CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 2016, OR THEREAFTER
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 2016, OR THEREAFTER
BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“WILL ‘NASCAR INITIATIVE’ PRODUCE NAKED LAWMAKERS?”
Turn
on the TV next time a NASCAR stock car race is on and get a good look at the
coveralls worn by the drivers. They are covered with patches bearing the logos
of many and varied companies that sponsor their automotive efforts, from
oil and carmaking companies to breweries.
Now imagine a normally staid state
legislative hearing, where politicians of both major parties today show up in
conservative business suits. Those folks could soon look like a stock car
racing crew if an initiative now circulating makes the November ballot and
passes.
The measure, formally called the “Name
All Sponsors California Accountability Reform (or NASCAR. Get it?) Initiative,”
would require all state legislators to wear the emblems or names of their 10
top donors every time they attend an official function.
The measure’s sponsor, Rancho Santa Fe
businessman John Cox, takes delight in the idea and has already done some
touring around California with 120 life-size photographic cutouts of
politicians dressed up as they might have to under his plan.
This idea has some similarity to part of
the defeated 2006 Proposition 89, an attempt to set up a publicly financed
election system that would also have required every privately-financed
political ad, whether on television or in newspapers or mailed flyers, to list
its three biggest financiers in type as large as the biggest print anywhere
else in the ad.
That proposition lost, but not because
of the donor exposure provision. It went down by a 76-24 percent margin because
voters didn’t want to be taxed for the sake of politicians.
There’s no tax associated with the
NASCAR initiative, which Cox, a former chairman of the Cook County (Chicago)
Republican committee, is willing to finance to the tune of $1 million.
“The whole idea is to hold the
entire corrupt, stupid system up to ridicule,” said Cox, who ran unsuccessfully
in Illinois for both Congress and the U.S. Senate before moving to California
in 2008.
One who appreciates the sentiment behind
this is Jamie Court, head of the Consumer Watchdog advocacy group, which
sponsored Proposition 89. “This could definitely make politics more racy,” he
said. “If this passes, it could turn the statehouse into a nudist colony
because no one would want to pin their real owners onto their clothes. We might
even discover that the emperors really don’t have any clothes.”
There is, you might guess, some question
over whether forcing lawmakers to wear signage is constitutional, or might be a
violation of their First Amendment free speech rights. Of course, no one forces
them to be legislators, any more than stock car race drivers are dragooned into
that calling.
Cox, for one, would welcome a court
challenge on the constitutionality of dictating dress in the state Capitol.
“That would be wonderful,” he said. “The real point here isn’t to force anyone
to wear anything, but to fix our broken, ridiculous system. It’s a system where
people who want things from government pay for and staff the campaigns of the
folks who will run that government. Any objective person would call that
corrupt.”
Cox, however, stops short of calling
California more corrupt than his old Chicago stomping ground. “I haven’t lived
here long enough to make that comparison,” he said.
He’ll need 365,880 valid voter
signatures to qualify this idea for the ballot, and Cox is convinced his $1
million commitment will be more than enough to pay for getting it on the
ballot.
“The petition drive outfit we’ve hired
says this is the biggest slam dunk they’ve ever seen,” he said. “They’re having
the petition carriers use it as a lead item to make it easier for them to get
signatures for other initiatives.”
He’s also trying to do much of the
petition drive online, the measure providing printable sheets with room for
only three signatures, thus making it easier for backers to get a full sheet to
send it in.
The bottom line: For anyone who wants to
afflict the powerful and make lawmakers feel anxious and perhaps a bit
threatened, this could be a strong – also amusing – vehicle.
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Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough, the Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net
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