Judging from his May 28 op-ed column, "The leaking of political speech," George F. Will doesn't want democracy, he wants oligarchy, money and the moneyed to rule our country. This was implied in his statement, "These vast reservoirs of money are, however, inevitable, reasonable and, on balance, wholesome responses to the reformers' attempts to combat what they call 'too much money' in politics."
It’s apparently fine by him for super PACs or billionaires such as Sheldon Adelson and the Koch brothers to buy candidates and elections. No one who believes in democracy — the rule of the people, not of money — could support this domination by virtually unlimited dollars. Mr. Will hid behind the false pretext of “free speech” — as has the rightist Supreme Court under Chief Justice John G. Roberts.
Corporations are not people, and money is not speech. The Founding Fathers wanted to protect speech and religion from government harassment; that’s what the First Amendment is about — it’s not about allowing the unchecked wealthy to buy elections and governments.
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Roger Carasso, Santa Fe, N.M.
George F. Will would have us believe that political contributions equate to speech (“political speech”) and are sacrosanct as they are protected by the First Amendment. Money facilitates speech but is not speech per se. Mr. Will argued that Congress can regulate the “time, place and manner” of elections but not campaigns. The casting and counting of ballots is all that an election is, according to him.
That is as if buying a car only pertains to the moment the customer signs the agreement and excludes the research, the past experience of other owners, the test drive, kicking the tires, etc. Elections are much more than casting a ballot blindfolded, and campaigning is very much a part of the process. Unfortunately, egregious political contributions (political speech, according to Mr. Will) are often used in a negative fashion. Do not let anyone fool you into believing that money does not influence votes.
George Smith, Frederick
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