RNC to John McCain: Screw you. (Campaign Finance)

seasleepy

So, now that the election's been over all of 9 days, the RNC has decided it's okay to drop the charade that they give a crap about John McCain: they've filed two suits claiming that McCain-Feingold is unconstitutional. The actual suits are in PDFs at that link for folks with legal knowhow, but for those of us who don't:

The RNC Press Release wrote:

WASHINGTON – The Republican National Committee (RNC) today announced it will file lawsuits in the District of Columbia and Louisiana challenging, respectively, the constitutionality of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act's ban on national parties raising and spending non-federal dollars, and the constitutionality of political party coordinated expenditure limits. The RNC does so to defend its interests as a national party committee with varied interests, including both state and federal elections, as well as redistricting and grassroots lobbying. RNC Chairman Robert M. "Mike" Duncan released the following statement today concerning the lawsuits.

"The campaign finance restrictions the RNC today challenged infringe on the First Amendment's core: political speech and association," Duncan said. "The RNC must have the ability to support state candidates, coordinate expenditures with our candidates, and truly engage in political activity on a national level.The RNC has operated under and complied with these provisions of the law since their enactment, and as applied it is unconstitutional."

Ambinder has a summary/analysis here as well.

Basically: "It's hard to campaign without soft money. Let's go suing!"

So, too soon? Too transparent? Too obviously a sign that the party needs some damn reorganization if they can't compete without gobs of money obtained in a shady manner?
Or... is it about damn time someone went after these restrictions on political free speech?

AngelHedgie

Well, this is yet more evidence that the death of TRMPAC/ARMPAC really hurt the Pubbies. Of course, what really hurt was the fact that because they were giving away (illegal) cash to their neophyte entrants in the 90s and early 2000s, said neophytes never really learned how to campaign and raise money. Which is why the 50 State Strategy was so damn effective.

Jengo

Heh, that's some world class sour grapes there. Really it just sounds like the RNC is a Scoobie-Doo villian, "I would have won the election if it wasn't for those kids and their blasted campaign finance reform."

Salvation122

McCain-Feingold includes provisions that explicitly disallow candidates to run certain types of ads within a given date of the election, and is the single largest infringement of free political speech since the Alien and Sedition Acts.

Matrijs

Salvation122 wrote: »

McCain-Feingold includes provisions that explicitly disallow candidates to run certain types of ads within a given date of the election, and is the single largest infringement of free political speech since the Alien and Sedition Acts.

Only if you believe that money is speech.

Also, are you referring to the provisions that prevent outside entities from running ads within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election? I'm having difficulty finding the provisions which you suggest would prevent candidates from running certain types of ads.

Yar

A political ad isn't money, it's speech.

Anyway, I think McCain-Feingold is a direct result of the dirty tricks Bush pulled to rip the nomination from McCain in 2000.

PantsB

Yar wrote: »

A political ad isn't money, it's speech.

The money collected to run those ads are money. Donating that money to a campaign or accepting that money is not speech but conduct. A candidate can do just about anything he or she wants with their own money.

Salvation122 wrote: »

McCain-Feingold includes provisions that explicitly disallow candidates to run certain types of ads within a given date of the election, and is the single largest infringement of free political speech since the Alien and Sedition Acts.

A) Your knowledge of infringements on free speech seem to have large gaps.
and
No it doesn't. It prohibits unions and corporations from doing so but not candidates. Neither unions nor corporations have 1st Amendment rights.

emp123

PantsB wrote: »

Yar wrote: »

A political ad isn't money, it's speech.

The money collected to run those ads are money. Donating that money to a campaign or accepting that money is not speech but conduct. A candidate can do just about anything he or she wants with their own money.

Salvation122 wrote: »

McCain-Feingold includes provisions that explicitly disallow candidates to run certain types of ads within a given date of the election, and is the single largest infringement of free political speech since the Alien and Sedition Acts.

A) Your knowledge of infringements on free speech seem to have large gaps.
and
No it doesn't. It prohibits unions and corporations from doing so but not candidates. Neither unions nor corporations have 1st Amendment rights.

Actually, I think corporations and unions both have limited first amendment rights, but I may be (and probably am) wrong.

Scooter

When it comes to political campaigning, there's already a ton of rules and requirements that you could say infringe free speech.