Cash gift, US-style (#49; Topic K)

Today's Washington Post reports: "Wednesday is the big birthday bash for Sen. Conrad Burns (R-Mont), who's celebrating his 70th at powerhouse lobbying firm Cassidy & Associates. No need to bring a special gift ... Simple attendance is $1,000 per PAC [political action committee] and only $500 per person." ("[I]f you want to host the bash", simply double the figure.) So, I was wrong -- cash gifts are not out of fashion in USA (#38), but are indeed used, and for a most worthy cause: to add to the coffers of reelection campaigns, the bedrock of democracy. Reading it, I also wonder: given that $500 equals the per capita GDP of East Timor, Somalia, or Sierra Leone (from the CIA World Factbook, as reported in aneki.com), how should these countries finance their election campaigns? Lobbying, according to Post, is a "noble profession;" in what ways are lobbyists benefiting the citizenry? This is answered elsewhere in the same issue of Post: "the [U.S.] Chamber [of Commerce], which lobbies for business large and small, wants the Securities and Exchange Commission" to relax rules affecting corporate accountability. Presumably, that would benefit ordinary investors, though the former SEC chairman, in an ed-op piece also in that very same issue of Post, demurs: "conflict of interest between members of Congress, their staffs, lobbyists and contributors must be untangled." So, for a third-world country moving toward democracy, is having the US-style campaign financing an integral part of the deal?
Posted at 8:30 pm, Monday, January 23, 2006