Isn't the earmark sufficient protection for those of us sensitive to candidates we don't like?

 
No.  In the end, earmarked or not, the government gets it, and it's all money.  As I note in the article, a dollar for tax financed campaigns is a dollar that can't be spent elsewhere.  And so the end question remains, is this a good use of tax dollars?  The fact that about 9% of tax filers seem to think so doesn't seem to me like a good reason for the expenditure.  Others have pointed out that there are many things government spends money on that may have relatively little popular support.  That strikes me as an argument against that spending, not for tax financing campaigns.  

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From: Michael Richardson [mailto:ballotaccessproject@hotmail.com]
Sent: Wed 4/19/2006 8:46 AM
To: Smith, Brad; election-law@majordomo.lls.edu
Subject: RE: Fulani and Tax Financed Campaigns

 Given that this leads to funding for many candidates that Americans think ought not be funded by government (and given many other problems with tax funding, including the view of many that it doesn't seriously address either the equality or the corruption problem, especially as the latter is defined in Austin and McConnell), the question is whether or not tax funding of campaigns is good policy and a good use of tax dollars.  My guess is that most academics think yes; polling data indicates that most Americans think no.

I don't like the idea of my tax dollars being used to fund campaigns of candidates with whom I disagree and have always checked no on the tax form earmark.  While I'm against the public funding of campaigns for that reason I find, for myself, the earmark to be a sufficient protection of my tax dollars for that purpose.  Brad's original comments, published elsewhere, that began this discussion called into question the earmark.

Isn't the earmark sufficient protection for those of us sensitive to candidates we don't like?

Michael Richardson


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