Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?

A conversation with friend and colleague Charles Madigan about those irritating email requests that jam our inboxes before every election.

Charlie: James, I believe Nancy Pelosi, the U.S. House Speaker, has fallen in love with me and I know this because she is the only woman in my life who has sent me more emails than my wife of fifty-one years. She always wants me, and I can only conclude that it’s a love thing.

photo by Giorgio Trovato

Wait a minute, she also wants money! Maybe $5, $10 or $15. I once had a woman in the old Soviet Union ask me for money right on the steps of the National Hotel, and she promised me a very good time. “I’m in the Workers Paradise, ” I said. ‘I’m already having a good time!”

But Nancy is about politics and that was about something else. In fact, there are lots of Nancy-like politicians, all of them Democrats, asking me for money. Between 8:45 a.m. and 11:49 a.m. Sunday morning, when I should have been lounging and eating eggs and toast, or praying at church, they were landing in my email just like docs who promise miracle cures for swollen prostate glands! And if I didn’t cough up the cash, we would all be doomed to a Republican future where our precious Medicare and Social Security benefits would be chopped to bits and malicious goons like that awful woman from Georgia would get into my stuff big time! But a fiver could stop all of that, but right now!

Jim: Well, Charlie, Madame Speaker is after you because you’re so charming. I mean women like Nancy just can’t get enough of you, or, perhaps, enough of your wallet. I’m having the same problem. I got a nice note from Nancy, too. At first, I thought it was from Nancy my wife of nearly fifty years, and that she needs the name of our $100 an hour plumber because she dropped her hair brush down the toilet again. But no. It was Speaker Pelosi asking for sixty seconds of my time to fork over more of my money to save the nation from catastrophe. I hear she’s raised $276 million! That’s a lot of fivers.

Guess who else shot me a plea for cash? Hillary. Yes, Hillary Clinton! Last time I saw her was in my office at the Los Angeles Times during the endorsement season. I was the editor and she just happened to drop by to say “Hi” while running her primary campaign against our old pal Barack Obama, someone else I’m starting to hear from again.

It’s heartwarming to hear from all these old friends and I appreciate they are only trying to hit me up for five or ten bucks? In a way, it’s kind of nice. They know newspaper editors didn’t make the big bucks even before we became journalistic dinosaurs. Why don’t they go after the big guys – the ones who can afford a night at Mar-a-Lago? I don’t think the Republicans have a lock on them anymore!

Charlie: I can’t tell you the impact this is having on me. I got a personal email from Carole King, I mean, I felt the earth move under my feet. She wanted some money for a Senate candidate out west. But it’s too late baby, it’s too late, because I’m not sending any money. This whole thing is becoming so irritating.

Look, I know times have changed but it wasn’t that long ago that Democrats were griping and moaning about the evil influence money plays in politics, arguing for public financing and lots of other reforms. But that was before our wonderful Supreme Court decided corporations were just like people and couldn’t be restrained in expressing themselves with trucks full of bucks for their favorite candidates.

Then along comes Barack Obama and Howard Dean and lots of other folks from a younger and more savvy generation and they email their way right into our pockets. I gave Obama money because I believed in him. But I wasn’t opening my limited old guy’s bank account to every Democrat with a lust for polling and advertising and whatever else. I love them all and I dearly hope they all win. I love Nancy Pelosi, too, despite the irritating familiar emails full of hyperbolic hoohah! (“I’m over the moon…I’ve had it!” And so on.) I’ve had it too, Nancy.

Jim: You’re not the only one, Charlie. For a full hour today, the only emails I got came from political campaigns with hands out seeking oodles of cash. At one point, I opened my email and the first six were from Sen. Raphael Warnock, who wanted enough money to buy an NFL game ticket to beat a guy who thinks he’s still playing football. You had Carole King. Well, I had a long note from Barbara Streisand! Take that! She asked me to pony up some dough for Maggie Hassan and the Democratic National Campaign Committee. She only wanted five bucks from me and a million other mopes on the Dems mailing lists.

Oh, for the days of The Way We Were.

Yes, the Dems used to scream about big corporate donors with bags full of money dropping the dough on Richard Nixon’s bagmen. We still have Pacs, Super Pacs, Dark Money and echoes of Senator Sam Ervin (“I’m just a country lawyer”) telling everyone to “follow the money.” Well now snot-nosed Internet whizzes operate artificial intelligence gizmos that follow us every hour with ominous messages about a “Rare Quadruple Impact Match” expiring at midnight. The money is following us.

Journalists used to cover political campaigns. Now they cover the money. Politicians used to campaign. Now they raise money. We used to chase money. Now the money’s chasing us. My inbox is full of pleas from Democrats. But Republicans do it, too, even as both parties clamor for campaign reform. Yet here we are, Charlie, gagging on email messages like “Hi James, It’s Chuck” — Schumer that is. We need some sanity, less hypocrisy, more honesty. Stop raising money and raise your voice again Barbara! What Were We Thinking Of?

—James O’Shea and Charles Madigan

James O’Shea is a longtime Chicago author and journalist who now lives in North Carolina. He is the author of several books and is the former editor of the Los Angeles Times and managing editor of the Chicago Tribune.

Charles Madigan is a writer and veteran foreign and national correspondent for UPI and the Chicago Tribune, where he also served as a senior writer and editor. He examines news reporting, politics and world events.