Finance limits will remain

Chaka Fattah's quest to have the city's campaign finance limits lifted in time for the primary is dead.

The Supreme Court said yesterday that it will take on Fattah's appeal, but not until after the May 15 election. That means all of the candidates are limited to $5,000 contributions from individuals and $20,000 from groups.

Tom Knox, meanwhile, is still rich.

Comments

[Jill]

Amusingly enough, I think that all the campaign finance limits have done is ensure that Knox can outspend everyone else.

Good Job City Council!!

STOP KNOX NOW!

[dude]

Laws shouldn't be made based on who you want to win an election. I wish Knox's spending could be capped, but a federal court ruling has ruled that out and I'd rather have special interests' spending capped than none.

Voters should be able to decide for themselves whether they like what Knox is doing.

[Jill]

Laws should also not be construed to give a single person an unfair advantage, which is what these poorly drafted rules have done. Constrain all of the candidates from competing against a self funded candidate.

[dude]

Fattah and Brady have plenty of unfair advantages of their own. Brady's got the Democratic Committee working for him and Fattah has all the name recognition from his celebrity wife. They're also both currently in congress, from where they've been generating publicity for themselves. Where do you think Fattah's security cameras for Wynnefield (oversight of which was given to a politically connected CDC right before the election and which don't even work), his gun buyback program and big cardboard check for Market St businesses came from?

The fact that Brady and Fattah aren't comfortably leading in the polls, in my opinion, is an indicator of how mediocre they are as elected officials.

Having said that, I think that if Knox were the ethical outsider he says he is, he would have limited his own spending, since federal law doesn't allow it to be limited locally.