[EL] Pay-to-play will thrive in budget debate

[Smith, Brad]

Solyndra wouldn’t have been affected at all by the type of disclosure Craig and Joe seek. The company’s unknown spending was on lobbying, not campaign contributions. The contributions of executives were already disclosed; the company itself did not make campaign expenditures, which were, we note, illegal at the time it got the loan guarantees anyway. Indeed, it is the fact that these disclosures are already required that allowed Prof. Zullo to conduct his research uncovering the “suspicious pattern.”  

 

The question is not whether companies inform “officeholders and party officials” whom they support or oppose but whether we insist that they include that information, including data on the activities of their employees and data on giving that is not necessarily related to politics at all, on their applications to be reviewed by purchasing officials.  Craig and Joe still offer no reason for requiring that disclosure.

 

 

Bradley A. Smith

Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault 

  Designated Professor of Law

Capital University Law School

303 East Broad Street

Columbus, OH 43215

(614) 236-6317

bsmith at law.capital.edu <mailto:bsmith at law.capital.edu> 

http://www.law.capital.edu/faculty/bios/bsmith.asp <http://www.law.capital.edu/faculty/bios/bsmith.asp> 

 

From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Joseph Birkenstock
Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2011 12:41 PM
To: Craig Holman; law-election at uci.edu
Subject: Re: [EL] Pay-to-play will thrive in budget debate

 

Craig, stop being silly.  Everyone knows corruption in government contracting only comes when political spending of the prospective contractors is broadly disclosed to the public, not when that information is privately known only to a subset of activists and politicians.  For example, I recall several long chains of commentary attacking the way that public disclosure (but only public disclosure) will lead to the enforcement of an “enemies list” of business partners that are presumptively unwelcome as government vendors.  

 

In fact, it seems to me that every instance of reconsideration of the DISCLOSE Act or policies toward the same effect has launched a mini-flood of tweets under the #enemieslist hashtag – but never any consideration of whether a private list of political help from companies known only to friendly public officeholders could have any similar corrupting effect.  

 

To be sure, there haven’t been any tweet floods at all, large or small, under the #friendslist hashtag.  Haven’t you been paying attention?

 

 

________________________________
Joseph M. Birkenstock, Esq.
Caplin & Drysdale, Chtd.
One Thomas Circle, NW
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 862-7836
www.capdale.com/jbirkenstock
*also admitted to practice in CA

 

 

 

From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Craig Holman
Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2011 11:36 AM
To: law-election at uci.edu
Subject: [EL] Pay-to-play will thrive in budget debate

 

Colleagues:

Below is a snippet of an op-ed I published in Roll Call today on the supercommittee and pay-to-play corruption. It would have been appropriate to mention the Solyndra issue (but the story broke after I wrote the piece), in which many congressional Republicans are beginning to realize -- in contradiction to their opposition to Obama's proposed transparency executive order -- that the lack of full disclosure of political spending by government contractors may result in pay-to-play favoritism in the awarding of contracts.

http://www.rollcall.com/issues/57_33/craig_holman_pay_to_play_will_thrive_budget_debate-208921-1.html

Pay-to-play corruption thrives in the shadows. As long as the public is generally kept in the dark as to how much a corporation is spending on behalf of super committee officials and their respective parties, pay-to-play can be an exceedingly effective tool in shaping the budget debate.

 

There is a viable solution that could take effect almost immediately: a proposed executive order under consideration by President Barack Obama that would require government contractors to fully disclose their campaign contributions and expenditures to the public, including corporate funds for spending on elections laundered through third-party groups.

 

 

Craig Holman, Ph.D.
Government Affairs Lobbyist
Public Citizen
215 Pennsylvania Avenue NE
Washington, D.C. 20003
TEL: (202) 454-5182
CEL: (202) 905-7413
FAX: (202) 547-7392
Holman at aol.com

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