|
|
| |
| Wed, Dec. 3, 2008 |  |
 |
|
||
| |
How to waste a million bucks Tuesday, Dec 12, 2006 By John Brummett This was what the news item in the Little Rock paper said: A group aimed at promoting conservative causes spent nearly $900,000 castigating Democratic candidates and lauding Republicans in this year's Arkansas campaigns, the group's latest report to the Internal Revenue Service shows. Here's the columnist's version: A Republican hit group operating under an egregious loophole in federal laws wasted nearly a cool million dollars raised from cloaked sources by spreading largely unaccountable smears and lies against Arkansas Democratic candidates in the recent election, and deservedly lost all but one of the races it targeted, engendering a delicious backlash and enduring what amounted to a Democratic sweep that set back the already pitiable Arkansas Republican cause. Behold the difference between fact and the greater search for truth. The news item is factual. The columnist's textured and descriptive account comes closer to truth, if he does say so himself. By the way, the columnist takes credits merely for coming closer to truth, rather than achieving it, only because he was talking with a historian the other day and the historian told him there's no such thing as truth, only, at best, honest versions of it. This, then, is the columnist's honest version: The campaign finance reform of McCain-Feingold has been skirted. Cynics told us at the time that money, like water, would find the cracks. Cynics often get close to truth. With the raising and spending of uncapped so-called soft money outlawed, we've seen the rise of non-profit groups organized under Section 527 of the IRS code. Actually, these are mere funnels for large amounts of otherwise unidentified party money. These groups call themselves independent, but are anything but. They are forbidden by law from expressly advocating anyone's election. So, they spend their money for smears of persons of the opposite party without directly urging a vote for or against anybody, as if that fooled anybody. The national Republican Governors Association and the Arkansas Republican Party threw this nearly million dollars into this facade calling itself the Coalition for Arkansas' Future. Among other things, the group cited an old newspaper column of mine in alleging that Mike Beebe was "embedded in disdainful behavior" through a supposed association with Nick Wilson. What I'd said in 1997 was that Beebe was embedded in the periphery of Wilson's disdainful behavior, and was vulnerable to the very exploitation we turned out to be witnessing. But the most justice-serving example is that of Monty Davenport, a bona fide culturally conservative Democrat from Marion County who got elected in 2004 by a razor-thin margin. Arkansas Republicans saw him as a ripe target, particularly since, as a reasonable man, he'd come to Little Rock and cast moderate and progressive votes. This hit squad flooded his district with mailings saying "Little Rock has changed Monty Davenport." One postcard showed young people boozing it up and criticized Davenport for voting for that merely permissive legislation that Little Rock wanted to allow drinking alcohol outside drinking establishments within entertainment districts, meaning the River Market. Another attacked Davenport for favoring college scholarship eligibility for academically qualifying children of illegal immigrants. Another accused the thoroughly pro-gun Monty of being anti-gun over his vote on a land use issue that, to him, had to do with drag strips. Davenport won this time not by a razor-thin margin, but by 53-47. Here's the columnist's version of the truth about what Arkansas Republicans ought to do: Govern pragmatically, campaign less and, if they're determined to waste a million dollars, just send it to me. ------- John Brummett is a columnist for Arkansas News Bureau in Little Rock. His e-mail address is jbrummett@arkansasnews.com; his telephone number is (501) 374-0699. |
