[EL] Article says "dark money" critic actually a dark money organization

[Smith, Brad]

This points up the problem with the phrase "full disclosure," which most of us are probably guilty of using, and is relevant to the posts yesterday re Bopp's position etc. "Full disclosure" merely the begs the question of what is being disclosed. Does "full disclosure mean that every person working for any organization agree to release their tax returns (how many years?) and unseal any juvenile court or other legal records they have? Well, no, probably not, though that info might be useful to some voters at the margins.

US PIRG obviously doesn't feel that "full disclosure" applies to the types of activities that they do. And maybe there is good reason for distinguishing US PIRGs efforts to shape public policy from those of, say, Crossroads. But if that is true for PIRG, certainly others have an equal right to make that argument without being accused of being opposed to something presented as so obviously beneficial as "full disclosure."

My guess is that we would advance the debate if we could all stop saying "full disclosure," and even stop saying things like "do you support disclosure?" as if these were defined positions. Do I support disclosure? Yes, of some things, under some circumstances. That's probably true of just about everybody who participates or lurks here. The action is in considering what, and under what circumstances.

Bradley A. Smith
Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault
  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

From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Rick Hasen
Sent: Friday, January 18, 2013 10:06 AM
To: BZall at aol.com; law-election at UCI.edu
Subject: Re: [EL] Article says "dark money" critic actually a dark money organization

There's a quote in here from the organization explaining its position:

Why doesn't PIRG consider itself a bunch of hypocrites?

Their answer is convoluted. The group advocates for policies and lobbies lawmakers, but it doesn't explicitly endorse candidates, make contributions to campaign committees or engage in independent campaign spending.

"Since we don't actually participate in any spending in elections as an organization, we don't release the names of our donors simply because we're not participating in campaign spending," said Sonia Ashe<http://iowapirg.org/staff/iap/sonia-ashe-0>, a registered lobbyist for Iowa PIRG.

On 1/18/13 7:00 AM, BZall at aol.com<mailto:BZall at aol.com> wrote:
Don't know anything about this story, but thought, if true, it would be useful balance if it appeared here or on the blog.

http://theiowarepublican.com/2013/pirg-hypocrisy/

Barnaby Zall
Of Counsel
Weinberg, Jacobs & Tolani, LLP
10411 Motor City Dr., Suite 500
Bethesda, MD 20817
301-231-6943 (direct dial)
www.wjlaw.com<http://www.wj/>
bzall at aol.com<mailto:bzall at aol.com>



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