I'm a politician. I admit that. I haven't been elected to anything yet, but still, I am a politician. I have been a politician for over a year now, and the more I run for office, the more that I am convinced that if we are going to save our democracy, we are going to need to have more candidates. Not only do we need more candidates, we need candidates who will represent us, the American people. Our present system is FUBAR. Because of this, we have the Iraq war, warrant less wiretaps, 20 year old CAFE standards, and collapsing bridges. The list goes on... How do we clean up this mess? Support the "Fair Elections Now Act". http://ga3.org/...
I originally got into politics because I was angry. I was complaining, and I have a personality that does not let me sit still and complain for too too long before doing something productive. Our present system of privately financed elections is broken. Many people realize this, and there have been efforts to clean this mess up. But, these efforts—lastly and most notably McCain-Feingold—have been unsuccessful.
In 2006, only about 18% of the Congressional Seats were considered "in play". Gerrymandering has a role in this, but it is not the only nor is it the biggest reason. Its all about the money. Everybody--the DCCC, interest group PACs, individual donors—all say the same thing, "Show me the money!"
It would be bad enough if it was only the groups that I was soliciting money from who where asking how much money I had, but the media was asking the same question. Though not all the media sources made this point. Many, TV especially, did. They then would say, "We're not sure that you are a viable candidate." Viable Candidate?! What the heck does that mean? I'm intelligent, I do my homework, I can think for myself, and I care. What else do I need? It's not the media's job to decide if I am a viable candidate. We have elections to do that job. Let's let the people decided who is and who is not viable.
In 2006, my opponent, the incumbent Bill Shuster (PA-09), spent $864,000 in the primary. He had no opponent. There was no Republican primary opponent. I was not even in the race yet. What did he spend $864,000 on? Mostly motel rooms and meals. Playing on the special interest group dime to the detriment of the people of the 9th district. This man "inherited" his Congressional seat from his Dad, the infamous King of Pork, Bud Shuster. Bud Shuster was literally in bed with lobbyists. Ok, he was only literally in bed with one lobbyist, Ann Eppart, his former chief of staff. Bud retired almost immediately after the 2000 elections for "health reasons". He was facing ethics charges in the House, and there was talk of a possible indictment. Bill Shuster has accomplished nothing since he has been in the House, he has parroted President Bush on almost every issue, and the district continues to decline. Who is the viable candidate. Let's level the playing field, and let the people decide.
Obviously, I have my frustrations with the system as a politician, but I also have them as a citizen. The day after the 2006 elections the front-runners (the viable candidates?) were anointed by the media based on fund-raising. Though there are increasingly more news stories about the issues, media coverage is still focused on the money. The fact that President Bush in 2000, Bush and Kerry in 2004, and all the front-runners to this point have opted out of the public elections funding is a disgrace.
No, I don't think that we should just give a chunk of money to everybody who comes along and asks for it. That is why I like the program requirement of gathering a certain number of $5 donations to be eligible. From what I understand, in PA, I would need to gather 11,000 $5 donations to be eligible for the public money. If my opponent wished to opt out, I would then be eligible for more money. If that happened, you can bet that I would make a big issue out of that in the campaign.
We have many things that need to be fixed in our country. Our democracy is one of them. The only was to fix it is to take money out of elections. I believe publicly funded election to be the best way to do this. Please Support the "Fair Elections Now Act" http://ga3.org/... . If you would like more information about my campaign, you can go to my website http://www.tonybarr2008.com . Thank you.