Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Barack Obama has apparently decided on a plan to fight back against the Citizens United decision that allows corporations a nearly unlimited ability to spend money in political campaigns:

The White House and leading Democrats in Congress are close to proposing legislation that would force private companies and groups to disclose their behind-the-scenes financial involvement in political campaigns and advertising, officials involved in the discussions said Monday. One provision would require the chief executive of any company or group that is the main backer of a campaign advertisement to personally appear in television and radio spots to acknowledge the sponsorship, the officials said.

Well, corporations can already spend unlimited sums on initiative campaigns in California, and I wouldn’t mind seeing a law like this in place here. Sort of a corporate version of the “I approve this message” that we require from actual human candidates.

My current bête noire is Proposition 16, a slimy little initiative called the “Taxpayers Right to Vote Act.” (Great name, isn’t it?) It’s the brainchild of Pacific Gas & Electric, which is outraged by the effrontery of public utilities that compete with it and wants to require a two-thirds vote before any public utility would be allowed to launch or expand its public power service. You probably couldn’t get a two-thirds vote in most places to pass a Mothers Day resolution, so Prop 16 effectively shuts down PG&E’s competitors completely.

Their current ad is narrated by the most reasonable looking soccer mom you’ve ever laid eyes on, and it’s in heavy rotation financed by PG&E’s millions. The opposition, ironically, isn’t allowed to really oppose the measure at all since public utilities aren’t allowed to spend public money on political campaigns. Sweet, isn’t it? There’s nothing much to be done about that, but it would be nice to even the scales just a wee bit by requiring Peter Darbee to append his corporate mug to the end of every one of those ads and say “I’m the chairman of PG&E and I approve this message.” People ought to know just whose pocketbook is being lined here, after all.

WE'LL BE BLUNT:

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate