Politicians Should Swear Off Wall Street Cash

Washington is too dysfunctional to pass any laws in response to Occupy Wall Street, but if Democrats want to stand with the protesters, Harold Meyerson has a modest proposal: Refuse all campaign contributions “from the whole financial sector,” he suggests in the Washington Post. “Sign a pledge to go off the sauce." It would be a little like Grover Norquist’s no-tax pledge, only “lawmakers wouldn’t be asking voters to trust them once the election is over."

Meyerson admits that forswearing by far the largest source of campaign contributions “appears at first glance—second, too—to be a sucker’s game, a form of unilateral disarmament." Perhaps Occupy Wall Street enthusiasts could chip in small donations to make up for some of that, and “the no-bank-money pledge could well be a winning political message." And once Wall Street couldn't buy its latest political whim, we'd also have "distinctly better public policy." (More Harold Meyerson stories.)