Re: Campaign Finance Reform

At 07:43 PM 12/17/95 PST, you wrote:
>On December 17th you wrote:
>
>>To: cypherpunks@toad.com
>>From: jim bell <jimbell@pacifier.com>
>>Subject: Political Cleanup program
>>
>>Politics is traditionally corrupt, it appears, because donors to politicians
>>and political campaigns expect a quid pro quo for their donations.  Various
>>unsatisfactory solutions include campaign spending limits, etc.
>>
>>It occurs to me that it would be a major advance if a system could be set up
>>that would "blind" campaign donations as to their source:  The donor could
>>be satisfied that his donation gets to the candidate or cause, but the
>>candidate couldn't know  who actually paid the money (and the donor would be
>>unable to prove that he made a donation, for example).  Admittedly there are
>>a lot of details that need to be worked out, but if this could be
>>accomplished it would change politics as we know it.
>
>If you'll give it some more thought, Jim, you'll see that it has a loophole
>in it you could drive a semi through. There is no way to keep a donor from
>passing the word to the recipient. No matter how you work out the details,
>it's impossible to keep the information from passing. It could never work.

It is absolutely true that you couldn't stop a person from communicating
claims of a donation to a politician.   But what you COULD do is to ensure
that the donor couldn't PROVE that he made such a donation.  In other words,
_I_ could claim that I gave $1K to Senator Sludgepump (a lie) and the good
senator would have no idea that I wasn't telling the truth.  The people who
REALLY made such donations would be helpless.


>Consider a more radical, and possibly workable, solution to the thorny issue
>of campaign finance. If we go back to the root of the problem, it seems
>clear that it is the high cost of a campaign. If a typical campaign were to
>cost a tenth or a twentieth of what it presently costs, we'd have gone a
>long way towards ameliorating the situation. How to do it? Simply ban all
>paid political spot ads - TV, radio, newspaper - all of them. Write it so
>that there's damned little wiggle room - a candidate can use lawn signs, but
>not billboards. They can use personal appearances, but not commercials.
>They can spend all the gas money they want running around their state or
>district, but not a dime for media spots.
>

Well, I have an even better and cheaper solution to the problem of
government and politics.  At an average of $20,000 per Congressman, we could
clean up Washington for $10 million dollars.

On Sun, 17 Dec 1995, jim bell wrote:

> >>It occurs to me that it would be a major advance if a system could be set up
> >>that would "blind" campaign donations as to their source:  The donor could
> >>be satisfied that his donation gets to the candidate or cause, but the
> >>candidate couldn't know  who actually paid the money (and the donor would be
> >>unable to prove that he made a donation, for example).  Admittedly there are
> >>a lot of details that need to be worked out, but if this could be
> >>accomplished it would change politics as we know it.
> >
> >If you'll give it some more thought, Jim, you'll see that it has a loophole
> >in it you could drive a semi through. There is no way to keep a donor from
> >passing the word to the recipient. No matter how you work out the details,
> >it's impossible to keep the information from passing. It could never work.
> 
> It is absolutely true that you couldn't stop a person from communicating
> claims of a donation to a politician.   But what you COULD do is to ensure
> that the donor couldn't PROVE that he made such a donation.  In other words,
> _I_ could claim that I gave $1K to Senator Sludgepump (a lie) and the good
> senator would have no idea that I wasn't telling the truth.  The people who
> REALLY made such donations would be helpless.

A tricky way around this, if it's done ALMOST properly, is to donate in 
odd amounts... ie "Senator Sludgepump, I am going to donate $469.23 to 
your campaign..."

All this means is that the donations would have to be lumped in some way 
so that Senator Sludgepump can't find out the exact amounts donated by 
any individual.

ObCrypto: Donating a specific amount of money could be considered a 
covert channel.
 
Jon
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jon Lasser                <jlasser@rwd.goucher.edu>            (410)494-3072 
          Visit my home page at http://www.goucher.edu/~jlasser/
  You have a friend at the NSA: Big Brother is watching. Finger for PGP key.

On Mon, 18 Dec 1995, Jon Lasser wrote:

> On Sun, 17 Dec 1995, jim bell wrote:
...
> > It is absolutely true that you couldn't stop a person from communicating
> > claims of a donation to a politician.   But what you COULD do is to ensure
> > that the donor couldn't PROVE that he made such a donation.  In other words,
> > _I_ could claim that I gave $1K to Senator Sludgepump (a lie) and the good
> > senator would have no idea that I wasn't telling the truth.  The people who
> > REALLY made such donations would be helpless.
> 
> A tricky way around this, if it's done ALMOST properly, is to donate in 
> odd amounts... ie "Senator Sludgepump, I am going to donate $469.23 to 
> your campaign..."
> 
> All this means is that the donations would have to be lumped in some way 
> so that Senator Sludgepump can't find out the exact amounts donated by 
> any individual.

Cancelled checks.

Or, hand check in addressed, stamped envelope to Senator Sludgepump and 
ask him if he would mind sealing it and dropping it in a mailbox.

Etc., etc.

For once, you guys aren't being very creative.