Some years ago, I had a conversation with an FBI agent at a cocktail party. In the course of our conversation, I asked the agent what the difference was between a bribe paid to an elected official and a campaign contribution. He didn’t know the answer. I have thought about this discussion many times over the years. Watching the events unfold at both the Democrat and Republican conventions in the coming weeks, I am reminded that this question remains not only unanswered but unasked.
What is the difference between a bribe and a campaign contribution?
Election lawyers, lobbyists and politicians all have their own pat answers but none of their responses get to the problem with politics and campaign finance in America. Moreover, the duplicity in this process remains the great hypocrisy in American politics today and for the foreseeable future.
Black’s Law Dictionary defines a bribe as the offering, giving, receiving, or soliciting of any item of value to influence the actions of an official or other person in discharge of a public or legal duty. The bribe is the gift bestowed to influence the recipient’s conduct. It may be any money, good, right in action, property, preferment, privilege, emolument, object of value, advantage, or merely a promise or undertaking to induce or influence the action, vote, or influence of a person in an official or public capacity.
Wikipedia oddly has no definition for the term political contribution. However, the search produces a definition for fundraising which is defined as “the process of soliciting and gathering money or other gifts in-kind, by requesting donations from individuals, businesses, charitable foundations, or governmental agencies. Although fundraising typically refers to efforts to gather funds for non-profit organizations, it is sometimes used to refer to the identification and solicitation of investors or other sources of capital for-profit enterprises.”
These definitions smell suspiciously similar.
In a recent article in the New York TImes, it was noted that “[a]t Invesco Field, the site of Barak Obama’s acceptance speech for the Democrat nomination, “Mr. Obama would allocate his skyboxes to “staff, supporters, family members and friends.” Among those getting skyboxes are Quest, Comcast, Xcel Energy and Tom Golisano, the New York Republican who recently gave $1 million to the Denver host committee.” [1. New York Times, August 22, 2008] In addition, the following corporate sponsors are participating in a range of events:
A.T.&T. and Genworth are among the sponsors of Blue Night in Denver, an event Sunday honoring the Blue Dog Coalition, a group of fiscally conservative Democratic House members.
Corporations and other donors are being solicited to buy “sponsorship packages” for events costing $25,000 to $50,000 and honoring the New Democrat Coalition, a group of moderate Democrats.
Donors to the New Democrat event will get V.I.P. tickets and access to the exclusive area, with amenities, for a party at Union Station, a Rockies game at Coors Field and a jazz brunch at “an incredible private residence” in Denver, according to the invitation.
Visa and U.S. Bank are also sponsoring a reception honoring the freshman Congressional class.
Of course the Democrats don’t have a lock on this sort of corruption nor is this phenomena new. Certainly in our contemporary memory, corporations have sponsored and heavily participated in the party conventions at many levels. Despite campaign finance reforms that have sought to tighten up the flow of political money, the conventions remain veritable sink holes of corporate cash into the political influence process in America.
What differentiates the American campaign finance system with backroom payoffs of politicians in third world countries is really only a matter of style. We have glamorized, regulated and legitimized the payoff system in America so that it has become the accepted norm. By comparison, smoking marijuana is illgeal and people are jailed for using and possessing the substance. However, alcohol is legal, it’s taxed and regulated and many more people die and suffer debilitating injuries and disease from its use. The later substance is commonly accepted in our society and is treated as a higher form of substance abuse. Social norms not objective consequences drive this differentiation.
Corporate influence through the expenditure of large sums of cashs may anger ordinary folk witnessing such activity but nothing more comes of such corrupting activities. However, like bribery and corruption in its more banal forms, it has a dramatic affect on the lives of people throughout the world. As noted by Transparency International:
Political corruption affects us all. We elect politicians and political parties expecting them to act in the public interest. By electing them we give them access to public resources and the power to take decisions that impact on our lives. Given this privileged position, immense damage can be inflicted by politicians or parties acting out of greed, or in the service of those who bankroll their ascent to power. It is not surprising that people the world over are demanding absolute probity of their political leaders: citizens in three out of four countries polled by TI and Gallup International in 2003 and in 2004 singled out political parties as the institution they perceived as most corrupt.
While it is unlikely that there will be any dramatic transformation in the way corporations get to influence politics in America, bringing a measure of transparency or openness to the process is critical. Every effort must be made to reveal both direct and indirect contributions to political candidates and parties and related causes. Currently, this is not happening in the U.S. We continue to convince ourselves that pigs at a trough are really socialites at a Southampton tea party. This does not bode well for humanity.
