Duplicitous fundraising

I just received an urgent email plea for a contribution to Sen. Bob Casey’s office, ostensibly because the Senator needs to raise $10,000 by midnight. There was no real explanation as to why it had to be done by midnight, and it looks to me like an indefensibly duplicitous method of fundraising. I regard this sort of thing as dishonest and unprincipled. I am a long-time registered Independent even more likely to vote against Trump and Republicans in the midterm elections because of their embrace of “alternative facts,” but this sort of thing makes me think I can’t believe what Sen. Casey says either.

I googled keywords “Casey” and “$10,000” and found only a quote from Tom Daschle saying that a Senator has to raise an average of $10,000 per day to fund campaigns for reelection. Undoubtedly this is behind the number and the notion that he needs the money by midnight…I must say it follows a Trump-style fast and loose regard for truth.

A number of years ago I received a similar email from a student fundraiser from my college fundraising office. There was a contact number so I called, or perhaps I emailed. At any rate, I did have a long, frank and friendly phone conversation with the student who explained that marketing studies showed that this technique declaiming urgency is successful in raising money. I suggested to him that short-term gain might undercut the long-term relationship, and the longer term fundraising potential. I told him to take me off the list. And I “unsubscribed” from Senator Casey’s list as well.

Since I reached awareness of politics during the Vietnam era, I have always been skeptical of government pronouncements. I was appalled by Pres. George W. Bush’s weapons-of-mass-destruction canard, but for the most part I at least listened to most government statements with the assumption that government announcements more or less reflected reality. Pres. Trump’s actions have flipped my approach to the current administration’s pronouncements. Democrats would do well to hold themselves to a better standard of truth than shown in Senator Casey’s email fundraiser, lest they contribute to loss of public trust.