'Unintended' consequences? Maybe ...

The Wall Street Journal opines today on the looming issue of how the Federal Election Commission is going to deal with political bloggers, thanks to a federal judge ruling that McCain-Feingold MUST be applied to the internet. For the most part the WSJ folks get it right but we wish to quibble with a couple of points:

When it comes to the law of unintended consequences, the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance "reform" is rapidly becoming a legal phenomenon. The latest example comes courtesy of the Federal Election Commission, where officials are being asked to extend the law to the very people it is supposed to empower: individual citizens.

Can we talk? "Unintended" consequences? There was little doubt from the git-go that campaign finance reform was meant to silence some people and ignore the megaphones of others. It was more like the Big Liberal Media Monopoly Protection Act. Honest opponents said so, McCain-Feingold apologists looked the other way.

Before the ink was dry the liberals demonstrated that they already knew where the loopholes were -- the 527 groups -- and were to wage electoral p.r. battles as usual. Thankfully "sauce for the goose" allowed conservative voices to establish their own 527s. McCain-Feingold in effect is in tatters, but its poisonous after-effects remain.

Our next quibble is in response to this statement:

Another alternative would be to classify all bloggers as journalists, seeing as how the press is about the only entity exempt from McCain-Feingold. As much we enjoy our profession, we think a nation of journalists is overkill.

Overkill? What's so wrong with a nation of journalists, i.e., citizen observers who report what they see, think about the issues, and offer their views? Isn't that the nature of free speech and free press? If a little is good, shouldn't a lot more be better? Thomas Jefferson certainly thought so.

We generally like the WSJ, but like others of its kind (MainStreamMedia) it is having a difficult time shaking off the old definitions and the sense of entitlement that for too long have tempted reporters and editorialists to believe that they were a special, privileged class. What they were were Americans representing all Americans, entrusted with a sacred duty to be thorough and tell the truth. One can argue whether this was ever well practiced in the industry, but it seems obvious that in recent years an increasingly "royal" press and its practice of advocacy for causes has often diminished the cause of accuracy and truth.

Competition changes all that. Even the small conservative wing of the MSM benefits from the competition and scrutiny of the blogosphere. Let a thousand flowers, nay even a million flowers, bloom!

Aside from these stipulations, it's a good editorial, and it concludes with a hope that McCain-Feingold should die.

Amen.