RE: Campaign contributions

[Denise Hood <hoodsx3@aol.com>]

Yes, I have supported many candidates that I believed in with financial contributions. This was the FIRST election where my husband and I opted to do that. We strongly felt that our party and it's candidates, both at the local and state level, as well as our party's candidates for U.S. House and Senate, as well as our party's presidential candidate were all disadvantaged by being WAY outspent by the candidates from the other party, and we wanted to do what we could to help out. But our contributions were not exorbitant, by any means. If REAL campaign finance reform were enacted, that levelled the playing field, and we could ALL have assurances, that despite ANY candidate's personal wealth, party, whether an incumbant or a challenger, ALL campaigned with an equal amount of money, and no one had any unfair financial advantage over the other, then there would be no NEED and no impulse to "give as much as we could." Then candidates would have to campaign on their ideas, their strenghts, their vision, what they had to offer to their constituents, their agendas, their issues, rather than "dazzling" people with their huge, frilly, over-inflated mega-bucks campaigns, and their vicious, negative attack-ads of their opponents. 

I think this is the stumbling block. Fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of trying something different, fear that if they vote to pass the McCain-Feingold Bill, that somehow all it will succeed in doing is drying up all THEIR sources of campaign money, without touching where their opponent gets his, and placing them at an incredible disadvantage, that will cost them the election. What they have now is their safety net, it's a KNOWN to them, a given. They don't wish to venture out into the new post McCain-Feingold campaign world and find out that the promised money does not materialize. 

Yes, I would be satisfied to contribute money to a pool that is split between candidates whose views I do not support. For years now, I check off that block on my 1040 every year, understanding that the money goes into a pool, that is evenly distributed between the candidates who qualify. THere are those I would not CHOOSE to support with my money, but I figure that for my $3.00, there is BOUND to be someone else putting money into the pot, who doesn't support my candidate, and an equal portion of his contribution goes to support my candidate as well, so I'm satisfied with that. It's all part of trusting the system.