A leading spokesperson for the lobbying reform community predicts the 2016 election will galvanize fresh anti-corruption initiatives.
Craig Holman, Ph.D., Government Affairs Lobbyist for the advocacy group Public Citizen was on the job when the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal broke in 2005. He went on to play a major role in the legislation assembled in the scandal’s wake, 2007’s amendment to the 1995 Lobbying Disclosure Act, The Honest Leadership and Open Government Act or LOGA. Suffice to say Holman was feeling déjà vu all over again when I sat down with him recently.
First though, a brief thumbnail on the early evolution of partisan and special interests in America might assist the reader.
Our nation’s disdain for special interests and partisan democracy is a longstanding one with evidence of it stretching back to at least the Hamilton-Jefferson Federalist Papers. Neither man relished splintering the nation’s political business along partisan lines. Yet ironically (or inevitably), both would go on to become leading voices in America’s first two parties, the Federalists and the Democratic-Republicans.
Why this sharp retreat from stated principle? As it turned out, an airless confab of powdered-wig wise men could not unitarily advance the business of the Republic. Compromise and imprecision are after all the nature of the democratic beast. If you want Amtrak to run on time, vote the fascist ticket.