Editor: Back in 1776, Thomas Paine wrote “Common Sense” and it was based on the sovereignty of the people under the rule of law with effective checks and balances in their government. It was a very good idea that evolved over the next 200 years with the checks and balances coming from liberal and conservative groups of people. It is time for us to realize that today the true liberal and conservative movements have been pulled together by special interest money and no longer are truly working as checks and balances. They are only working for the special interest groups. In the election of 2006, there was supposed to be a sweeping change, however, 90 percent of special interest money went to incumbents and then 94 percent of the incumbents were re-elected. The phrase “Campaign Finance Reform” has become oxymoronic. In 2002 before the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform was placed, the spending for all House and Senate campaigns was just over $1 billion.