Dahlia Lithwick has an interesting piece at Slate that covers Stephen Colbert’s shenanigans (and let’s face it, shenanigans is really the word to use) with his super PAC. Lithwick points to a lot of the issues with Citizens United decision by the Supreme Court in 2010. Personally I’m a fan of what Colbert is doing if for no other reason than it raises awareness of the inherent…well, shenanigan nature of campaign finance and the murky waters that is the sea of super PACs. If nothing else the ramifications of money (be it public, private, limited, or unlimited) on our political campaigns is something that deserves widespread attention. That said, you can certainly make an argument about the quality of that awareness, but I’m willing to say that at this point quantity might be more important than quality.
Also, there’s some genuinely good comedy coming out of all of this. I’m pretty sure none of this would be happening if that wasn’t the case.
Errant Reader 