John McCain's gutting of campaign finance is even bigger than previously thought

I wrote the other day about John McCain agreeing to lift the caps on coordinated party expenditures as part of the 527 bill. The initial concern was that this would now permit the Republicans to spend hundreds of millions of more dollars on the 2008 presidential race, while the Democrats don't have nearly as much cash on hand to spend - thus, the change was made to screw Democrats, not to keep money out of elections.

So basically, Mr. McCain agreed to gut campaign finance law - his trademark issue - in order to help himself to the trough. Gee, what a surprise.

Well, it's gets worse. A friend who works on such issues now tells me that it’s more than just the 2008 election that this will affect. I'll summarize my friend's analysis below.

The language of the bill is that is goes into effect upon enactment, meaning the party committees will be able to spend unlimited coordinated dollars in 2006 on candidates. I'm told this bill would be a huge boon to the Republican committees and leave the Democratic committees in the dust. Given the significant cash on hand advantage the RNC currently has, they could field candidates across the country that don’t have to raise a finger to fundraise.

The current limit on coordinated party expenditures for most House races is only $39,600 ($79,200 for At Large House candidates). Senate races vary with the state, the big states are $1 or $2 million but most are considerably less (the formula is based on population).

If the RNC, NRSC and NRCC are allowed to turn on the spigot, it won’t just be for only endangered incumbents. It will also be marginal Rs, forcing Ds to defend seats thought to be safe.

So, yet again the Republicans, in their Orwellian well, pass a bill whose intent has nothing to do at all with the name of the bill. Rather, the Republicans who control the US House and the US Senate simply are trying to rewrite the laws to write the Democratic party out of existence, just like Tom Delay did in Texas.

While Bush is simply incompetent, the Republicans controling the Congress, with John McCain leading the pack, are corrupt to their core.