that may also engage in political advocacy.  The Democrats have made the Koch Brothers the poster children for this effort which is insane since they run a private company, but that doesn't matter because their supporters are too ignorant to realize that.

This is all part of a larger effort by Democrats to limit free speech, both directly by law and indirectly by public intimidation.  Many of those railing against Citizens United think the case had something to do with political contributions by large corporations when it was actually about a group of private citizens who made a film critical of Hillary Clinton and wanted to show it.  Democrats don't think that should happen.  Let's state it very clearly - Hillary Clinton thinks people should be prohibited from criticizing her.  Many of those railing against Citizens United also don't realize that Senator Schumer's proposed legislation to overturn it would have only applied to corporations and exempted unions, even though Citizens United applied also to them.  Gee, I wonder why?  It's all gamesmanship - the Democrats want to shut down speech they disagree with.

But something else perked my interest in the article; a reminder that the whole campaign finance reform argument is phony and apart from the political rhetoric around it no one really takes it seriously.

What the article reminded us of was that in the 2008 election, Senator McCain accepted the spending restrictions of public financing, while Senator Obama opted out of those restrictions once he realized he could raise significantly more money than McCain, allowing him to outspend the McCain campaign by nearly 3 to 1.  THC believes Senator McCain was wrong as both a matter of policy and constitutional law regarding McCain-Feingold's free speech restrictions, but he respects the Senator as a man of principle; principles he abided by in 2008 though they placed him at a disadvantage.

On the other hand, Senator Obama, after professing his support of McCain-Feingold and announcing his intent to adhere to its limits, blithely changed his mind once he knew he could raise more funds outside those constraints.  Of all course, all those media and public interest types who feverishly preached of the need for such reform, ignored what Obama did because he was their guy.

That President Obama and his acolytes now campaign for overturning Citizens United and imposing restrictions on political speech is a tribute to their hypocrisy and bad faith.