My friend Steve (and, it occurs to me that I talk about several Steves, so let's just dub this one "Conservative Steve") emails me with an interesting question:

Why is it that there's such a huge outcry to "get the money out of politics", which obviously originates from the left (and sadly, John McCain), while little or nothing is said about getting the "fame out of politics." Let me explain. It's such an accepted fact in the media that wealthy donors and big business try to use their money to influence politics and that this is a bad thing (except when it comes from George Soros but I digress). Well then, shouldn't it be a bad thing when Bruce Springsteen, Leo Dicaprio, Sheryl Crow, et al try to use their fame to influence elections? In both cases people are using the resources available to them (whether it be fame or cash) to influence people's vote. If you are going to ban or severely limit the use of cash, shouldn't you also limit the use of fame? Ridiculous right? But how do these two resources differ? Maybe I'm just tired of living in a swing state and having to listen to high school dropouts who got famous talk about what a villain Bush is.

Conservative Steve has a good point. Can you imagine the outcry if, for example, there was a "Specter/Kennedy Bill" that restricted the amount of volunteer hours that people could put into a political campaign? The free speech hawks would be up in arms, and rightly so.

Like Conservative Steve, I just don't see the sense in limiting the use of some personal resources, but not others. It's another perfect example of the way some liberals know nothing except that rich people are "bad".