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A Lot of People Just Can't Afford McCain-Feingold

OK, enough shilling for the Democrats. On the front page of today's New York Times, I found an article that woke up my inner right-winger:

These supporters - some of whom have raised $200,000 or more for President Bush or the party - are being charged a "convention fee'' this year of up to $4,500 per person for themselves and each guest, according to a Web page run by LogiCom Project Management, the company handling the events and travel arrangements....
"A lot of us looked at that thing and said, whoa!'' said Bruce Bialosky of California, who raised $100,000 to become a Pioneer fund-raiser. He estimates that the convention will cost him and his family $15,000. "A lot of people just can't afford that.''
Republican officials say the fees have risen this year - they topped out at $1,750 in 2000 - because of the new McCain-Feingold campaign finance law, which eliminated the unlimited so-called soft money contributions that used to make up a large part of the party's finances and were traditionally used to pay for convention events. Now operating on a leaner budget, the Republican Party chose to pass the costs on to those attending the convention rather than spend cash that could be used to support President Bush in the election.

Perhaps you've forgotten, but this is the same McCain-Feingold campaign finance law that was going to "bring our government back to the people" and "shut down the machine that brings so much money to politicians" (both quotes from Common Cause) but has been most effective at keeping sketch comedy off the air.

Thanks to easily-predicted consequences of McCain-Feingold, it's harder for average people to attend political conventions. Will General Electric and Disney have any trouble attending the conventions? No, they will not. Thanks John! Thanks Russ!

I've previously written about McCain-Feingold here, here, and here.

Posted by digamma at August 8, 2004 08:39 PM | TrackBack