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In this issue:
1)
Op-Ed: Democrats would clean up if they’d clean up the
system
2)
Contact
Information
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Item 1: Op-Ed in The
Capital Times (
Democrats would clean up if they'd clean up the system
By Jack E. Lohman
November 29, 2005
So what's a voter to do? The Republicans are bad, but
the Democrats haven't been any better not even when in power.
Gov. Doyle isn't willing to address the real issues
of concern. Sounds to me like walking papers.
First and foremost, the voters want honest
government, and with that alone we'd see many of our issues automatically fix
themselves. Get private money out of our public electoral system, period! We
want the special interests out and the taxpayers in, and the only way to
achieve that is to install full public financing of campaigns, the same as they
have in
Admittedly, some Wisconsinites don't understand the
true costs of our moneyed political system, but when they do, 90 percent are
outraged. If politicians are to be beholden to their funders, we want those
funders to be the taxpayers. For $5 per taxpayer per year we could fund the
entire
Some people may not like paying for the elections directly, but
figure it out: When the fat cats contribute to political campaigns, they add
their costs to the price of their product, and we reimburse them at the cash
register. So no matter how much politicians spend getting elected, the consumer
is still paying the tab. There's no free lunch. But worse, the current system
of paybacks in corporate welfare is costing each
I'd prefer the $5 tax even if it didn't return a
penny but brought us a clean government.
That five Republican and Democratic legislators have
been indicted, convicted or are serving time is not an indication that our
current system works, only that the tip of the iceberg was impossible to
conceal.
What's beneath the tip should be of great concern to
us all.
As a businessman, if I had an employee taking money
from vendors in return for company assets or favors, I'd fire him, perhaps even
have him jailed. We call that bribery and payola in the private world. But what
do we call that practice when those employees are elected state officials
taking campaign money from companies or executives with business before the
state? There's little difference.
Importantly, under a clean political system these
scandals would likely not have occurred; the state budget would not be
horrendously unbalanced; there would not be a major state deficit; and local
spending cuts would not have been necessary all because we had to satisfy the
private interests who funded the elections.
If the taxpayers were funding the elections, the
results would be reversed. And it is now abundantly clear: The Democrats have
been feeding from the same corporate troughs as the Republicans.
If the Dems were smart they'd expose this for what it
is a major taxpayer rip-off and perhaps they'd win back the state. If the
Republicans were smart they'd beat them to the punch; they'd fix it on their
watch and for years hence point to it as a Republican reform. The question now
is: Who is smarter?
Rep. Mark Pocan and a
bipartisan group of politicians have moved forward with Assembly Bill 626. It's
much like the
I offer this in the hopes that the Democratic Party
better competes with my party. I am a lifelong Republican who voted for
President Bush twice. But our state doesn't need more of the same; it needs
honest political representation. It's time to change, and if this Legislature
doesn't do it we may just see a well-deserved and major turnover in the next
elections.
Jack E. Lohman is a
retired business owner and now executive director of www.WiCleanElections.org.
He volunteers for
Published:
6:41 AM 11/29/05
Item 2: Contact information
Jack Lohman is a retired business owner in
Campaign
finance reform -
Universal
health care -
Contact: Jack Lohman
Phone 414-477-8686 (cell)
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