Money Talks

Surprise, surprise: even in our McCained and Feingolded world, money still hasn't been driven out of politics. Mother Jones notes that the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act "didn't quite turn off the spigot pouring special interest money into politics; in a sense, it just slightly redirected the flow—and largely, thanks to a loophole, to Democrats' advantage." You can still donate to your favorite political causes via groups called 527s, just as an earlier wave of campaign finance reform allowed us to give money to new-fangled beasts called Political Action Committees.

"Though political non-profits are not new," the article continues, "they have proliferated following the passage of BCRA as a handy way of skirting the soft-money ban. Republicans fear that the success of Democratic 527s is threatening the fund-raising advantage that the Republicans currently enjoy." Democrats like Wes Boyd of MoveOn respond that Republicans are trying to "silence" their critics. An FEC decision is pending, and tighter restrictions may be on the way.

If nothing else, I guess this lays that whole "money isn't speech" business to rest.