Another SuperPAC Trying Another Approach To Getting 'Dark' Money Out Of Politics

from the using-the-system dept

We've written a bunch about Larry Lessig's MayDay SuperPAC and its crowdfunded attempt to elect politicians who promise to change the way money in politics works. And many users also pointed to Wolf PAC, which is another high profile political action committee committed to dealing with the issue of money in politics. Now another such PAC has been announced, kicked off by some more Silicon Valley folks, called CounterPAC, the focus is on getting candidates to take a pledge not to accept so-called "dark money".

It's based on the (mostly successful) pledge that Senate candidates Elizabeth Warren and Scott Brown took in the 2012 Massachusetts Senate race, that if any such group spent money on their campaigns, the campaigns would give a similar amount to charity. As CounterPAC notes, the pledge was a success:

It worked. Outside spending was drastically reduced to merely 9% of total spending in contrast to upwards of 60% in other states.

CounterPAC’s mission this year is to get as many candidates as possible to agree to a similar pledge rejecting untraceable dark money.

CounterPAC was apparently put together by a bunch of Silicon Valley folks, including (currently on leave from Google) Matt Cutts (who I know a little bit, but had no idea he was doing this), Ethan Beard from Greylock, well-known Silicon Valley lawyer Ted Wang and some others. It was officially started by Jim Greer (who ran the site Kongregate) and Zack Booth Simpson.

Who knows if any of these approaches will be successful, but it's encouraging to see people trying to do something different, rather than just complaining about things and being cynical and defeatist. Part of the Silicon Valley world is that you need a lot of experiments to see what works, and here's another one to throw at the wall.

Filed Under: counterpac, dark money, elizabeth warren, mayday, money in politics, pledge, scott brown, superpac

Awesome Stuff: One Last Chance To Join With Thousands Of Others To Help Limit The Influence Of Money In Politics

from the don't-let-cynicism-get-in-the-way dept

Okay, we've written about Larry Lessig's Mayday PAC a bunch of times already, including when it launched, when it hit its first target of $1 million (which was then matched by donors for another $1 million), and again when the second round launched with a goal of raising $5 million (again to be matched with another $5 million) by July 4th.

Guess what? Today is July 4th, and the campaign ends today.

And you have a chance to help determine if it meets that $5 million goal or not. While there's been a big last minute push from a variety of places, as I write this, the campaign is still significantly short of its target goal. There is a very real chance that it won't reach the $5 million. And that would be unfortunate. So, today is basically a big chance for you to make a statement about trying to limit the impact of money in politics. One note on cynicism: pretty much every time we've written about this, the comments have been filled with people cynically trashing the idea either based on the argument that it's impossible to get rid of the influence of money in politics or because Lessig hasn't taken a specific issue on a particular pet issue (term limits is one that comes up often enough). Personally, I find this disingenuous and disappointing. It seems like people are actively looking for ways to keep the status quo, rather than to represent any real challenge to it at all. This kind of attitude is a self-fulfilling prophecy that only keeps things the way they are.

No one knows for sure if Lessig's plans will have any real impact, but I know of no one who has put as much time, thought and effort into tackling the problem of the corrupting influence of money in politics. For every simplistic point that someone has for why this plan or that plan won't work, Lessig has a detailed, fact-based or data-based answer. This isn't just some randomly idealistic person with a dream. This is someone who has dedicated a huge chunk of his life and intellectual resources towards really tackling the problem in a realistic and doable way. Even if I don't know all of the details, if there's one person who can actively make a difference, who has thought through the pros and cons of basically every possible approach, it's Larry Lessig.

Go ahead and be cynical, if you must. But think about what that cynicism leads to in the end. Even if the MAYDAY PAC fails, isn't it better that they have a chance to succeed, rather than killing it off from the start so you can sound smart about how you knew it wouldn't work?

Filed Under: cynicism, larry lessig, mayday, mayday citizens pac, money in politics, politics, superpac

Awesome Stuff: Crowdfunding To Get Money Out Of Politics... Now With Steve Wozniak!

from the mayday! dept

Two weeks ago, we took a slight detour from our usual Awesome Stuff fare to talk about Larry Lessig's new crowdfunding project, MAYDAY.US, which aims to start a serious effort to significantly reduce the influence of money in politics. This week we're highlighting MAYDAY.US again, since it just received a major boost in the form of a video endorsement from Steve Wozniak:

The project already completed its first phase, raising $1-million and securing another million in matching funds, and now it's partway through the second, which has a goal of $5-million (and another $5-million to match). With two weeks left to go, it's got some distance to make up, so now is the time to use your money to fight back against the corrosive influence of money in politics. It could be awesome.

Filed Under: awesome stuff, larry lessig, mayday, mayday citizens superpac, mayday superpac, money in politics, steve wozniak

Awesome Stuff: Crowdfund Our Way To Reducing The Influence Of Money In Politics

from the a-different-sort-of-crowdfunding-campaign dept

Okay, so each week for our awesome stuff post about crowdfunding projects, we look at a variety of interesting projects for weird, funky, innovative and interesting products that are being offered on platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo. This week is going to be a bit different. We're just going to point people to a single project: Larry Lessig's MAYDAY.US. And, yes, we already wrote about this at the beginning of May when the first phase launched, and again when it hit the $1 million goal -- and then secured the second million in matching funds. However, the project has now moved into phase two, where the goal is to raise (and match) $5 million, instead of just $1 million. Already it's around half a million dollars, so there's a long way to go, but it's a good start. And, once again, the goal here is to raise this total of $12 million ($1 million + $1 million match in May, and then $5 million + $5 million match in June) as a test for a much larger effort. I've seen too many overly cynical folks say "$12 million isn't enough to change politics." And you're right. But that's not the goal. This is $12 million to be used in specific races as a proof of concept for a much larger moonshot. But to make that happen, this campaign needs to get to $5 million by the end of June. If that happens, it will truly fit into the category of "awesome stuff."

Filed Under: awesome stuff, crowdfunding, larry lessig, mayday, mayday citizens superpac, mayone, money in politics

Larry Lessig's Anti-SuperPAC SuperPAC Already Halfway To $1 Million Initial Target

from the into-orbit,-next-stop,-the-moon dept

Last Thursday, we wrote about Larry Lessig launching the MAYDAY Citizens' SuperPAC, an attempted "moonshot" to crowdfund a SuperPAC with the long term goal to elect politicians to Congress who will be dedicated to ending the power of money in politics. It is, as we noted, the SuperPAC to end all SuperPACs. The structure of the plan is interesting in that it's a staged approach explained on the Mayone website. The first two "test" stages happen this year, with the first goal being to raise $1 million by the end of May, at which point Lessig will get someone (who almost certainly is already lined up) to donate another $1 million. Then they launch stage 2 for June, which is an attempt to do the same, but at $5 million (with a further matching $5 million). If both of those work out, the SuperPAC will then have $12 million, which it will use in 5 races for the mid-term elections this year. And, with that in place, the goal will be to launch a much bigger crowdfunding effort for 2016. Many people seemed to misunderstand the original plan, thinking that this $12 million part was the moonshot. It's not. It's a test flight.

Anyway, the first stage of the test flight is just to get to that $1 million mark, and it's worth noting that here we are on May 6th, just five days into the effort, and the MAYDAY Citizens' SuperPAC is already more than halfway to its goal. That is, they've already hit the $500,000 mark less than a week into the effort. Will that be enough to hit both of the 2014 goals? That's tough to say, but as an initial effort, it sure seems like a very nice start, and almost certainly goes way beyond what many people expected would happen. Still, this is just the start. A moonshot is inherently risky, but the first week has been tremendously encouraging.

Filed Under: larry lessig, mayday, moonshot, superpac

Larry Lessig Launches Crowdfunded SuperPAC To Try To End SuperPACs

from the fighting-superpacs-with-superpacs dept

Larry Lessig is thinking big (as per usual) and taking a "moonshot." Today he announced the launch of the MAYDAY Citizens' SuperPAC, in which he's hoping to crowdfund $1 million to help elect people to Congress who will help reform the political system to try to take money out of politics -- basically a SuperPAC to end all SuperPACs. This project has an interesting twist on traditional crowdfunding: nothing will happen if the goal isn't met, but if it is, then two interesting things will happen: a matching donation and a second round, seeking $5 million:

We’ve structured this as a series of matched-contingent goals. We’ve got to raise $1 million in 30 days; if we do, we’ll get that $1 million matched. Then we’ve got to raise $5 million in 30 days; if we do, we’ll get that $5 million matched as well. If both challenges are successful, then we’ll have the money we need to compete in 5 races in 2014. Based on those results, we’ll launch a (much much) bigger effort in 2016 — big enough to win.

The ultimate aim is to spend enough to win a majority in Congress committed to fundamental reform by 2016. We’ve spent the last year gaming out how much that would cost. I think it is feasible and possible — if we can take these first steps successfully now.

Lessig has put together a video explaining all this as well: This whole thing is wildly ambitious, which means it has a high likelihood of failure -- but if it succeeds, think of the impact it could have. If you're an American citizen, you can contribute here and help see if this moonshot is possible.

Filed Under: corruption, crowdfunding, larry lessig, mayday, money and politics, politics, superpac