Bloggers' Bid

WaPo reports FEC Hears Bloggers' Bid to Share Media Exemption - They go to the political conventions. They cover the White House. Now, some bloggers want the same special protections from campaign finance laws that the mainstream media enjoy. A growing number of the online pundits of various political persuasions are urging the Federal Election Commission to explicitly grant them the same wholesale exemptions from regulations governing contributions to political candidates that mainstream reporters, editorial writers and pundits get.

Captain Ed blogged Some, of course, see blogging as a big loophole for political parties and special-interest groups to advertise through deception and straw men. Jay Leno and Jon Stewart have their exemption, and yet no one at the FEC appears particularly concerned about their fundraising for political candidates or their use of their stages as platforms for either endorsing or ridiculing candidates. Leno usually spreads it around, but Stewart has consistently used his pulpit to push a partisan agenda. How about Whoopi Goldberg, Robin Williams, and other comedians who openly target Republicans during their HBO specials? Will the FEC start regulating that as in-kind campaign contributions? The entertainment community spends most of its political efforts in raising money for Democrats. Using Darr's logic, studios and broadcasters should therefore come under BCRA regulation as well. I don't endorse any of the above. However, I use it to show how destructive the BCRA has become in its zeal to regulate campaign financing by equating speech to money. That's why I believe in the long run, asking for a media exemption can't be our final position, but merely a tactical goal in an overall strategy to eliminate the BCRA altogether.

Atrios blogged "Bloggers want it both ways," said Carol Darr, head of the Institute for Politics, Democracy and the Internet at George Washington University. "They want to preserve their rights as political activists, donors and even fundraisers -- activities regulated by campaign finance laws -- yet, at the same time, enjoy the broad exemptions from the campaign finance laws afforded to traditional journalists."

Many media people, that call themselves journalists, are clearly political activists, they have donated to campaigns, and have even participated in fundraisers, yet they enjoy the broad exemptions from campaign finance laws. Why not bloggers?