RonK has kicked up a bit of dust with his
two most
recent posts examining the contributions of the Indian tribes once represented by Republican felon Jack Abramoff. (Repeat the phrase "Republican felon Jack Abramoff" three times, then find a way to slip it into a conversation, and it will always be part of your active vocabulary.) I urge readers with the time to go through the comments on those two threads, and follow the arguments of the participants. With only a few exceptions, even when heated and irritated, the participants made good points, and at this point on the second thread there seems to be a consensus around the facts as presented by RonK, and at least a modicum of acceptance on where it may fit in to the bigger scheme regarding the Republican scandal involving Republican felon Jack Abramoff.
As RonK laid out, over the last few days some very smart and shrewd people on our side of the blogosphere made some assertions about patterns of tribal political donations that don't appear to hold up to a factual examination. RonK should be commended for straightening out the fact that the tribes represented by Abramoff actually gave more money to Democrats during his involvement. However, their donations to Republicans grew at an even greater rate of increase. Thus, it was more money to Democrats, but the percentage to Democrats shrunk during Abramoff's involvement with the tribes, meaning that the net differential between donations to Republicans and Democrats shifted in favor of the Republicans.
Furthermore, there is testimony supporting the claim rejected by some that in fact Abramoff directed the tribes to dispense some of their money to Democrats. Since the sources of this testimony themselves may not be unimpeachable, we can leave that open for now. But even if one fully accepts the proposition that Abramoff was directing his clients to continue the standard pattern of tribes donating to Democrats, he was still altering that pattern by increasing the number of donations to Republicans, and shifting the percentages of donations to the parties in favor of the Republicans.
There are some important lessons to be learned from the statements of some smart people who were wrong, from the information assembled by RonK, and by what wasn't being discussed during this dust up over whether Abramoff directed donations to Democrats, and whether Democrats were receiving more or fewer donations from Abramoff's clients.
First, the lessons of what not to do:
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Crossposted at The Next Hurrah0
- Don't make assertions that you don't know for a fact are true. In the comments to RonK's second post, jukeboxgrad points to a good example, in this case by Howard Dean, after beating down the b.s. of Wolf Blitzer, possibly going one step too far by saying There's no evidence that I've seen that Jack Abramoff directed any contributions to Democrats." Well, maybe it's true he didn't see the evidence. But that just means he didn't see the evidence, not, as RonK has shown, that the evidence doesn't exist.
- Don't assume you understand the complexities of campaign finance unless you really do. I've dealt with campaign finance issues for several years, from the side of labor unions, from caucus operations, individual campaigns 501(c)3's, 527's, federal PAC's, state PAC's, soft money, almost all of it. And I'll be blunt and tell you that nobody in the press understands campaign finance issues. Well, maybe Tom Edsall and possibly Jeff Birnbaum at the Washington Post. Maybe a few others here or there. But if you're consuming some media report about campaign finance, assume that the person has only the most cursory knowledge of the subject. As a result, don't expect the press to understand the various shell-games that Abramoff had going unless someone who does understand campaign finance issues walks them through it in great detail. And you, reader, don't assume that you understand it either. It's clear from the comments on the threads that a few of our readers know campaign finance, possibly quite well. But in political journalism, and on political blogs, it's the issue most likely to trip up otherwise bright, shrewd political observers.
- Don't get bogged down in minutia when engaged in a PR battle. Closely related to that...
- Don't believe that you must prevail on every point. It would be very easy to say "sure, I don't know if Republican felon Jack Abramoff directed his clients to give to Democrats. But that's both easily explained, and ultimately irrelevant. The easy explanation is that his clients wanted to give to Democrats, and he was just providing cover for his real intent, which was to redirect a net increase of money to Republicans, and into his illegal schemes. And it's irrelevant because it wasn't Jack Abramoff's money, the tribes were his victims, and there's no evidence any of those donations were illegal or ethically tainted, or that the Democrats did or should have had any reason to think they were tainted donations." Instead, too many people wanted to show that Deborah Howell is wrong about every point. There's nothing wrong with conceding a small point in pursuit of the larger argument, especially when her small point can easily be dismissed as irrelevant.
- Don't focus too much on the FEC-regulated donations. This scandal is not going to be about donations to candidates' campaign committees. It's about moving money around through 501(c)3's and 501(c)4's, 527's, state ballot committees, consultancies, lobbying shops and the like. The breakdown between which party got the most legal campaign donations is a huge, huge distraction. That's not where the illegalities will lie, in large part because that's not where the real money is. $2,000 and $5,000 is, in this context, chump change. Look for the chunks of $25,000 and $50,000 and the like, and those aren't going to show up in the FEC filings.
Now, what we SHOULD do:
- STAY. ON. MESSAGE!
- Messengers of long-established good faith aren't the enemy. Related to that, if someone says something with implications you don't like, don't put your immediate focus on your (most likely unfounded) attributions of their motives, first direct your attention at their facts and arguments.
- Don't be afraid of truth coming out. We're better if we can anticipate lines of attack than if we're caught flat-footed.
- Demand intellectual rigor and dispassionate analysis of yourself, and try to recognize it when exercised by others. As Orwell wrote in Politics and the English Language, "to think clearly is a necessary step toward political regeneration."
- STAY. ON. MESSAGE!
Finally, what, you may ask, is the message?
- All evidence suggests that this is an exclusively Republican scandal, done to benefit Republicans and their corrupt allies.
- Republican felon Jack Abramoff engaged in wide-ranging illegalities and public corruption to benefit himself and his allies in the Republican party.
- There is no evidence any of Abramoff's corruption was perpetrated with the help of or done to the benefit of Democrats.
- Everyone implicated or accused of being involved in Abramoff's corruption is a Republican, most of them either elected officials or people closely linked to powerful Republican officials.
- There is no evidence at this point that the Indian tribes Republican felon Jack Abramoff represented did anything wrong. Instead, the tribes were Abramoff's victims. Furthermore, there is no evidence that any donations received by Democrats were tainted.
- Republicans are trying to taint the tribal donations to distract attention from their own exclusive role in the Abramoff corruption scandal. Suggesting the tribes did something illegal, with no evidence to suggest they did, is blaming the victim, and an attempt to sully the reputations of Democrats associated with the tribes.
I hope this helps. Let's get our facts straight. Let's pick the right fights, and ignore the counterproductive or distracting bickering, be it with the press, the Republicans, or with ourselves. Keep our focus. Recognize the limitations of our knowledge and our evidence. Stay on message. Win.