Maybe Albany wouldn’t have so much trouble meeting its budget deadlines if it didn’t waste so much time on a favorite sideshow: public financing of political campaigns.
This, our politicians tell us, is the answer to the endemic corruption. What they don’t tell you is that public financing invites corruption, too — as New York City has found out from its own program.
Not to mention the hypocrisy. The son of left-wing billionaire George Soros, for example, spent millions to sway the politics in an effort to . . . keep money out politics. Activists also sought to curb donation limits (the First Amendment be damned) and take money from taxpayers to fund political candidates whose positions they don’t agree with, who have zero chance of winning or who are shoo-ins who don’t need public funds.
So what did Albany do in the end? It passed a “demo” program that affects just one office (state comptroller), applies to just this year and can be counted on to “demonstrate” absolutely nothing.
Even the advocates of public financing rightly see this as meaningless. As for Comptroller Tom DiNapoli, he seems to have had a change of heart, saying that, contrary to claims from the governor’s office, this “demo” was not his idea.
We suspect learning it would mean he couldn’t use nearly three-quarters of the funds he has in his war chest may have helped him clarify his position.
Let’s face it: Lawmakers never had any intention of cleaning up politics. The demo program, along with a few anti-corruption measures that were passed, was simply a way of calling off the Moreland Commission hounds probing Albany wrongdoing.
If Albany really believes private money is corrupting and public financing is the only way to level the playing field, there are two clear answers: Require legislators to disclose all outside income, and force any New York pol with a war chest to give up funds raised under the old system and face all newcomers as equals.