My friends Honest Abe and Jim Purcell are beginning to go off on "dirty money" from developers and "Pay to Play" over at Abe's blog. This is an issue where I disagree with Abe and Jim.
I'm concerned that as a party we are over reacting to past scandals and that we are letting the Asbury Park Press set our fund raising policies. When the APP starts making as much an issue of Labor Union contributions as they have with vendor and developer contributions, they will have more credibility with me.
Rather than re-invent the wheeling, I give you the words of another friend, former Freeholder candidate Tom DeSeno, as originally published in his Justified Right column in the TriCity News on February 15, 2006. (Note to Tom and Dan: Please don't sue me for copyright infringement. Consider this a plug to increase your readership among the surburbanites. Then again, if you do sue me, maybe the APP will cover us and we'll all get more readers. Hmmmm.)
PAY TO PLAY: A phony scare like the Jersey Devil.
An open challenge to debate Heather Taylor
By Tommy DeSeno. Originally published in the TriCity News. February 15,2006
Who cannot open an honest mind / no friend will he be of mine. Euripides
Like the only boy honest enough in the Kingdom to yell, "The Emperor has no clothes," I stand now to yell: "The pay-to-play problem is a fake media illusion to scare people, just like the Jersey Devil."
Before we get into it, let's clarify some law: Each of us has a 1st amendment right of "free speech" to endorse a candidate for office. The right to donate money to a candidate has been held as "free speech." By law if I want to stand on a street corner and yell, "Vote for George," since I have a 1st Amendment right to do so, a town will need a "compelling" state interest to stop my speech. Well by the very same laws, a town will need to show a "compelling" state interest to stop me from writing a check to George.
Here is the usual media dupe on pay-to-play: An engineer likes a candidate for City Council and donates $2,600.00 to him. Candidate wins. The next month that same engineer is hired by the city as an engineer.
Now here is the media "assumption:" All people in the world being corrupt, criminal, base, vile, awful and bad, the engineer over-bills the City to get his $2,600.00 back and the city raises taxes to cover it, so the taxpayers lose money.
"Oh what a terrible scandal!" yelled the mainstream media. "Let's write a billion words on it and convince New Jerseyeans that every local politician (also known as their friends and neighbors) is corrupt and every professional in the world is a hell-bound sinner!" So the media assault began, and it never stopped.
Here's the real deal: The assumption above isn't true. Professionals, despite contributing to campaigns, don't over-bill their government clients. If you poll lawyers with government contracts, most charge about 50% less per hour to the government than they do to their private clients.
The media response is: "Who gives a damn about the truth. We have the greatest "scare" story since War of the Worlds. Let's keep writing it!"
There is a group running amok in New Jersey pressuring every town and county to pass their version of Pay to Play laws (and many towns are caving in faster than a trailer park in a tornado). The group is called Center for Civic Responsibility and it is connected to the national group called Commie Cause. I mean Common Cause. Sorry. Scampering about the state for them, Jersey Devil in tow, is Heather Taylor.
When the Asbury Park Press writes about this group, they refer to them as "the good government group." OK AP Press, a lesson in journalism: Objectivity does not allow for value judgments when describing a partisan group, so when you... Oh forget it. Look who I'm talking to.
So Heather skips from town to town with her cookie-cutter pay-to-pay laws and says, "We insist you pass this law." Then she winks. Do you know what the wink means? "If you don"t pass it, the Asbury Park Press will grind you into sausage meat." Fearing for the good reputations of their families because there is no way to fight the AP Press, towns dutifully pass Heather's laws.
Here is my proof that Heather's group and the Asbury Park Press are over-stuffed like 10 pounds of manure in a 5 pound bag. Consider the firm Schoor DePalma, a group of engineers hired by government all over New Jersey. So as to remove themselves from this silliness, they announced they will no longer give any campaign contributions. You know what they didn't announce? That they were lowering their fees! You see, despite formerly being large campaign contributors, they weren't over-billing government to get the money back, and government wasn't raising taxes to pay them back. There was no "hidden tax." Schoor De Palma was hired then, and now, because they are great engineers.
That is also proof of my main assertion: Even if every town in New Jersey passes Heather's pay to play law, not one town will have their budget reduced by even a penny. She is selling a phony, made-up, non-existent scandal and a "feel-good" law to fix it.
All Heather and the Jersey Devil Press are accomplishing is to take away campaign dollars. The problem is, not all money is bad. Much off it is good. People have busy lives, so the only way they get to know who candidates are and what they stand for is advertising, which costs money. Without ads, the electorate will be uninformed. By the way, did the Asbury Park Press offer to lower their advertising rates to political campaigns to help the electorate stay informed? Of course not; they're no Schoor De Palma.
Now take me for example. My firm has an appointment in non-partisan Asbury Park. Heather's group demanded Asbury pass a pay to play law that says not only can't I give money in Asbury, but I can't give to the County Republican Party, which by the way spends exactly $0.00 each year in Asbury Park. So as a Monmouth County resident, I can't buy a $45.00 ticket to a Monmouth fundraiser to buy flyers that let people know about our candidates. Under these same laws though, Camden County boys George Norcross and Joe Roberts donated $1 million dollars in Monmouth last year to lie about our people. Heather and the Asbury Park Press call that "good government." Good Grief. By the way, The AP Press is "coincidentally" run by 2 Camden men. Double Good Grief.
Right now the good people in Tinton Falls are acting to remove the very unconstitutional ban on Contributions to County Parties from their pay-to-pay law. Applause! They should also get rid of the "large firm loophole" that allows big firms to donate but not small firms (what big firms made donations to Heather's group to ensure that was in there?).
So today I challenge Heather to debate me on these subjects, and I'll do it in front of the editorial board of the Asbury Park Press so she can feel at home. Any time.
The Political Pathology of Palestinian Liberation
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Wil, here's my point of view on pandering to the press (Or the Press):
"While a pillar of a free press is to be critical of government and its officials, a watch-dog if you will, and politicians should be on their p's & q's lest their actions be reported negatively, it is not healthy to tailor all public policy simply for the satisfaction of any journal or journalist. At that point, the press becomes just another special interest group being pandered to."
I believe political organizations and campaigns should police themselves when it comes to fundraising. Attempting to appease the press is like appeasing the Knights Who Say Ne. They're never satisfied with just one shrubbery.
So the feel-good laws restrict no-bid contracts. Has anybody asked just what a no-bid contract is?
A contract is awarded without bidding for professional services, namely attorneys, engineers, architects, auditors and the like.
Why?
Well, let's look at the nature of the positions. Decisions based on advice given by these professionals can be much more far-reaching than a faulty sack of nails. You may not want a low-bid contract here. That was the way the law was set up by the State Legislature many years ago.
The APP jumped on the "reform" bandwagon very quickly. Remember that calling it reform doesn't make it so. They went after the no-bid contracts and not much else. Like Pavlov's dogs, many politicians reacted without thinking it through, only to satisfy the Press.
Since the Press didn't go after the unions, that aspect of "Pay to Play" remains untouched. For perspective, on the Democrats' 4th Quarter '05 ELEC report, there are contributions totaling $287,055.00 from various labor unions, not all of which are public employee unions. In a comment on that thread, Jim Purcell attempted to justify it: "they're probably putting money into pro-labor candidates." Sorry Jim, nice try. Since many of them are in trades, I would wonder if, under a Democratic administration, in addition to renaming Larrison Hall after Ray Kramer, we didn't see more major county construction projects.
As to the public employee unions, like CWA, I'm sure many of their membership would object to seeing their dues go to the Democrats in the amount they do.
So I'm with you Mr. Secretary. I'm not holding my breath for the APP to do a write-up on union contributions.
Tommy Deseno- he DA Man.
I could not say it better.
First off, Tommy is a good man. If everyone were as honest as Abe, or Will or Tommy, things would be different. But, they're not.
Tommy said: "Here's the real deal: The assumption above isn't true. Professionals, despite contributing to campaigns, don't over-bill their government clients."
So, what about the county counsel and his trusty assitant counsels? Malcolm would be the first one to tell you what he's billing isn't on the low side of ANYTHING. And, this may be gov't, but people and firms are supposed to make a LIVING on government, not become RICH off tax dollars.
Tommy said: "If you poll lawyers with government contracts, most charge about 50% less per hour to the government than they do to their private clients."
With respect, so Pete Carton is bargain basement, like Malcolm? Sorry, not believing here. Better luck selling me NAFTA.
Pay for Play and Anti-Wheeling is supposed to stop people, like some elected people in my district, who get like $70K in contributions from one developer, who is given the red carpet treatment in various towns and, when needed, gets some Trenton muscle to rouse the locals his way.
Therre's a place for pay to play. This ain't Disney. Union Beach was damn near redeveloped for the sake of the public private bonding that would have put peoples' grand kids in hock for a BS project that served little esle than make a few fat GOP lawyers fatter. Not everyone is like that, and it's a shame good people have to suffer, but there are enough bad actors on both sides of the aisle to make campaign finance reform a topic.
And, Mr. Yeungling: Did you name yourself after beers?
Mr. Secretary, have you heard anything about the Howell crowd trying to come up with a candidate to put up against Jim Giannell?
they have no one. john costigan would be a name if he wanted to do it, which there may have been a rumbling or two about but nothing serious. but the coalition isn't there for a win.
besides, fred's crew over there was a part of the problem: how can they bring grassroots anything after the whole getting people jobs thing?
there's great people over there, but those folks are on jim's side anyway. wouldn't a howell candidate be a kind of post-fred death rattle for his supporters there?
Honest Abe said...
"Mr. Secretary, have you heard anything about the Howell crowd trying to come up with a candidate to put up against Jim Giannell? "
Mr. President, this is the first I've heard of it.
As the song says, "When will they ever learn, when will they eeeeveerr learn?"
From a former Howell Mayor and County Committee Member -- Jim Gianell is the best candidate for the job, but it does not surprise me that a few would be making a last ditch effort to hold on to their "power." Is their any update on the $16,000+ from Fred's PAC that was spent on DIBella's freeholder bid? I have not seen an ELEC report yet.
And with all due respoect to Tom DeSeno, AST Development gave a hefty donation to Howell's URC PAC and was the major sponsor of their Golf Outing (loudly proclaimed on the URC website) while the firm was seeking a zoning change that would have made Highway Commercial into high density residential housing. This donation was made AFTER DiBella signed a memorandum of understanding with AST pledging the council's cooperation in making the zoning change happen. Of course, DiBella will tell you that Howell has the "toughest ethics law" in the state, country and world! In fact he will tell you that it a law of "historic proportions."
The Emperor is an airbather!
At least he's not a power washer.
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