Democracy for Vancouver

Durbin of the Columbian reports on last Thursday’s meeting of the Senate Committee on Public Finance of Judicial Elections. According to my sources, there were about 40-45 people that showed up for the meeting and only 3 or so were allowed to speak.

Change is difficult. People who were elected with private money are just naturally going to resist changing the system that they used to get elected. However, I believe that if you really study this issue, public financing of campaigns is not a threat to anyone that already holds office. It only means that officeholders can stop “dialing for dollars” and spend more time interacting with their constituents and be more responsive to their constituents’ issues. Why would any elected official prefer to be beholden to special interests because of their campaign contributions rather than be beholden to their constituency?

To argue that their free speech is being abridged by being publicly financed rather than special interest financed is ridiculous when you consider the restraint on their free speech imposed by those that provide large sums of money to their campaigns. Whether officeholders will admit it or not, opposing “clean elections” actually represents a self-imposed restraint on their ability to freely advocate for the people.