saying what you mean?

More verbal weird-age from Bush. Just what does he want to do with these 527s? Here is what he says, from this weekend's interview with the Times:

Let me talk about a larger issue, and that is 527s. I spoke to John McCain today, and I think these ought to be outlawed. I thought they ought to be outlawed a year ago, when I--whenever I signed the bill. I think they're bad for the system.

Wow. Outlaw the 527 groups altogether? Pretty aggressive, and, as noted in a post below, quite contrary to Bush's previous statements about the importance of protecting individual speech. Thus, the campaign chairman, Marc Racicot, corrected the President's remarks,

to say that the campaign would ask a court to order the Federal Election Commission to treat the so-called "527s" the same as other political action committees.

The difference, of course, between abolition and regulation happens to be significant. As McCain remarks,

"I want to emphasize if I could that we're not saying that 527's should be abolished. We're just saying they should live under the same campaign finance restrictions" as so-called hard-money groups "because they are engaged in partisan activity."

And, as it turns out, the lawsuit Bush speaks of when saying he wishes to outlaw 527s simply seeks to regulate the groups under existing FEC regulations over PACs. From the Journal:

Bush's lawsuit would mean that a $5,000 limit on individual contributions to 527s would take effect immediately instead of as scheduled in 2006. McCain, a co-author of the 2002 campaign-finance reform law, supports that.

I'm not sure whether Bush's confusion over his own lawsuit is a matter of simply mispeaking, or something else. He seems to push the "getting rid of all the ads" fairly hard--too much so to not either think that's what he's doing or to purposefully imply that. But, it seems rather politically disadvantageous to want to shut down the groups entirely, in the face of speech concerns.

My guess is: the tough language on 527s sounds absolute, and non-complex. That is the character Bush wants, and to get into details of regulations would make him sound more like Kerry. I prefer the complex reality to simplistic jingo...but I reckon that's why I don't like Bush.