Smart Bombs: Pity the influence peddlers

After scores of endorsement interviews stretching over several months, I have shocking news for special interests: You might be supporting the candidates, but they’re not outwardly supporting you. All of them – regardless of party affiliation – say they’re “for the people.”

The rhetoric of candidates lionizes the average American or Washingtonian. The candidates cast themselves in that role, too, never missing an opportunity to show how they’re commoners. They even gather their families around the old kitchen table to hammer out the household budget – just like you and me, and unlike “the other Washington.”

Sorry, influence peddlers, but they don’t mention you, except to insinuate that their opponents are in your back pocket. This is also reflected in their ads and those endearing robo-calls you pay for. Now I know this must be a stunner, given the massive mountains of money you’ve spent on these ingrates. But when candidates invoke “the people,” they’re talking about the folks who speak with words, not dollar signs. Apparently, they didn’t get the U.S. Supreme Court memo that corporations and unions are persons, too.

In congressional races alone, an estimated $4 billion will be spent on midterm races nationwide, with you guys as the major source of funding. The Boston Globe ran a series of articles in 2013 on how this works in Congress. Freshmen are indoctrinated immediately, because their seats are the most vulnerable. Both parties coerce the newbies to spend at least four hours a day dialing for dollars, which exceeds the time they spend on committee work. If freshmen refuse, they won’t get financial support for their re-election. So each day the people elected to “change the culture” trudge off to phone banks set up near Capitol Hill to call you.

I imagine those conversations go something like: “We need your help so we can help you.” But they don’t mention you when they talk to us. In fact, many of them fight bills that would honor your selfless contributions by identifying you. It’s a wonder you put up with such indignities.

The Supreme Court, in the Citizens United ruling, said there’s no such thing as too much free speech. But if these candidates are telling the truth – and in what kind of crazy conspiracy would they all be fibbing ? – it seems all you’re getting in return is writer’s cramp. It was naïve for the court’s dissenters to suggest that checkbook communiques are tantamount to buying influence.

I try to tell my journalist friends concerned about “dark money” and “quid pro quo” and other hurtful terms that you guys are getting scammed. Relax, I tell them, the candidates are working for us, and corporations and unions are getting stuck with the bill.

Anyway, I’ve always had a soft spot for victims and underdogs, so I thought you ought to know.

Whoever you are.

Beat the press. It isn’t news when someone threatens a lawsuit, only when they file it. That’s a journalism rule designed to deter the practice of playing the media for chumps just to grab a headline.

This rule was tossed when House Speaker John Boehner announced in July that he was suing the president for overstepping the limits of executive authority. Before that, Republicans routinely accused the president of illegally altering or delaying laws, and some House members called for his impeachment. It was widely presumed that Boehner dangled this legal bauble to distract the rabble from electoral suicide.

Well, three months have passed, and Boehner has yet to file the lawsuit. That’s probably because the Congressional Research Service examined the issue and found that the president had been acting well within his authority.

Lawsuit-happy Republicans got played by the speaker, but the media did, too. Time to reinstall a wise journalism safeguard.