(This is the article I submitted to gopusa.com - never heard a thing about it. Bummer, I thought it was good.)
Today I went to my mailbox, opened it up, and received something I get about every month or two – an appeal from the Republican National Committee to donate money. They’re always concerned that I haven’t renewed my membership for the year. Funny, but I don’t recall ever becoming a member in the first place. Stranger still, the mail has followed me to my new home. Looks like they used some of the money from my phantom membership to acquire my new address.
Obviously the RNC knows that, in the past, I have taken advantage of my ever-shrinking First Amendment rights (as far as political speech goes) and donated some small sums of money to local and state candidates. Additionally, I’ve spent a lot of hours pounding the pavement and working the polls for people who I believed would be an improvement in the political office from the person then occupying it. This happened a lot in my native Ohio, where I lived most of my adult life in a heavily Democrat area.
But I’ve never donated to the national party and there’s a very logical reason why. I’m a person who has an overarching belief that individual rights are paramount, and as far as government goes I believe in the adage that government which governs best governs least. It’s too bad that some in the Republican Party have seemed to get away from this. One example already noted is the McCain-Feingold campaign finance act, with Senator McCain being the main Republican advancing this infringement on political speech rights.
However, the RNC has no real litmus test as to whom their money supports. It’s pretty much a given that as long as the "R" is behind the name and the person’s not way off the so-called "mainstream", the RNC will give its financial help.
A little-known fact is that actual direct monetary support to candidates is a fraction of RNC expenditures – out of over $300 million collected in the 2004 election cycle, less than a quarter actually went to state and federal candidates. Most of the rest goes to the grunt work of getting the volunteers and, more importantly, the GOP voters out on Election Day. And there’s really nothing wrong with that. My beef (and thus my withholding) only extends to having this huge sum of money in a big pot for anyone with an "R" to use.
This means that the $25, $38, or $50 contribution suggested in the mailing (they must know what I make, too) is just as likely to help out someone I consider a "RINO" like Senators Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania or Lincoln Chaffee of Rhode Island as it is to a Republican officeholder I mostly agree with and admire like Ron Paul of Texas or Ken Blackwell in Ohio.
To this end, my personal solution has been to donate money and time to individual candidates. I feel a lot more comfortable in meeting the person and finding out what sort of views he or she has on the issues I’m most passionate about. Getting to know these things influences the decision whether or not to open up my checkbook. I know from experience that what I give may not be a huge amount, but in most local races any amount I give helps in a big way.
So I have a suggestion for the people at the RNC who run the fundraising arm, and I’m going to use this widely-read forum to opine it: let me tell you where I want my money to go. Even if you provide a short checklist of items I can focus my donation on, much like the United Way does, I’d be more encouraged to send in a few dollars.
But for the remainder of readers, before you send in another donation to the RNC and possibly to the Specters and Chaffees of the world you may not agree with, think about maybe sending a donation directly to the candidates and officeholders you admire most for their views on your pet issues.
I certainly don’t want the Republican National Committee to dry up and blow away – we do need some sort of bulwark against the socialistic liberals who continue to try and erode individual freedom any way they can. But I also don’t want the RNC to help those who seem to be aiding and abetting the liberal cause, and letting just anyone with an "R" at that big pile of money may not be helping the Republican Party in the long run.
