Noah Stewart spent a lot of time talking about receipts.
Not literal receipts. Although after his latest commentary, several politicians may want to start saving theirs.
Stewart took aim at Republican Fabiana Mendez for promising to make her voters proud before an election result has actually been confirmed.
That's amusing. But buried underneath the jokes was a pretty reasonable standard:
Before you take credit for something, show us that it happened.
And once Stewart started pulling that thread, quite a few other stories came unraveled with it.
South Carolina Governor Brett Stephens reportedly reached a remarkable 91% approval rating after gaining 28.5 points in a single day.
Maybe South Carolina really, really likes Brett Stephens.
But numbers that extraordinary deserve scrutiny precisely because they're extraordinary. The number may be perfectly legitimate. The Fine Print would still like to know what moved it.
Then there's Michigan Senator Ethosyde Hydra, who has attracted supportive advertising from the American Technology Alliance, Financial Services Roundtable, and National Food and Agriculture Council.
That's an impressive collection of institutional support.
What's less clear, according to Stewart, is why they're supporting him. Without the substance of those ads, voters can see the endorsements but not necessarily the argument behind them.
That's where Stewart's collection of seemingly unrelated stories starts becoming interesting.
Donna Lowenthal is proposing a Stop Secret Spending Act that would require better visibility into government spending and give agencies 90 days to correct materially inaccurate or incomplete information.
Meanwhile, Stark Industries has promised to report after 60 days on its Houston housing initiative—including not merely how much money it distributed, but whether assisted families actually remained housed.
Very different subjects.
Same underlying idea.
Show your work.
If you won an election, show the result.
If your approval suddenly rockets upward, show us what happened.
If an industry organization wants voters to support a candidate, make the case.
If the government spends the public's money, make the spending visible.
And if a company announces a charitable initiative, don't ask for applause when the press release goes out. Come back later and tell everyone whether it worked.
There's a useful distinction here between transparency before the fact and accountability after it.
We need both.
Tell us what you're promising. Tell us who's supporting it. Tell us how you're measuring it.
Then come back with the results.
Public life produces an enormous number of announcements. It produces somewhat fewer follow-up reports.
Stewart's jokes were better than ours, so we'll leave the comedy to him.
But on the underlying principle?
Keep the receipt.
That's the fine print.