More transparency… unless you like guns.

Today in hypocrisy: finally, a cause liberal and conservative interest groups can rally together in opposition to.

I’m no expert by any means on campaign finance, but here’s how I understand the story thus far:  Supreme Court issues ruling lifting restrictions on campaign funding by corporations.  General outcry ensues.  Congress resolves to Do Something.  Something takes the form of the DISCLOSE Act, which would require corporations, unions, and non-profits to report their top donors (defined as anyone who gives them $1,000).  It also would require organizations to identify themselves in ads, and the orgs’ top donors to appear in campaign ads they fund.  The bill also includes a bunch of other disclosure provisions, most of which seem like good steps to prevent future Swiftboat style sneaky undercover ad campaigns in the future.

Cool so far, except some groups are worried their funding will dry up if donors realize they’ll be publicly outed as supporting their organizations.  But who cares about whiny interest groups, right?  Right.  Except, wait.  Turns out there’s one whiny interest group Congress actually cares a lot about: the National Rifle Association.  In fact, the NRA has so much sway that its disapproval meant the bill had no chance of passing… until Congress responded by crafting a special NRA exception!  Yay, gun lobby!

Cleverly, as CQ Politics reported, “The text of the amendment making the change never mentions the NRA specifically. Instead, it grants an exception to any 501(c)(4) group that claims more than 1 million dues-paying members, with a presence in all U.S. states, that has existed for at least 10 years, and derives no more than 15 percent of its funding from corporate or union sources.”  It’s not clear what groups besides the NRA would actually match that description, other than the AARP.

So here’s the problem.  If the NRA is so powerful that it could singlehandedly kill this legislation, isn’t it EXACTLY the kind of group that should be covered by a law seeking greater transparency?  This is the most ridiculous sort of pandering, the kind that can’t even be semi-plausibly explained away.  Yet here was sponsor Rep. Van Hollen’s valiant attempt:  “A good number of our members wanted to address concerns that were raised by large citizen-based organizations that were not trying to fool anybody as to their identity. That’s what this agreement does.”

But smaller citizen-based organizations that aren’t trying to fool anybody/ more to the point aren’t as powerful as the NRA?  Screw them.  And that’s how you end up with strange bedfellows Sierra Club and National Right to Life coming out in opposition to the same piece of legislation.

A NYT editorial yesterday supported the legislation as worthwhile even with the NRA exemption, but it also called out Democratic lawmakers: “We keep hoping the Democratic majority in Congress will muster the courage to rise above callow survival politics and stand up to the gun lobby in the cause of public safety.”  That would be nice.  The Senate version of the bill doesn’t have the exemption, so it’s yet to be determined what the final version will look like.

*Edit: my source on the Hill tells me there’s no way the bill is going to the president without the NRA carve out.  So maybe don’t hold your breath for a Senate fix.