Manipulating The Election System 

Since my friend and colleague Henry Stern penned his column below, more questionable issues have arisen concerning the potential politicization of the change of Campaign Finance rules.

Sadly, we are again faced with an elected official trying to manipulate the system and change the law to enhance his own political future.

It has happened before; it’ll happen again. When it does, we must ignore whether or not we support that candidate, and demand that election rules not be changed for the benefit or detriment of any single candidate. When election rule changes impact those voting on them, those changes should be put into effect after the full election cycle is over. That would in effect make those participating in the changes evaluate the proposal based on public benefit and not their own self-interest.

Just as we led the fight to prevent elected officials from overturning term limits for themselves, we condemn any elected official involved in a rule/law change to benefit him or herself.

Elected officials should not be allowed to change the law to limit their challengers’ ability to use funds, raise funds or to increase their own ability to access money. If a legislative body believes that such change is necessary, let them make the effective date of the law change far enough into the future so as not to impact present election contests which they may be involved in. This is not a cute statement of language. This is as strong a position of advocacy as I can make: it is wrong for elected officials to participate in a process of law or rule change that will improve their own chances of getting elected to the detriment of their opponents.

Let me explain. In Henry’s column below, he refers to the proposed change of campaign finance board matching funds from 4:1 to 8:1 if the opponent does not participate in the program. This would double the amount of money that the Democratic candidate would get against Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Henry clearly states the case against this. Me, even if I believed that such a reform was necessary to level the playing field against the wealthy, I would not accept the change while the upcoming election seems clearly to be between a participant in the program and one who intends not to use matching funds but his own resources. To do so would allow the Democratically controlled City Council to cast a vote that would promote the candidacy of the Democrat over the Republican. Not fair, not democratic, not acceptable — even though I’m a Democrat.

Now, I don’t have a candidate for Mayor — I’ve met them all. I consider quite a number of them as friends. I have been a strong supporter of the administration of Mayor Mike Bloomberg, and just last week had four of the five leading Democratic candidates for Mayor celebrating the season with me at the Tribune’s annual Holiday Party.

Basically, there are five viable Democratic challengers and one Republican incumbent in the Mayoral mix, and this City is blessed to have such a quality crop of candidates. They all won’t make the race and watching the process play out from my box seat is one of the perks that this political junkie gets from writing this column and publishing this paper. It is an exciting time for those of us who find government and politics as exciting as Monday night football or Yankee (I wish I could say Met) baseball.

But as the game of politics is played, it is real important not to let those folks who can lose perception of right and wrong, stray from the principles of fairness and democracy.

I’m afraid that Council Speaker Giff Miller is about to stray — again. Miller, the 34-year-old, very bright Councilman from the Upper East Side, became Speaker two years ago, after term limits ousted all but a couple of handfuls of senior Councilmembers. With the support of a united Queens delegation, Miller, the best man for the job, won. He immediately and skillfully pushed through a change in term limit law that allowed him and six others to run for an additional two years. He is about to begin those "final" two years.

In passing that term limit "tweak," Miller as boss of the Council changed the law passed by referendum of the people in order to extend the number of years he was allowed to serve in the Council. The same law denied other former Councilmembers the right to run. Miller was a masterful salesman and sold his "tweak" to most good-government groups and editorial boards in spite of the fact that it was clearly a self-serving piece of legislation.

This newspaper was almost alone calling attention to and opposing this initial self-serving manipulation by Miller.

Well, the City didn’t stop him them, and he’s trying it again.

He is placing before the Council new campaign finance law changes. There’s the lead item, the 8:1 match to fill his own coffers with City tax money (or the coffers of the winner of the Democratic Primary) for the showdown against Mike Bloomberg.

His own press release was deceptive, not revealing all the advantages he planned on legislating for himself. Last time, he hid the fact that his term limit "tweak" denied former Council people the right to run.

This time his publicity attempted to hide the provision which would allow Miller to transfer to his Mayoral campaign and utilize all the campaign funds he has banked for any office, but deny Anthony Weiner eligible funds in his Federal Account or Brian McLaughlin eligible funds in his State account — a move to gain an advantage over two of his Democratic foes. Miller, McLaughlin Weiner, and Bill Thompson have roughly the same size campaign war chests somewhere under $2 million — none of them raised any money for a mayoral race. Miller (and Thompson) would be able to use all of theirs while Weiner and McLaughlin could use none of theirs if Miller’s change is adopted. Just plain wrong!

Miller cohort Manhattan Councilman Bill Perkins, chairman of the Government Operations Committee, is putting forth these proposals — the very same route the term limit "tweak" took as it was skillfully rushed to passage.

Expect nothing less here. I spoke to Giff briefly about his plans to change the rules midstream. And he rattled off a string of platitudes: we always do it; what, we should delay justice, etc. He seems hell-bent on changing the rules to gain as much advantage as he can.

Several Councilmembers have told me in confidence: It’s wrong; but I can’t afford to oppose the Speaker.

Miller controls Committee chairs, assignments, perks, budgets and lots of other goodies that give him almost complete control over the Council agenda and votes.

And sadly, he’s using it to advance his own political career.

And in the end, I predict it will not only cost him the support of this newspaper, but of many who view politics as public service and not the use of charm and power.

Abuse By Greedy Pols 

Last week, I appeared before the Campaign Finance Board. I had signed up to testify, before the controversy erupted about doubling the match rate from 4:1 to a maximum of 8:1 for candidates opposing others who are not participating in the CFB program. 

On the substance, I believe that an 8:1 ratio is excessive for a number of reasons:

1) It does not fully consider the non-cash contributions by public employee unions, political clubs and others. Money, although important, is far from the only asset in an election campaign. Volunteers, are an important part of the political equation.

2) For the Board to suggest, or the Council to adopt major changes in the rules at this time, when the Speaker and the Mayor are two of the major opposing candidates, is tampering with a race which is already underway. To the mayor’s credit, when he tried to abolish party primaries, he deferred the effective date to 2009, so he could not be accused of promoting his own election chances. The least the CFB can do is follow that example.

3) With the city in a financial crisis, the new formula would add tens of millions of dollars to the expense budget. How many police officers, teachers or park workers should we do without in order to provide more commercials, leaflets and tschotchkes for candidates unable or unwilling to pay their own bills?

4) The 8:1 figure is itself arbitrary.  If it a sin for Bloomberg to spend more money than the others, why not give his rivals enough to match his spending, and abolish some of the smaller city agencies to do it.  Isn’t 4:1, which comes out to about fifteen million dollars per contender, or about $6.50 per voter, enough to put one’s message across? 

But the greater vice of the current system of public financing of campaigns is the way it has been misused by those who do not need or deserve its benefit.

For example: sure winners, Democrats in overwhelmingly Democratic districts; sure losers, people who have no chance of election, but simply manipulate the system to advertise themselves; spurious candidates, where people of a particular ethnic group or gender are placed on the ballot in order to split the vote. The idea of any of these Trojan horses or straw men or women receiving public funds for their charade of a candidacy is ridiculous.

The Board pleads that all the abuse is carried out according to the law.  There are a number of able lawyers on the CFB staff. The brightest of all is their chairman, Fritz Schwarz, Harvard Law School LLB ’60, magna cum laude, former NYC Corporation Counsel (under Koch), and longtime senior partner at Cravath, Swaine and Moore.

If anyone can find a legal way out of this mare’s nest of conceit and deceit, Fritz Schwarz can. And he should.

Not4Publication.com by Dom Nunziato