Last week, the FEC threw out a complaint against CBS for supposedly “coordinating” with the Kerry campaign in running its botched National Guard story — and, thus, making an illegal contribution to said campaign.
Allison Hayward analyzes what this decision means for “media” (an important question for bloggers) here and here.
I would also note that just because the FEC reached a reasonable decision here doesn’t mean that campaign-finance laws aren’t a direct threat to the media. The fact that such a complaint can even be brought is a tremendous injustice in and of itself.
And the FEC isn’t always going to act rationally. John McCain and Russ Feingold are constantly suing to make sure of that. And now they’re lobbying for more extreme reformers to be appointed.
McCain-Feingold must be repealed, or it must be taken apart in court once Justice O’Connor (the swing vote in the case that upheld McCain-Feingold) is gone.
As someone who lives in Arizona I am very disappointed that McCain has wreaked havoc on our country through his so-called campaign finance reform! It also looks bad for Arizona when another one of our own, Justice O’Connor, went along with the train wreck and upheld the denial of our free speech rights!