A long time ago, in America…
It is a dark time for the Rebellion. Although the Death Star has been destroyed, the Empire has driven the Rebel forces from their base and pursued them across the galaxy.
[Democracy21 President Fred Wertheimer as Yoda]
Sounds like an episode of the Star Wars trilogy, right?
But in this episode, self-styled reformers play the role of the noble Rebel forces while defenders of free political speech are cast as the evil Empire. The Rebels are indeed on the run, as the Supreme Court has repudiated a large swath of their agenda.
Many film buffs have described the Star Wars franchise as a Cold War allegory, but at least one obscure Internet site offers a different interpretation: “[T]he Star Wars Trilogy is indeed a political allegory of the events leading all the way from Watergate to the election of Ronald Reagan, the years 1972-1980,” according to a humor website. “Consider the name that Lucas called the galactic government overthrown by the Emperor and his minions: The Old Republic. Sound familiar? It should. Its Lucas’ allegorical name for the GOP, the Grand Old Party.”
“Creator George Lucas admits that his tale of a republic succumbing to dictatorship is colored by his observations of the Nixon administration…” wrote Thomas A. Firey of the Cato Institute.
In the reformers’ view, Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell represents Darth Vader, and his long campaign against political speech restrictions has made him infamous in goo-goo circles. McConnell has embraced the casting call with good humor.
“[Center for Competitive Politics Chairman Bradley A. Smith’s] conservative writings—he saw campaign finance restrictions as largely unconstitutional and favored abolishing the election commission itself—were sure to provoke controversy. But Mr. McConnell, a scrappy politician who has long reveled in his reputation as the ‘Darth Vader’ of campaign finance, made clear that he welcomed a good fight, Mr. Smith said. ‘I owe him a lot,’ he said,” the New York Times wrote last week.
The Washington Post noted last year that McConnell once announced that “Darth Vader has arrived” at a news conference. Indeed, a query of the Nexis news database finds some 40 references to McConnell as Darth Vader, although some point to other issues besides campaign finance. “Anybody who is in the minority is accused of obstruction. It’s a fairly common charge,” McConnell told the Post. “I may be Darth Vader to some groups, but to a lot of others I’m Luke Skywalker.”
McConnell’s not the only force cast as the Empire. A recent Times article describes the cyclical fundraising effort of the opposition organizing against the establishment, referring to a Democratic operative’s observation that after 2010 the party will need to build a “soft-money Death Star” to counter the recent gains of Republican-allied groups.
In a column for the Wall Street Journal today, GOP über-operative Karl Rove chides President Obama for describing conservative groups critical of the president and Democrats as “the Empire is striking back.”
The Huffington Post and TIME both posted pieces examining the Rebel plan for a comeback. Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington further opines in HuffPo that President Obama should “do more than make stump speeches criticizing Citizens United and hinting of foreign involvement in American elections,” by cleaning house at the Federal Election Commission.
The conventional wisdom, reflected in this whimsical comparison, is that the Empire represents evil and the Rebels stand for truth, justice and the American way.
In the decades since Star Wars was released in the post-Watergate 1970s, people have challenged this conventional wisdom: “Yoda runs rampant in ‘Revenge of the Sith,’ and he is everywhere and always irritating,” said Jonathan Last of The Weekly Standard. “He spouts off fortune cookie wisdom as though it were serious philosophy.” Stuff like, “They who have the gold, make the rules,” as a Brennan Center for Justice attorney recently wrote.
In an incredible coup, reformers poured hundreds of millions of dollars of foundation money into organizations pushing for stricter political regulations with virtually no push-back. They defined the terms of debate, convincing journalists to refer to them as “reformers” and to eagerly buy their product: a regular stream of alarmist quotes and studies about the allegedly insidious influence of money and politics.
Smith founded the Center for Competitive Politics to clash against this conventional wisdom. As the New York Times notes, “In the role of intellectual powerhouse is Mr. Smith, who returned to Ohio in 2005 after his stint on the commission and formed a conservative research center meant to counter what Republicans saw as an overload of liberal campaign finance watchdog groups.”
Casting this as a battle between liberals and conservatives is approximately accurate, but it’s probably better understood as a battle between civil libertarians and statists. Prominent liberal groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union and the Sierra Club are regularly in our corner. Republicans such as Sen. John McCain and Connecticut Gov. M. Jodi Rell stand with the reformers, more often than not.
The forces of freedom have won some important victories in the Supreme Court recently, and congressional leaders failed to muscle through the DISCLOSE Act this summer. The war, though, is far from over.
May the force be with us.
[7:28 p.m. Oct. 21: CCP Chairman Brad Smith notes that on closer review, it’s not so clear just who are the good guys in Star Wars. We all assume it’s the Rebels, but only because the director tells us so. Even getting past the fact that they appear to be monarchists who carry out Leni Riefenstahl-type rallies, however, the charming Mr. Last notes that appearances can deceive. Perhaps that is true of the “reform” movement, self-described good guys who try to do in the First Amendment, while claiming to love it. Or maybe none of the fable should be taken so seriously!]
