Corporate Influence

It is time to put an end to the influence businesses have on American political legislation.  Perhaps the best way to accomplish such a change is to totally eliminate any deductions for expenses related to lobbying.  Today’s tax laws subsidize lobbying by allowing businesses such as Google or AT&T to hire platoons of Washington lobbying firms and deduct the expenses as a business expense.  A simple change in the income tax law which would no longer permit any business to deduct such expenses would go a long way to reduce the influence of a business or of lobbying in general.  Another solution to work towards reducing the influence of businesses on legislation would be to make it a violation of campaign rules for any individual seeking election to a federal office from accepting a contribution from any source that is not a registered voter, eligible to vote for the individual contribution recipient.  This would eliminate candidates for the Senate from soliciting and accepting contributions from anyone not eligible to vote for that senator...in other words, an out of state contributor.  A candidate for the House could only accept a contribution from a eligible voter from his or her congressional district.  As a part of this change, all PACs and other organizations intended to funnel money into the political process need to be prohibited as would be contributions from businesses and non-individual entities.  Only individuals can run for office and only individuals should be permitted to have any form of political influence.  These changes would be a step in changing campaign laws to reduce the influence of business on the election process.