The Gadfly is a series of letters offering commentary on local issues and published in the Warrensburg Gazette.

Dear Editor

The humor of the Reform Party dispute over who is the real nominee (entitled to lots of taxpayer money for the campaign) is tempered by the possibility that something similar could happen right here in Missouri - if voters this November pass the so-called “Fair Elections initiative” on public financing of elections.

This initiative would apply to candidates for state legislative positions and candidates for state-wide office and congress. Candidates would have to raise a specified amount of $5 contributions and promise not to accept any more money (except from the state). Tax subsidies would range from $15,000 for State Representative to $1 million for Governor, and they could get the money twice, for both the primary and the general election.

I have several objections to public financing in general and this scheme in particular.

• First, it takes money from people (corporations – really their stockholders - in this case) and gives it to politicians, even though the politician may completely oppose the interests of the business. This would be like making Anheuser-Busch pay for the campaign of a prohibitionist. They say they’ll collect $13 million more in taxes per year, which translates to over $50 million in a 4-year election cycle, but it will surely go up as fringe candidates take advantage of the ‘free’ money.

• Second, it says Republicans and Democrats have better ideas than Libertarians, Greens or Reformers. It says that by setting limits that will subsidize the establishment parties and not the ‘third parties.’ As a result, it censors the ability of people from other parties to spread their ideas – unless they run as independents, who for some reason can collect more tax support than a third-party nominee.

• Third, it actually protects incumbents. Incumbents already have the built-in advantage of name recognition. Generally, to defeat an incumbent, a challenger needs to spend a great deal more money to get his/her name & positions to the public. This “fair elections” scam would make it impossible to do so, since it would give the incumbent extra tax money if the challenger decided not to accept the limits and to raise money on his/her own.

• Fourth, the procedures require record keeping more complex even than what is required now. It will increase the bureaucracy and administrative costs to the taxpayer. It will actually require ‘participating’ candidates to only do business with companies that can accept a debit card (and not all can), since it will be a felony to pay for any campaign expenses without using the debit card that the state will supply the candidate.