Awash in cash

I’ve written about this before — ad nauseum — but this story out of Robbinsville only reinforces my conviction that campaign finance reforms must include local elections.

Too many towns in the state — Monroe, South Brunswick and North Brunswick, for instance — have become one-party enclaves thanks to the ability of the majority party to raise and spend money on their campaigns.

The money, because it comes from private donors who often plan to do business in the community, can seem as if it has strings attached. The impression that leavse is corrosive to public trust.

Just as importantly, the ability to use a campaign warchest to outspend an opponent into oblivion, to crush entire party apparatus under the weight of money, limits debate, freezing out the arguments and proposals that might be offered by the minority party/challenging candidates.

I don’t want this to imply a judgment of the candidates who have the money — the rules are the rules and that discussion is for another day. It is the system that is corrupt and must be changed, as David Donnelly of the Public Campaign Action Fund told me last week. As he put it, “It is the system that should be indicted.”

Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie. View all posts by hankkalet