[EL] Campaign finance reform and life expectancy

Sat May 5 12:51:55 PDT 2012

For those interested in the history of the U.S. Government's policy towards
sugar, here's a link: http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/sc019

The very first Congress, back in 1789, passed a tariff on foreign sugar. I'm
sure the Fanjul family contributed heavily to Frederick Muhlenberg for this
little goody - it's not as though, in the history of the United States,
there have ever been any credible reason offered for imposing protectionist
measures that benefit an industry, or that there's ever been any genuine
support by people who weren't themselves farmers for the idea that
government ought to in some way help the agricultural sector by setting
quotas, tariffs, crop subsidies, etc. Only corrupt or bought-off (or, to
borrow from Professor Lessig, 'dependent') people have ever advocated these
sorts of things.

Sean Parnell

President

Impact Policy Management, LLC

6411 Caleb Court

Alexandria, VA  22315

571-289-1374 (c)

sean at impactpolicymanagement.com

From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu
[mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Craig
Holman
Sent: Saturday, May 05, 2012 1:27 PM
To: law-election at department-lists.uci.edu
Subject: Re: [EL] Campaign finance reform and life expectancy

Very well stated, Doug. 

"I'll look forward to the evidence that campaign finance reforms prevent
famines or improve life expectancy..."

Ok, I'll bite:

I don't know if such evidence could exist since we are not likely to get
expansive campaign finance reform at the national level, and money has a way
of sneaking around reforms. 

Still, I think you will find that a great many middle-of-the-road economists
and other observers believe that US trade policy on sugar and some other
crops wreak havoc with the economies of poorer nations. Some say ag trade
policies are right up there with the HIV epidemic and other public health
issues in importance to poor nations. So, there's a policy affecting life
expectancy. 

And observers of policy making who think that the ability of the ag lobby to
keep these policies in place doesn't come (in part) from how it throws money
around DC are simply not paying attention. The ag lobby makes the other
lobby sectors look like children. They play hardball and for keeps. 

I'm not very familiar with recent campaign finance literature, but often in
the social sciences methods and definitions used in studies determine what
phenomena we see to the point of missing the real action. After all,
interest groups are playing a complex game (with campaign finance as one
part of it) and they will make many wrong steps. There's no guarantee you
can win with donations, but that doesn't mean you don't need to play the
game (if you don't play, you don't win).  

But it seems to me that there are many people around DC who can tell us
first-hand how their contributions influenced policies, and another set of
people who can tell us first-hand how the policy making process was
influenced by contributions. Unless these participants all suffer from an
inflated sense of self importance, are under some group delusion, or express
thoughts that are just epiphenomena divorced from their behavior, I don't
see how one discounts their analysis and experience entirely. In other
words, the number of people and the tales they tell are large enough that it
is hard to believe there is nothing to it, or that it is just sour grapes of
the losing side. Of course, an interesting question is: are the lobbyists
playing both sides of the game as a con? But even that would imply that they
force people to play by trying to punish those that don't play (e.g., "Your
opponents will hire us to coach them how to spread their money around, even
if your side doesn't!"). Just as members of congress will sometimes, when
asked to move on something, switch the conversation to fundraisers that are
coming up. 

Craig Holman, Ph.D.
Government Affairs Lobbyist
Public Citizen
215 Pennsylvania Avenue SE
Washington, D.C. 20003
T-(202) 454-5182
C-(202) 905-7413
F-(202) 547-7392
Holman at aol.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Doug Hess <douglasrhess at gmail.com>
To: law-election <law-election at department-lists.uci.edu>
Sent: Fri, May 4, 2012 11:54 pm
Subject: [EL] Campaign finance reform and life expectancy

"I'll look forward to the evidence that campaign finance reforms prevent
famines or improve life expectancy..."

Ok, I'll bite:

I don't know if such evidence could exist since we are not likely to get
expansive campaign finance reform at the national level, and money has a way
of sneaking around reforms. 

Still, I think you will find that a great many middle-of-the-road economists
and other observers believe that US trade policy on sugar and some other
crops wreak havoc with the economies of poorer nations. Some say ag trade
policies are right up there with the HIV epidemic and other public health
issues in importance to poor nations. So, there's a policy affecting life
expectancy. 

And observers of policy making who think that the ability of the ag lobby to
keep these policies in place doesn't come (in part) from how it throws money
around DC are simply not paying attention. The ag lobby makes the other
lobby sectors look like children. They play hardball and for keeps. 

I'm not very familiar with recent campaign finance literature, but often in
the social sciences methods and definitions used in studies determine what
phenomena we see to the point of missing the real action. After all,
interest groups are playing a complex game (with campaign finance as one
part of it) and they will make many wrong steps. There's no guarantee you
can win with donations, but that doesn't mean you don't need to play the
game (if you don't play, you don't win).  

But it seems to me that there are many people around DC who can tell us
first-hand how their contributions influenced policies, and another set of
people who can tell us first-hand how the policy making process was
influenced by contributions. Unless these participants all suffer from an
inflated sense of self importance, are under some group delusion, or express
thoughts that are just epiphenomena divorced from their behavior, I don't
see how one discounts their analysis and experience entirely. In other
words, the number of people and the tales they tell are large enough that it
is hard to believe there is nothing to it, or that it is just sour grapes of
the losing side. Of course, an interesting question is: are the lobbyists
playing both sides of the game as a con? But even that would imply that they
force people to play by trying to punish those that don't play (e.g., "Your
opponents will hire us to coach them how to spread their money around, even
if your side doesn't!"). Just as members of congress will sometimes, when
asked to move on something, switch the conversation to fundraisers that are
coming up. 

-D

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