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This bill isn’t my favorite design. But it is close to the design of the program in Connecticut, Maine, and Arizona, and those states have demonstrated the great value of “clean,” or “voter-owned,” elections. Even if not perfect, the bill would have been a critically important change. And if we could get so close in the House, maybe we don’t need anything really fancy here. Maybe some letters to the editor, and some pressure on congressmen to sign up. If this single bill could really change D.C., why point attention anywhere else?

If I thought there were a chance we could get this bill passed in both Houses of Congress, I’d put all my worrying about the details of the bill aside and push for it.

But there are a number of reasons to be skeptical about this possibility—the first, and most important: Why was it so close to passing in the House?

The answer in part is because it was so certain not to pass in the Senate. There are many who supported the bill who would have thought twice if they actually believed it was going to pass. To be on the side of clean elections is valuable, in some districts at least, with some constituencies. There’s no doubt that it pays, at least there, to be seen on the side of reform.

It’s another matter entirely, however, to imagine actually living under that system of reform. The one thing every incumbent has done under the current system is win. The one thing no incumbent can be certain of is that he can win under a radically different system. It is very unlikely congressmen are going to want to give this up, voluntarily.

Moreover, as I’ve already described, the devil they know is not the only thing they would have to give up. The existing system for many members of Congress is just a stepping stone, not to higher political office, but to a lobbying firm. At least some now see their six or eight years in Congress as the apprenticeship for the real job coming later. Not all members of Congress, or even most—but I do think that almost all members are uncertain about what their future will be, and almost all of them are therefore keen to keep their options open.

Likewise, and again, as I’ve already described, a radical change in the way campaigns get funded would mean an even more radical change in the business of fund-raising. That, in turn, would eliminate many of the cushy write-offs members now get as they flail about trying to raise campaign funds. Many who now support the legislation would think twice about whether to enact it when they recognized its most significant consequence for them would be that they would have to live on the salary of a first-year lawyer in a Wall Street firm.

Finally, let’s not forget the elephant in the room. There is a professional class of policy manipulators in this picture. They’re called lobbyists. A very large percentage of those lobbyists are going to recognize that if elections were funded by citizens, and not by the funds they channel to candidates, their power, and therefore their wealth, would collapse.

These professional policy manipulators will have an overwhelming interest in stopping this legislation. And while there is only one way to pass a bill, there are a million ways to block it. We can count on these manipulators using every weapon they have to block this bill. Why wouldn’t they? Wouldn’t you, if you saw that the total value of your industry were about to collapse?

These four reasons all point to a common lesson in the history of warfare: You don’t beat the British by lining up in red coats and marching on their lines, as they would on you. You beat them by adopting a strategy they’ve never met, or never played. The forces that would block this bill work well and effectively on Capitol Hill, and inside the Beltway. That is their home. And if we’re going to seize their home, and dismantle it, we need a strategy that they’re sure is going to fail.

Yet we need it to win.

CHAPTER 18

Strategy 2

An Unconventional (Primary) Game

We