A Challenge to John McCain

Mark Tapscott lays it on the line:

With a 3-3 vote featuring Democrat commissioners supporting the silencing of political speech against congressional incumbents and Republican commissioners in favoring of allowing it, the Federal Elections Commission has now made it official - As required by the McCain-Feingold Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2002, there can be no paid political broadcast ads criticizing incumbent Members of Congress for the two months prior to the Nov. 7 election.

* * * *.

I say it again - if the Republican Party nominates Sen. John McCain, R-AZ, for president in 2008 without his official apology for and repudiation of McCain-Feingold, plus introduction of legislation to repeal that monstrous outrage against the First Amendment, no conservative, libertarian or honest liberal can support him for the White House.

There is NO room for compromise on this issue. Either you believe in the First Amendment right to freedom of speech or you don't.

I might not go that far, but the whole Campaign Finance Reform thing is pretty misguided.

It (and especially the Supreme Court decision in Buckley v. Valeo) has led to a series of unancipated and adverse consequences; self-financed millionaire candidates (Perot, Bloomberg, Corzine), "soft" money, the massive paper-pushing burden on campaigns, the 527s.

I respect John McCain in many ways--he's articulate, without a lateral /s/, thoughtful, made great sacrifices for the country, is sound on fiscal and security matters--but his position on CFR troubles me greatly.

We should repeal all these laws and replace them with a reporting requirement with prompt posting on the Internet.