With the 16th Pick in the 2007 NFL Draft, the Green Bay Packers Select...

I hereby announce my retirement from the National Football League.

What? Well, no, I never actually worked for the NFL. Or for any NFL team. Never actually played, never had my name on a roster, never got invited to a training camp, or a pre-draft workout, or even a draft-day party.

So maybe “retirement” isn’t exactly the word. The point is: this year, I will not be entering the NFL draft.

It’s the end of an era.

Every year since, roughly, 1988, I’ve made myself available for the NFL draft. Every year, I’ve sat by the phone, waiting for the call. It never came.

Too bad, because I would have been the best backup quarterback in league history.

Nobody looks as good wearing a baseball cap and headphones as I do. Nobody can hold a clipboard under one arm and still signal in plays like me. I can joke around during pre-game warm-ups, chew gum intensely during fourth-quarter strategerizing, dump buckets of Gatorade on whomever needs it, hold towels up so the cameras can’t see which part of Brett the trainers are working on.

I do it all.

And do you think anybody would take a knee in the wee moments of a game faster than me?

Don’t make me laugh. Ha. Ha. Ha.

Okay, so I’m being ridiculous. I never played college ball. I was a mediocre lineman in high school. I’m slow, clumsy, can’t get rim on the basketball court, and my spirals are, shall we say, shaky.

There is no vast conspiracy keeping me out of the NFL.

All the more reason. You know that everybody would look good riding some kid’s bike across the parking lot during training camp, if they were doing so next to me.

Sorry about that reflector, kid. Have an autograph.

But, just for fun, let’s say the Packers had chosen me one year instead of…oh, just to pick a random example…Aaron Rodgers.

Would they have been any worse off?

No. In fact, they’d be better off. For one thing, I’d happily settle for the league’s minimum salary – over the past three years, that adds up to just over a million dollars. Your average first-round pick makes more than that in one year.

If you’re going to pay somebody not to play, why not go for the bargain? Plus, I’d quite happily kick a piece of it back. Shall we say…seventy five percent?

I know, the league wouldn’t allow that, but: what the league doesn’t know won’t hurt them. “Say there, you highly-sought-after free agent: not sure you want to play at Lambeau Field? Would a brand new fully-tricked-out Hummer help you change your mind?”

Because I can make that happen.

Oh, you’re an environmentalist? Fine. An H3, then.

Point is, with me on the roster, there’d be options. Options that don’t exist right now.

This is what I think about, as I listen to all the discussion and debate and prediction and dissection leading up to NFL Draft Day.

I’ve seen umpteen mock drafts and dozens of rumors. This team’s moving up, this player’s falling. Which team has what needs, but which GM preaches the gospel of best available player.

It’s like listening to a weather forecaster tell me what’s going to happen next week, or, as I like to call it: guessing.

They scrutinize drafting reports and rosters, compare 40-yard-dash times and vertical leaps, endlessly debate whether this cornerback’s slight inclination to turn his shoulders too early is more likely to drop him into the 3rd round than that tackle’s bare propensity to lean back on his heels.

General managers and head coaches do the same thing. And how do they fare?

Well, just look down the list, and…busts and coulda-been-shoulda-beens outnumber the impact players. By a lot.

Now: name the Packers’ current top five impact players. Name their top ten.

Donald Driver, Mark Tauscher, and Aaron Kampman – two 7th-rounders and a 5th-rounder – should all be there.

The point: nobody really knows who’s going to pan out.

Don’t get me wrong. I love the draft. I love the guessing. I love the obsessing over every slightest detail. Mostly, I love that it’s a little bit of football in an otherwise barren and lifeless off-season.

Oh, God, the off-season. If only it were shorter.

But considering the history, the uncertainty, the downright failure, more often than not, to bring a real blue-chipper in from the first round…

Huh. Maybe I’ll keep my name in the hat after all.

Arguing for Free Speech

The U.S. Supreme Court hears arguments tomorrow on whether or not we can publicly criticize elected officials during campaign season.

Sounds odd to say that, doesn’t it? What’s to argue? Of course we have the right to criticize our elected officials, especially during campaign season.

Wrong, says the Federal Elections Commission (FEC). We don’t.

The case revolves around TV and radio ads Wisconsin Right to Life (WRTL) wanted to run in 2004, urging Wisconsin’s two U.S. Senators to confirm the President’s judicial nominees.

The FEC told them no, you can’t do that. Because you both name and show Senator Feingold, and because he is up for re-election this year, and because it’s too close to the elections, you cannot run those ads. They’re “sham” issue ads. “Electioneering communications.” They may once have met federal criteria for allowance under The Right Formerly Known as Free Speech, but no longer.

WRTL sued. A U.S. District Court ruled in their favor. The FEC appealed, and the case is before SCOTUS tomorrow.

I won’t insult anyone’s intelligence by pretending to be an expert either on the law or on this case: I’ve thumbed through enough legal documents now to conclude that I’ll never fully understand all the legalistic flaming hoops.

I’m not sure even the courts will ever fully understand them. What, exactly, is the difference between an “issue ad” and a “sham issue ad?” Between “express advocacy” and “electioneering?” What about “grass-roots lobbying?”

Should the Court look at verifiable and objective facts, or at the “‘intent’ behind the ad’s creation and the ‘effect’ that the ad is intended (to have),” as the FEC claims?

Nobody seems to know quite where the line should be. That’s the problem with rules like these is: there has to be a line somewhere, and somebody has to decide where.

Which means it could all come down to a mid-level bureaucrat getting a good night’s sleep, or being up all night with a cough.

That’s no way to run a democracy.

Even if WRTL wins this case – meaning their attempts at free speech during an election season are legal – the fact that there was a case at all means somebody else’s attempts at free speech aren’t legal. It all depends on where the line is that day.

And if they lose, well, that means the FEC is right, and we can’t even imply criticism of our elected officials during an election. Not publicly, anyway.

Oh, sure, there are still loopholes. You can run those ads, as long as they don’t name or show a candidate, or run during the blackout period, or target the “relevant electorate,” or if the money comes from the correct fund, or if the second house of Mercury is floating in the Sun’s backyard while the hopeful Free Speech applicant barbeques the chicken whose entrails predicted a favorable ruling.

Subject to further court decisions, of course.

The other side says these restrictions on free speech aren’t just necessary, they’re right. Wisconsin Democracy Campaign’s Mike McCabe writes:

For all the talk of free speech, this legal debate is really about the boundaries of paid speech – namely whether monied interest groups should be able to use their vast treasuries to monopolize political debate and drown out the voices of ordinary citizens.

And who, exactly, are these “monied interest groups” who support WRTL’s suit? Among others: the Coalition of Public Charities; the ACLU; the AFL-CIO; the U.S. Chamber of Commerce; the Family Research Council and Home School Legal Defense Association.

And who are they?

Why, they’re groups of people – “ordinary citizens” – who have banded together to increase their own influence and who, with the exception of the union members, can leave those organizations at any time, if they don’t like what the organization stands for.

They’re citizens, entitled to the free expression of their opinions that is guaranteed us by the Constitution of the United States.

Government shall make no law. That’s what it says. The phrase “subject to hyper-detailed bureaucratic legalisms” occurs nowhere in the Bill of Rights.

Is money a problem in politics? Yes, sometimes it is. And that’s a weakness in our system of government. Until we do away with the frailties of human character, there will always be weakness in the system.

The solution to that weakness is not diluting one of our system’s greatest strengths.

So argue well tomorrow, lawyers. Let’s hope SCOTUS gets this one right.

SAGE: Don't Look Too Closely

So the Democrats don’t want an audit of the SAGE program.

Really big surprise, there. No, seriously. Without sarcasm. I’m surprised.

SAGE – Student Achievement Guarantee in Education – began in 1996 as a pretty simple idea: reduce class sizes in kindergartens and first grades of low-income schools.

Why? Low-income families are more likely to be headed by lesser-educated and/or single parents. That means less direct supervision, less emphasis on academics, fewer role models leading a child to do well in school, finish high school, and go on to higher education.

Focusing more on such students would, we hoped, mean greater achievement and opportunity for those students later on.

Well. Since this is a government program, you can guess what happened next. It grew.

In 1998, we added grades 2 and 3 to the program, doubling its size and cost. Then, in 2000, the “low income” requirement was removed. Every school was eligible. Hundreds signed up.

So much for targeting the “at-risk” kids. The program went from $4.3 million in its first year to $98.6 million this year. Democrats have proposed $109 million a year in each of the next two years.

Over 30% growth per year, average, compounded. If only my Roth IRA could do that.

Why? Duh. It’s good politics. Smaller class sizes were The Next Big Thing back in the late 90s-early 00s. If you opposed SAGE, you opposed children, you heartless piece of puppy-kicking filth. How dare you!

So that’s not exactly cracking the DaVinci Code.

Since we’ve spent over $660 million on SAGE already (with a lot more to come), Republicans on the Legislature’s Joint Audit Committee requested an audit this week.

The audit wasn’t going to look at whether SAGE is working: whether or not it’s making better students. There have been a few studies on that already, with mixed and unimpressive results.

But those were very short-term studies. To really evaluate a program like this, you have to watch the students long-term. How did the program affect dropout rates? High school achievement? Post-high school decisions? And we’re just not there yet.

No, the audit was only going to look at whether participating schools are following the rules – whether the money is being used in the way the Legislature intended. Because there is some doubt about that.

Tough noogies, the Democrats said. They all voted no, so the motion failed, 5-5. No audit.

In a press release, Democrat committee member Rep. Joe Parisi said: “…committee members determined the proposed audit was not an appropriate use of the Legislative Audit Bureau’s limited taxpayer-funded resources.”

Well, all right, then. If Democrats simply believed LAB’s budget is better prioritized some other way, fine.

But I don’t believe that they really believe that.

By rejecting the audit, Democrats have done one of two things: they’ve passed up an opportunity, or they’ve prevented Republicans from pursuing one.

It’s entirely possible that an audit would prove SAGE is doing fine, everybody following the rules, happy, successful. Exceeding expectations. Making the world a better place.

If so, it would help cement the SAGE program in state policy – even more than it already is – and let Democrats accuse Republicans of attacking education. As usual!

It would have, if Democrats had taken the opportunity. They didn’t.

Because…why, exactly? This is what surprises me. Surely, they’re not afraid of what the audit might find?

We can’t answer that for sure, but, well, what else? We can certainly assume that, if they expected positive results, they’d have gone along with it.

But if the audit turned up problems – that would undermine the program’s credibility. Might undermine the funding. Might result in SAGE returning to its original purpose: boosting students at higher-than-average risk of mediocrity or worse.

That would mean less funding, and fewer teachers. WEAC – the state teacher’s union – wouldn’t like that. And as the teacher’s union goes, so go the Democrats.

And that doesn’t surprise me. Not one little bit.

What Do We Do Now?

Monday morning, a 23-year-old student at Virginia Tech University opened fire, in a dorm and a classroom. He killed 32 people, then himself.

You’ve probably already heard.

We have lots of questions, not the least of which is: why? Maybe, someday, we’ll know.

In the meantime, we have other questions.

Did local laws have an impact? Virginia has a concealed carry law – its citizens are allowed to carry weapons for their own defense. But not on campus. Virginia Tech University is designated a “gun-free zone.”

The irony would be delicious, if the subject weren’t so serious.

Did it make any difference? In all honesty, probably not. Even in states with liberal (classical sense) concealed carry laws, very few people carry. If one of those few people had been nearby, and armed, and understood what was going on in time, then…maybe.

Of course, there’s still a big difference between knowing what to do and being able to do it.

On the other side, we already hear the call for stricter gun control. Because one more law would surely have stopped this young man from killing 32 people and himself.

Or maybe the culture in general was at fault. Social mores have deteriorated. We have no culture of life. Too much glorification of violence. Not enough anti-bullying education.

It’s interesting to note, as this story does, that the previous most deadly shooting on a college campus was the clock tower in Texas, in 1966. Thirty-one years ago. Hardly seems like a trend, although we conservatives do like to blame the 60s counterculture.

The wisest advice I’ve seen so far is that we should ignore the politics, at least for a while, and concentrate on the Virginia Tech families. As expected, we’re not listening. Far be it for me to pretend I’m better than everybody else, so I’ll add to the cacophony.

Bear with me, here.

At the Constitutional Convention in 1787, James Madison said: "All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree."

That was the whole idea behind the Constitution – a document meant specifically to limit the power of government. To diffuse that power among states, between state and federal governments, among the various branches of the national government.

They – the Founding Fathers – knew something that too many of us ignore today. They knew that human beings tend toward corruption. We tend toward evil. We tend to be taken in by power, by money, by importance. When we don’t have these things, we want them. When we do have them, we want to keep them; we want to use them; we want to get more of them.

That’s why they weren’t looking to create another monarchy in 1787. They’d learned the lesson of what happens when too much power is placed into too few hands.

Today: conservatives distrust government because government has power over the individual. Modern liberals want to use government to further what they think is best for society.

The conservative way requires diffusion of power. It’s ironic: conservatism requires faith in individuals, because we know individuals shouldn’t be trusted when they have power.

The modern liberal way requires us to ignore that reality – the reality the Founding Fathers saw clearly. It requires individuals to give up more of themselves in favor of a collective, led by…well, somebody.

Unfortunately, that somebody is just as prone to corruption and evil as the rest of us.

This isn’t to blame modern liberalism for Monday’s shootings. That would be stupid. I’m simply comparing philosophies, in order to compare the probable “solutions.” Such as they are.

The problem in Virginia wasn’t so much that this young man had a gun, or that he had every intention of using it. The problem was that power was concentrated in one person. There was no diffusion of power. One guy had it all.

How do we change that? In incidents like these, maybe we don’t. We can’t. They’re too random. Too unpredictable. None of the myriad laws that exist at all the various levels of government have been enough to prevent them. None will be.

Regardless, we’re already having the great debate about What To Do. The sides will boil down to: trying to diffuse power, or allowing it to concentrate.

A Democrat Leads the Way

The Ownership Society is still breathing.

In its infancy, maybe. But breathing. And growing.

It’s gotta be, when a Democrat is using it.

Bob Ziegelbauer, a Democrat member of the State Assembly and the Manitowoc County Executive, switched out his county’s traditional health insurance for a Health Savings Account (HSA), instead. The result: both the county and the employees are spending less for the same service.

An HSA works like any other health insurance plan. You have an annual deductible. You pay all your medical costs yourself, until you’ve paid up to the amount of that deductible. The insurance pays the rest.

Here’s the good part: if you don’t spend the entire deductible, you keep whatever’s left. You keep the money. It stays in an investment account, earning interest until you retire.

HSA deductibles tend to be pretty high: Manitowoc’s is $1,500 for a single plan, $3,000 for a family plan. Yes, that’s a lot of money. A lot for a working family to pay. But that doesn’t matter to Manitowoc County’s employees, because the county gives it to them.

All of it. The entire deductible.

And you know what? They’re still saving money. The premiums are so much lower, the county is saving over $2,600 per family plan. And that’s after eliminating employee co-pays and other out-of-pocket costs.

I want one of those. Yes, because it will be cheaper for my employer – the state – but if I can just hang onto an average of $500 a year, over the next 30 years…let’s see…carry the two…I’ll have over $37,000, at an average 5% annual interest. More than double what I put into it.

If I can do better than 5% - and, as any financial advisor will tell you, I can – I’ll earn even more.

That’s the magic of compound interest. Want to be rich? Invest, early and often. Any blue-collar worker can retire on a seven-figure nest egg, just by doing that.

Of course, had any kind of actual Social Security reform ever passed into law, lots of us could experience this by doing nothing at all. If President Bush’s (not to mention Congressman Paul Ryan’s) Personal Savings Accounts had become a reality, the American people would be on the way to a great deal more wealth.

And why’s that? Let’s see: Social Security offers about a 2% annual return on your lifetime “investment.”

The Dow Jones averaged about 7% a year the last 10 years, and that’s including the recession from a few years ago.

And the Wisconsin Retirement System has earned nearly 9% a year over the last decade.

You know, if I earn 9% on my hypothetical 30 years of an HSA, that’s $81,000. That won’t pay for much nursing home care, but it’ll buy a lot of long term care insurance.

My problem, of course, is that I’m 37 years old. I’ve already lost the best years of my investment time – the best years, of course, being the first years, since what you put away the first year has the longest to grow.

Invest a dollar in the Wisconsin Retirement System at 20 years of age, and by the time you reach 67 it’s worth over $54.

Put that dollar into Social Security at 20, and if you live to be 90 it’ll have “grown” to $2.54.

This is not rocket science. Not to mention, I can leave what’s in my Personal Savings Account (and my HSA) to my heirs. Sure, Social Security will make payments to my dependents, if I have any. Reduced payments. Whee.

And if I outlive my spouse, die at 70, and my kids are all grown…

Well, that money’s just gone, then.

If I can teach my children nothing else, I hope to teach them this: by socking just a little away every week, or every month, and getting started with an IRA or some such investment early in their lives, they can make later in their lives a hell of a lot easier.

If only Democrats in Congress, and Democrats in the Legislature would figure that out.

That is, Democrats other than Ziegelbauer. He’s figured it out, and his employees are thanking him. And so are his taxpayers.

Living in Fear of Big Business

Big Business is trying to buy the election. Oh, no, Big Business done bought the election!

It’s a staple on the political left’s rhetorical menu. Watch out! It’s Big Business! Pasty-white men wearing three-piece suits drinking brandy and smoking cigars while their Dickensian factories pump out thick billows of putrid smoke made by clear-cutting and burning old-growth forest.

Big business isn’t you and me – we struggle to make ends meet. We clip coupons. We drive 8-year-old cars. Big Business is somebody else. Somebody rich, powerful, and willing to use their wealth to gain more for themselves, even when that means subverting the political process by spending literally oodles of money to get the right politicians elected.

Joseph Kennedy once told his soon-to-be-President son: “don’t buy any more votes than you have to – I’m not paying for a landslide!” Or something like that. Or so I read.

The Left’s anti-business ire most recently revealed itself during (and following) Wisconsin’s Supreme Court election. Specifically, the villain was Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, WMC, the state’s chamber of commerce. Over and over again, the lefty Cheddarsphere anguished: WMC has bought the election!

When it’s unions or Indian-owned casinos or multi-millionaire sugar daddies flooding the election process with money, well, that’s okay. But not Big Business!

Those latter examples are, of course, also big business. Casinos are big business. Unions = business. Without the business, there’s no jobs. No jobs, no paychecks. No paychecks, no union dues. No dues, no unions.

And just how did those mega-millionaire liberal benefactors – George Soros comes to mind – become multi-millionaires? Business. Big Business.

WMC chose to support a candidate, and reportedly spent a great deal of money to help her win.

This angered the Left. Why should this soulless front for the worst of our money-grubbing capitalists be allowed to influence our elections like that?

Who is WMC? About four thousand companies. Businesses, owned by people – citizens, taxpayers, voters – who have freely chosen to join an organization which takes an active role in politics.

WMC’s opinions aren’t exactly secrets. Their choice of candidates aren’t exactly secrets, either. Any of their members who disagree with those opinions and candidates are free to try and change them. Change WMC’s direction, policy, candidate, political party.

Or they’re free to withdraw their support and their money entirely, and leave.

Unlike, for example, union members, who are required to stay if they want their jobs.

Although…union members can, just like WMC members, try to influence their group’s political stand. Members can try to influence which candidates their unions support – which candidates get the money, which candidates get the union-bought TV commercials.

Unions, like business organizations, are simply groups of people who have banded together to pool their influence. We don’t always like the direction or the results of their influence, but we have to respect their right to try.

It’s a facet of democracy. It’s why every little burg and village has its own taxpayer group, land rights group, school support group.

It’s why the uber-liberal Progressive Dane thinks they can try to pack Dane County Democratic Party meetings, to steer the party in the (ruinous) direction they – Progressive Dane – want it to go.

Of course, the more moderate (compared to Progressive Dane) Madison-area liberal doesn’t like it when PD does that, either, any more than they do when it’s WMC.

Winston Churchill once said "Some regard private enterprise as if it were a predatory tiger to be shot. Others look upon it as a cow that they can milk. Only a handful see it for what it really is - the strong horse that pulls the whole cart."

The left wants to pit business against the little guy, but where would the little guy be if not for business? Where would the unions, and Medicare, and, ironically, the Stewardship Fund be without businesses to supply the money for salaries and the taxes those salaries pay?

One way or another, we are all Big Business.

And, like it or not, a business – even a Big Business – is made of people. People who have every right to spend their time, effort, and money – individually, or in a group – trying to influence our government.

That’s life in democracy. We should all just get used to it.

What a Game!

...they did not believe the women, beause their words seemed to them like nonsense. Peter, however, got up and ran to the tomb. Bending over, he saw the strips of linen lying by themselves, and he went away, wondering to himself what had happened.

Luke 24:11-12

Two thousand years ago, a smallish group of men and women learned what it meant to despair.

And then they learned the exact opposite.

We’ve all felt it. That single, awful moment, when you think the worst possible thing has happened.

Maybe you lost the report your boss wants today. Or broke someone’s irreplaceable family heirloom. Or realized that you were supposed to pick your 5-year-old up from kindergarten three hours ago.

That’s a cold feeling. A hard, frozen ball of lead sitting in the pit of your stomach.

But then you find the report, catch hold of the heirloom, remember that your kid didn’t have kindergarten today. And it’s all better.

We’ll get back to 2,000 years ago in just a second. First, three months and a couple of days ago:

The 2007 Fiesta Bowl. Boise St., a mid-major charity case, facing off against Oklahoma, the perennial Big 12 powerhouse.

It was the greatest football game I’ve ever seen.

The Boise St. Mustangs were huge underdogs. Nobody took them seriously. Until, that is, they went up 14-0, then 21-10 at halftime. An interception return late in the third quarter made it 28-10, and it looked like the Mustangs – the little team with its core of believers who, given the history of such things, had no business being at the game, much less in it – might just come out on top.

And then…the Sooners scored 18 unanswered points to tie the game and, late in the 4th quarter, intercepted a Boise St. pass and scored.

Oklahoma 35, Boise St. 28. A minute left to play. And that was that.

The lead gone. Optimism, jubilation, celebration forgotten. Interception returns rip the throats out of opposing teams. Momentum, size, history, and the scoreboard were entirely on the side of the Sooners.

All that was left to Boise St.: that cold, hard, heavy ball of lead.

Oh, sure, the Mustangs gave it a shot. They got to midfield with about 18 seconds remaining. And then…a wouldn’t-believe-it-if-I-hadn’t-seen-it turn of events. A perfectly executed hook and ladder – a play that never works – worked. Touchdown, extra point, and overtime. The glimmer of hope had returned.

And then, an overtime 4th down touchdown, and the Mustangs go for two. Do or die. Succeed and win, or fail and lose. And…a wouldn’t-have-believed-it Statue of Liberty play. Score. Mustangs win.

Not just a comeback. Not just an upset. This was overcoming enormous odds in the most improbable, unimaginable, unprecedented way possible.

Which brings me back to the apostles, 2,000 years ago. To the average fan, things looked bad. Our team was the underdog – no doubt about that. A ragtag bunch of penniless nobodies up against the Roman Empire and thousands of years of Jewish law.

Things looked good for a while. The miracles burgeoned. Followers swelled in number. It looked like nothing could stop them, or Him.

But then: Jesus arrested. Jesus on trial, the crowds screaming for his crucifixion. Pilate going along. Jesus on a cross, and then in a tomb.

Jesus dead. Our momentum stopped cold. The other team, now, with a seemingly insurmountable lead. Our star player not just on the bench with ice on his foot, but buried behind a boulder.

Those disciples knew, that day, what it felt like to have a frozen ball of lead at the bottom of one’s stomach.

Could they have known that the impossible was about to happen? That the most improbable, unpredictable comeback in human history was just a couple days away?

Could they feel then that maybe, just maybe, something big was coming? Something that would make them swarm the court? Rush the field? Clamber onto the goalposts?

That moment every sports fan feels was coming, when they think yeah, this might actually happen, just before that next moment, when you know it has happened.

The moment was coming when they’d see the empty tomb, hear Mary Magdalene’s words. When they’d see the wounds in Jesus’ outstretched hands.

We can imagine what the Boise St. fans were feeling. We can even feel it ourselves.

But that was just a football game. Peter, and Andrew, and Luke went in moments from their lives being ruined, beliefs let in flames, to seeing Jesus alive again, and eating fish. From nothing at all, to everything there is.

Happy Easter.

Campaign Button Reform

What’s it mean to be accused of campaign violations?

It can mean a lot of things. Lost time, money, peace of mind. Reputation. Criminal charges, even, meaning the loss of even more.

And sometimes it means something more important: the idea that political speech is a protected right for everyone, not just the rich and legalistic.

Maybe I’m reading too much into things. It wouldn’t be the first time. But I can’t help thinking that this idea is under assault.

The latest: conservative Wisconsin blog Boots & Sabers wanted to support Annette Ziegler’s campaign for the Wisconsin Supreme Court, so they put a “Blogs for Ziegler” button on their website (the same button you see directly to the left).

Someone named Monica Sitter filed a complaint with the state elections board. The button didn’t have a disclaimer on it, you see, telling us who paid for it.

On the face of it, the complaint doesn’t seem to have merit, but the Boots & Sabers crew might still have to spend time, and possibly money, responding to it.

That’s rules for you. Picky, snippy, bureaucratic regulations that seep into the cracks of our everyday lives just as sure as water seeps into my basement.

Twistedly ironic, isn’t it? It’s the political Left that most wants campaign finance reform – that most wants these regulations to be tighter and stronger. And who benefits the most? Incumbents – entrenched power, also known as The Man – and the rich, who can finance their own campaigns.

We can’t stop candidates from spending their own money. It’s their money, and if they want to spend it – all of it – running for office, they can. Candidates have a vested interest in the outcome, after all. And it’s not like they can be indebted to themselves.

So if you’re rich, well, that’s a big advantage for you.

But sometimes I have a vested interest, too. Some of these races are extremely important to me. I might want to do anything I can (legally, that is) to support a candidate. I may want to do everything I can (again, legally) to oppose another.

I’m not allowed to. No matter how important it is to me, I don’t have the same freedom to use my money to express my political opinion that the candidates themselves have.

But maybe I don’t need money. Last week, I wrote about the race for Wisconsin Supreme Court. Like Boots & Sabers, I backed Annette Ziegler, mostly because her opponent was an uber-left flower child who thinks the written law doesn’t necessarily mean anything.

My blog doesn’t have a large readership. A few dozen people – maybe more – read that column. The equivalent of making a few dozen phone calls, or printing a few dozen flyers.

Other blogs have daily readerships in the hundreds, even thousands. For them, endorsing a candidate is the equivalent of making thousands of calls, printing thousands of flyers. It’s the equivalent of days’ worth of radio and, maybe, television ads.

But so what? It’s free, mostly. Anyone can start and run a blog for nothing. No money at all.

Again, though, so what? What’s to stop a quid pro quo anyway?

What’s to stop a candidate for statewide office from promising to support concealed carry in exchange for support from Boots & Sabers?

What’s to stop that same candidate from promising to repeal the QEO, if liberal blogger Folkbum will actively support him?

Everybody wants something, and there’s nothing stopping a campaign from offering a blogger the things he/she wants, in return for frequent and positive coverage.

They may not cost anything, but blogs can still have value. And as such, sooner or later, they’ll be targeted for regulation.

Townhall’s Hugh Hewitt notes:

...the spontaneous speech that has long characterized American politics begins to erupt only to be tamped down by worries about registration, incorporation, reporting and safe harbors.

And:

So much core political speech is being chilled by fear of crossing the boundary of some obscure FEC regulation…

Is anybody wondering, just for a second, whether posting a Blogs for Ziegler button is worth the risk?

That’s where campaign finance reform is taking us.