Parasite at Anti-Schwarzenegger Rally

I was present yesterday at the San Francisco Ritz-Carleton Hotel for a protest against California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Although I oppose him in general, I was not there as part of the actual protest. Instead, I was for the first time one of those pests who swarm to such things to promote their own causes. Mine was Clean Money, Clean Elections. It was more difficult talking to people there than at the previous tabling events I've done. Most people were busy going someplace or other, and those that weren't were listening to people on a stage with speakers. However, of those with whom I managed to converse, most were interested in my cause, and many people signed our petition to the state legislature to support Loni Hancock's bill to have clean money elections in California.

Briefly, the idea behind Clean Money, Clean Elections: to run for office, candidates need money to get their message out to voters. Where does this money come from? Almost entirely from deep-pocket donors. These donors are the folks that need to be pleased by the successful candidate's time in office. So if politicians want to be re-elected, they are responsible to this small, wealthy constituency, and not to the voters who elected them. Clean Money gives politicians the option to run their campaigns entirely with public money (from taxes) if they take no private money. Then politicians are beholden not to special interests, but to voters at large. This is a non-partisan cause and should be supported by anyone who wants to strengthen our democracy.

Most of the crowd there were union members understandably angry about Arnie's proposals to shortchange the state workers' pensions. I asked many of the people with whom I talked if they thought their unions would endorse Clean Money. Every one of them said that, while there would probably be good support for it among the membership, the leadership would oppose it because it would limit the union's ability to pay for politicians. This didn't especially surprise me, but it does nonetheless disappoint me. Unions exist to promote the interests of the working people in their membership, and I doubt that we can really have a progressive movement in society without organized labor being perhaps the driving force. However, if unions had the broader picture of advancing their members' interests, they'd get behind Clean Money 100%.
Working people would be the immediate beneficiaries of Clean Elections because unions usually get outspent, as I recall off the top of my head, by about 3 or 4 to 1.

I believe, though, that all people would ultimately benefit from Clean Elections because decisions could be made more collectively and not just for the interests of a small segment of society. Everyone likes to believe that they know what's best for society, but for unions and business groups alike, their opinions happen to line up with what's best for them economically. A more disinterested decision making process will be necessary if we, as a society, are going to have a hope of making choices truly in the general interest.