Ridgefield First Selectman and Democratic candidate for Governor Rudy Marconi has this clever video out today exhorting his fellow candidates to “Go public or don’t go at all”:
Though 2006 Democratic nominee Ned Lamont seems to be the most immediate target of this video, the real target is likely to be Democratic voters across the state that likely have never heard of Mr. Marconi.
Marconi should also get extra credit for what is perhaps the most creative input into the gubernatorial race to this point.
20 responses so far ↓
Mr Marconi’s argument has fallen on my deaf ears.Are we in the Democratic Party supposed to abandon the battlefield to a self funded multi millionaire like Mr Foley….who can and will mostly self-fund his race and spend millions of dollars while Mr Marconi would have the democratic challengers work the phones and fundraisers for no more then $100. per person in the publically financed system? By the time any democratic winner got his/her puny few million dollars, Mr Foley would have probably spent many millions and possibly would successfuly define himself AND his democratic opponnet.While I personally have not publically committed to a candidate yet, I do perceive a huge problem that SB and DM have here.The advent of Mr Foley into the Governor’s race has added an argument for the simultaneous advent of Lamont in an exploratory capacity.With Lamont having at least the ability to also self-fund an argument can be made…and will be made by Lamont and his supporters that while they would wish to be in the public election fund they cannot at this time, until and unless Mr Foley and ALL the candidates agree to use public funds.
Seems just as likely to be aimed at Tom Foley, that other Greenwich millionaire.
In a time where every social interest group is begging for their state aid to not be cut, and every taxpayer getting nervous about the posibility of new taxes, additional revenue enhancements or whatever they call them these days is this really the time to be spending our precious tax dollars on political campaigns. The Citizens Election Fund has over $40 million dollars. That could a long way to helping municipalities, hospitals, nursing homes etc. I think it is an absoute shame that we use public money to fund political campaigns. You want to run for office, do it the old fashioned way, get on the phone ask your would be constiuents for support, or stay home. Either way don’t waste anymore of my money.
NeoConn-
I agree, if you want to hold onto your elected office, sell it out to the special interests in exchange for campaign $$$.
And if you want to challenge an incumbent? I guess you’re sh*t out of luck!
Perhaps the argument that over the long haul, public financing saves the taxpayer money fell on your deaf ears? Legislators used to have to payback those bundlers with loopholes and pet projects. Now they don’t.
And even without the savings, public financing is worth it sheerly for the integrity it puts back into the system. (Imagine if Congressional campaigns were publicly funded!)
Mr. Scooper,
I have no problem with current prohibitions on special interest money, I just do not see how we justify spending money on politicans that could be spent on children, veterans and the homeless. We have to prioritze, we as a state and a country have limited means and resources. How can anyone say that by spending $10, $20 or however many millions every two years for political campaigns will save the state money. The state can save money by consolidating agencies, reducing our workforce by not rehiring everyone who took an early retirement.
Great ad!
And while I support the idea of public financing to restore trust in the system… question…
I agree that there’d be no reason for public officials to provide “payback” via loopholes, etc. But what about “prepayments” on the revolving door? With a few glaring exceptions in Hartford, there’s not too much of a revolving door in Hartford of which I am aware.
But Washington?
Those guys are all doing favors for their buddies… knowing that their next stop is K Street. (And it’s both sides of the aisle.) So I don’t see how public financing of Congressional campaigns has that positive an impact… well… to some extent. But in the end, the same %$^#%$ will still occur.
Compete transparency is all that’s needed.
Candidates should be required to post all donations & expenditures weekly or bi-weekly at least.
We could erase all caps too.
If someone’s out to buy an election we wouldn’t have to search for the data that would indicate that case.
Yes I *do* know what a complete PIA that would amount to.
It would however quickly expose just who’s on board with a candidate, and that’s not an unfair method by which to judge them.
Total transparency shouldn’t stop there either.
We should be able to see how every single dime of our money is spent save for occasions involving national security.
That means the local Board of Eds here in CT that typically absorb around 70% of a municipalities budget would have to post where they spent it down to the last cent.
Why would anyone want such strict exposure regulations?
Because it’s our money.
I think I’d be comfortable with unlimited “hard money,” a ban on “soft money” and 24 hr (7days might suffice) online notice. While the media wouldn’t have time to investigate all the various relationships… I’m certain there’d be plenty of bloggers doing OR for their candidate.
And considering there’s a learning curve on fundraising / running for office… perhaps you set the online notice rule on a sliding scale in relation to funds raised?
For instance, how many first-timers are running for CT-5… who probably haven’t raised $20,000 and probably never will? They shouldn’t be given some sort of FEC fine. Perhaps after you raise, for example, $100,000 you need to begin reporting all donations within 7 days. And when you raise $1,000,000 you need to report within 72 hours?
The Federal Government could provide a software program free of charge There’s been enough written.
One that includes online reporting and disbursement and meets Federal Requirements. The Fed could even host it for a nominal charge.
>>The Federal Government could provide a software program free of charge There’s been enough written.
They’ll make a mess; they always do.
Let Google do it.
>>And even without the savings, public financing is worth it sheerly for the integrity it puts back into the system.
Integrity?
It’s nothing less than the pro-union Democratic candidate enrichment act.
Candidates that don’t enjoy the favor of unions have no quick method with which to quickly and efficiently collect the required signatures and donations.
Candidate that *are* in favor however don’t need to even get out of their recliners because their union servants will take care of everything for them.
ACR, the Fed would have to subcontract it but it’s a fairly simple program. It’s not a money or technological issue to do it. SalesForce.com pretty much has all the tools .
Bill, I would say it’s definitely not aimed at Foley since he’s refusing special interest money and has also run an ad speaking out against special interests.
I think Bruce has a valid point that it’s not fair for less financially successfully candidates to have to run against him without the same resources, but I think making them beholden to special interests causes bigger problems than it solves.
And speaking of “prepayments”
http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/chi-health-lobbyists_bddec20,0,5453763,print.story
(also credit for finding it on HuffPost)
CT gets between .65 to .67 back from every Federal Tax dollar (2nd worst in the nation).
Of that, subtract the Social Security and Medicare numbers and far and away CT gets the bulk back in defense spending and ranks among the lowest for education and health and social services.
Our Congressional Delegation does their lobbying every day for the defense industry. In CT Financial Services, Insurance and Health are the only other industries that matter besides the military.
Per-capita spending nationally on military contracts was $828. Connecticut (4th nationally) received $2,499 per capita.
Connecticut received $468 million in education aid, $372 million in food and nutrition services and $42 million in EPA spending, for a total of $882 million or 9.3 percent of the state’s $9.52 billion in military spending in 2006.
“A new report by the Political Economy Research Institute shows that public spending on education creates more jobs that are higher paying than the same amount of money spent on the military,” the NPP said. “Public spending on other areas such as health care and energy efficiency also create more jobs than the equivalent amount spent on the military, though the jobs have lower pay and benefits. Nevertheless, the overall economic impact in terms of wages and benefits is much higher.
“Moreoever, investing in renewable energy and conservation, health care and education can have considerable impact on technological developments, work force skills and infrastructure, all of which will support further economic growth and development.”
http://www.pbn.com/stories/28007.html
That’s a lot of military money from a largely Democratic delegation. Not to mention CTs trade deficit with the Federal government has been running at 35% of all tax dollars collected for over 25 years. We export dollars, jobs, and livelihoods in return for large military contracts. What state can survive such a financial drain without becoming another brownfield industrial state?
CT gets between .65 to .67 back from every Federal Tax dollar (2nd worst in the nation).
Not if you count the AIG Bailout. The AIGFP subsidiary is in Wilton. It got what, $185 billion? IF you allocate that to NY (where AIG is based) and CT (where AIGFP is), that’ll push those numbers above $1.00.
Unfortunately, AIG was merely a front man for Goldman Sachs and a few others. So we should definitely view that $185 billion as being attributed to NY, IMHO.
Although I guess we could take that one step further and count that bailout in terms of campaign contributions to politicians… hmmm… I wonder which politician has benefited the most from all the bailouts over the past 24 mos? Hmmm… which politician is known for carrying water for Wall Street?
When people say that only so many cents goes to the state for every dollar send in taxes, I really wonder how those stats are being computed. There’s no way that you could do that calculation and not allocate a sizable chunk of the AIG bailout to Connecticut. AIG FP is in Wilton, they are the division of AIG that really screwed up. Even allocation 10%, $18.5 billion, to CT, would radically affect the ratio. because $18.5 billion is, after all, $5,300 for every person in the state of Connecticut…
Add in stimulus money (money spent from more borrowings) and CT will certainly be over $1.00 in that ratio
My understanding is AIG FP employed around 375 people at the peak of about 116,000 AIG employees international.
I’ve seen similar numbers derived elsewhere before. I’ve never seen numbers that suggest CT gets it tax dollars back even when deficits are considered and the government is paying out more than a dollar for each dollar it recieved. I’d hesitate to compare an EB contract with AIG bailouts and their stimulus effect on the CT economy.
Yeah, but those 375 people entered into contracts which basically brought down AIG. There were AIG FP employees in London as well. But CT should be allocated a big chunk of the bailout money for AIG. At least 10% of the $185 billion should be allocated here.
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