Campaign Finance And Obama Shame

I feel sorry for John McCain.

Not for his dismal and his ever schizophrenic campaign strategy though. My pity for McCain is due to the fact that he simply can't compete with Barack Obama for simple financial reasons.

Early in the campaign process, both candidates agreed to participate in public campaign financing, which would create a level spending playing field through limits on private fundraising that would then be rewarded with a portion of matching funds contributed through public financing.

John McCain maintained this commitment and pressed onward through public finance and the restrictions that come with it.

Barack Obama changed his mind and reversed his pledge. The outcome was a brilliant strategic move by the Obama camp, skilled in viral marketing and fundraising via the internet. Millions of people that have made .99-cent contributions have added, well, millions of dollars to Obama's fat campaign wallet. The result is Obama maintaining a four to one spending advantage during the final two weeks of the campaign.

It must be an uncomfortable reality for Obama. The fact is he offered a pledge that he should not have made and then danced a 180 reversal. This is shameful, at least in my book.

By the way, the book I refer to was written by my father.

In order to level the playing field, we need to have clean campaigns that require caps on financial contributions from the private sector that come with public matching funds.

In addition, PAC's and 527's need to be eliminated entirely from our political process. They do nothing to advance the cause of democracy and focus entirely on lies and distortions of truths to meet a very narrow agenda.

Politics is ugly. You can put lipstick on a pig but - uh, never mind.