June 24, 2008 - 11:07am
Change we can believe in
By Rob Tornoe
Until this year, all presidential nominees since 1972 have accepted federal money and the restrictions that come with it.
Maybe Barack Obama is a different kind of candidate after all.
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Hm.
Uh, I'm at least vaguely certain that Obama agreed to accept public financing only on the condition that he and his opponent agreed to a set of common rules.
Except, McCain in the Republican primary took out a $5 million loan, using public financing money as collateral. Then when donors paid off his loan for him, he backed out of his public financing pledge. Hm...if that isn't outright fraud, it's at least dishonest as hell, and it shows that McCain can not at all be trusted to play fair in the general election.
But, gee, I guess it's really hypocritical of Obama to "back out" of public financing, because requiring your opponent to adhere to a basic set of rules before agreeing to something just makes you a flip-flopper.
McCain is the one gaming the system
Since McCain created his "Victory 08" fund to circumvent campaign contribution limits (raising $70,000 each from individual donors -- see http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/21/mccain-financing-structur_n_978...), kudos to Barack Obama for taking the high road, transparently telling people what he is doing and why. About one out of every ten people who voted for Obama in the primary gave him a donation. If that isn't public campaign finance, I don't know what is. All Americans own Obama's campaign. A few rich folks giving $70,000 a pop own McCain. I'll take Obama, thank you very much.
Publicly financed elections.
Barack Obama said he would use the public finance system if his opponent did. The two camps talked and no agreement could be reached.
If we need to judge the wide spread in raising money of the two camps let's add all the donations and divide by the number of donors.
Can we overcome big money with numbers of real people making small donations? Yes we can.
Should he put himself at a disadvantage because McCain can't keep up money wise? Not just no, but hell no.
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