Pajama Pundits

Yet McCain will continue to be the people's choice among the cluelesss.

McCain-Feingold merely moved the money that was already going into the process via soft money and moved it into the spotlight of disclosure. That was a necessary first step in reforming campaign finance.

527s were already there before McCain-Feingold. They just weren't used very much because soft money had no limits or restrictions and went directly to the political parties, thus giving donors more bang for the buck.

Oh, I don't think it was unintended consequences. He knew full well that closing one loophole would mean the money would move to another loophole. There are so many loopholes that he probably had no idea that it would specifically end up in 527s, but he knew the money would find one. That does not argue towards leaving the first loophole open. Especially since 527s have stricter disclosure rules and are separate from the political parties, which has the effect of decentralizing the money and power. Every election breaks the record for campaign spending, and no, this year is no exception, largely due to the increase in hard money limits in McCain-Feingold, but that was a compromise that was probably necessary to pass the thing in the first place. At least hard money also has much stricter disclosure limits than soft money. I think the disclosure has worked pretty well in at least raising awareness of the whole campaign finance issue. If you are interested in a more complete solution, public financing of campaigns is the only answer that I can see, but this will be a harder sell to voters. You may want to research the Clean Money, Clean Elections system to learn more. The efforts right now are more at the state and local levels, such as Arizona and Maine. Once voters get used to the idea, it might be possible to fully implement it at the federal level. Currently, the amount of funding generated by the $3 check-off box on IRS forms for the presidential race is too small to make a difference.