February 16, 2012
Securities and Exchange Commission
Comment on File Number 4-637
Demand for Political Donor Identification
Gentlemen,
The Supreme Court of the United States made its decision of the case "Citizens United" to allow unlimited corporate and union monetary influence of our election system. That is now the law. At issue is the critical consideration of accountability for both clean, honest and dirty, tainted, or unethical tactics.
We must remove anonymity from U.S. political influence. Anyone who is willing to fund candidate tailored commentary, which can be negative in nature, must be accountable for the characterization of the message they are funding. Anonymity enables a unnamed donor to engage in or support issuance false "documentation" or dishonest "expert testimony" that can mislead voters, can unfairly malign a competing candidate and can spread false information, inaccurate data, deliberately misquoted experts and that opens the flood gates for an unlimited number of dangerous propaganda tactics.
We already have laws requiring full disclosure in media campaigns by the candidates themselves. Now we must extend that full disclosure to also cover PAC's and "independent donors" and agencies. Unfortunately we have seen that we must pass more laws to keep American politics clean and honest, because without such laws, some people will stoop to any low level to attain their desires. A prime example of the unlimited depth of dirty tactics is the despicable ads that were aired against John Kerry, by men falsely claiming to be his ship mates and fellow servicemen; radically denying the validity of his Honorable Military Service and his three Purple Hearts. Their protestations and slurs against a man who served our country above and beyond the call of duty and was wounded, who denied the severity of those wounds, were later found to be complete falsifications!! That was an absolute slap in the face to every American Soldier who ever sacrificed his flesh to the defense of this Great Nation!! As a serviceman myself I am outraged that such malicious lies were spewed effectively against all US troops and one comrade in arms in particular. If those anonymous despicable dishonest cowardly persons can attack a Presidential candidate and call into question the honor and validity of his sacrifice and the awarding of three purple hearts to an officer, what could they do for a common soldier who is now crippled, or blinded, or even question the character of those brave men who gave the ultimate sacrifice? We the People Demand that the media of the United States not be used for anonymous propaganda, as was the case when Joseph Goebbels used the German media to convince the German people than an entire segment of their population was not worthy of respect....just as anonymous special interests are now doing in the American media against honest hard working immigrants. We absolutely must make political campaign donors identify themselves and take accountability for their messages!!
With Respect for Your Position Representing all our Best Interests,
I remain sincerely yours,
Donald Eyermann
Vietnam era vet, retired aerospace engineer,
and Proud Citizen of America for 66 years.