The Fair Elections Now Act got notice in a couple of stories covering campaign finance issues over the weekend. The Herald & Review talked about the fundraising activity of Fair Elections Now Act sponsor Senator Richard Durbin (D-IL); he knows as well as anyone how big a role fundraising plays, no wonder he's excited about an alternative.

Wahoo! Public Campaign Action Fund members are tearing up the letters to the editor pages -- just today, three of you had letters published about Clean Elections! Read on to see what your fellow activists are writing.

What do you get when you cross a highly competitive slate of Congressional races with a Presidential race? A wooley jumper! Sorry...wrong joke: actually you get a campaign fundraising season sure to dwarf its predecessors in terms of sheer dollars raised and overall number of wealthy donors squeezed dry by a parade of candidates and their fundraising invitations.

The Post-Tribune in Gary, Indiana joins the growing list of newspapers expressing support for the Fair Elections Now Act introduced last week in the Senate. They conclude that by raising the profile of voters in elections and reducing the influence of special interest money: "The proposal would go a long way toward eliminating the Jack Abramoffs of the world and take the constraints off congressmen who feel indebted to their financiers."

The Chicago Sun-Times has a great article on the Fair Elections Now Act, praising its potential to reign in campaign spending and produce a Congress mroe responsive to the needs of constituents. Overall, a very clear explanation of the bill, and a pragmatic enumeration of its benefits.

Deborah Burger, President of the California Nurses Association, knows as well as anyone the effects our current campaign finance system has on health care policy: while HMOs write checks up and down Capitol Hill, we watch insurance premiums spike and affordable health care move further and further out of the grasp of ordinary people. That's why she's excited by what the Fair Elections Now Act could mean for comprehensive healthcare reform.

Likening the Fair Elections Now Act to a campaign finance revolution, the Philadelphia Daily News heralds the work of Senators Richard Durbin (D-IL) and Arlen Specter (R-PA) in introducing a bill that represents a simultaneously far-reaching and practical solution to the money in politics woes of Congress.

From the editorial:

National Public Radio's Peter Overby covered yesterday's Fair Elections Now Act announcement. The clip has quotes from both Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA). You can download and listen to the clip below.

The text of public financing bills introduced yesterday in the Senate and the House will be available online in the next few days if you'd like to read them for yourself. The Fair Elections Now Act (Senate) is here and the Clean Money Clean Elections Act (House) will be here.

The uproar over the firing of eight U.S. Attorneys shows no signs of quieting down, with a House Judiciary Subcommittee now authorizing subpoenas to Bush aides (among them Karl Rove). As evidence mounts that these eight US Attorneys were fired to quell corruption investigations into Republican officials, and tilt the tables in favor of GOP election chances, Simon Rosenberg gives a compelling argument about why these eight were chosen.