"No right is more precious in a free country than that of having a
voice in the election of those who make the laws under which, as good citizens, we must live."
- Wesberry v Sanders, 376 US 1
___________
“In order to achieve the widest possible distribution of political power, financial contributions to political campaigns should be made by individuals alone.I see no reason for labor
unions — or corporations — to participate in politics. Both were created for economic purposes and their activities
should be restricted accordingly….Our nation is facing a crisis of liberty if we do not control campaign expenditures.
We must prove that elective office is not for sale. We must convince the public that elected officials are what James Madison
intended us to be, agents of the sovereign people, not the hired hands of rich givers….”
------ Senator Barry Goldwater in Conscience
of a Conservative
Click on underlined extracts to read full articles.
Haz clic sobre extractos subrayados para leer articulos
completos.
CONTRIBUTION LIMITS FOR 2015-2016 FEDERAL ELECTIONS
DONORS
RECIPIENTS
Candidate Committee
PAC1 (SSF and Nonconnected)
State/District/Local Party Committee
National Party Committee
Additional National Party Committee Accounts2
Individual
$2,700* per
election
$5,000 per
year
$10,000 per
year (combined)
$33,400* per
year
$100,200* per
account, per year
Candidate Committee
$2,000 per
election
$5,000 per
year
Unlimited
Transfers
Unlimited
Transfers
PAC
- Multicandidate
$5,000 per
election
$5,000 per
year
$5,000 per
year (combined)
$15,000 per
year
$45,000 per
account, per year
PAC - Nonmulticandidate
$2,700* per
election
$5,000 per
year
$10,000 per
year (combined)
$33,400* per
year
$100,200* per
account, per year
State, District & Local Party Committee
$5,000 per
election
$5,000 per
year
Unlimited Transfers
* Indexed for
inflation in odd-numbered years.
1. “PAC” here refers to a committee that makes contributions to
other federal political committees. Independent-expenditure-only political committees (sometimes called “super PACs”)
may accept unlimited contributions, including from corporations and labor organizations.
2. The limits
in this column apply to a national party committee’s accounts for: (i) the presidential nominating convention; (ii)
election recounts and contests and other legal proceedings; and (iii) national party headquarters buildings. A party’s
national committee, Senate campaign committee and House campaign committee are each considered separate national party committees
with separate limits. Only a national party committee, not the parties’ national congressional campaign committees,
may have an account for the presidential nominating convention.
3. Additionally,
a national party committee and its Senatorial campaign committee may contribute up to $46,800 combined per campaign to each
Senate candidate.
Number of Close Races (winning
margin less than 10%)
60
11
Average Winner's Vote Percentage
65%
57%
Average Winner's Receipts from PACs
$665,728
$2,185,650
Most Receipts from PACs
$3,172,193
$4,783,168
Candidate with Most PAC Receipts
Dave Camp (R-Mich)
Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah)
Average Winner's End-of-year Campaign Balance
$371,255
$952,289
Biggest
End-of-year Campaign Balance
$3,406,269
$5,676,609
Candidate with Largest
End-of-year Campaign Balance
Frank
Pallone Jr (D-NJ)
Bob Corker
(R-Tenn)
* Figures cover full six-year
cycle for Senate incumbents.
** Averages include all incumbent politicians
and major party challengers in thegeneral
election. Third-party challengers are not included, as their number and relative lack of funds tend to artificially
lower the averages.
*** Loser averages are based on the
money raised and spent by the candidate who came in second on Election Day. Where candidates ran unopposed, losers' spending
and fundraising are counted as $0.
U.S. Billionaires
Political Power Index is a ranking of the top U.S. billionaires in terms of overall political power. There are a number of
existing rankings that rate the net worth of billionaires, but no one has assessed their overall political influence: ***1 Charles & David Koch ***2 Michael Bloomberg ***3 Tom Steyer ***4 Sheldon Adelson ***5 George Soros ***6 Rupert Murdoch ***7
Bill and Melinda Gates ***8 John and Laura Arnold ***9 Penny Pritzker ***10 Warren Buffett ***11 Peter Thiel ***12
Mark Zuckerberg ***13 Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos ***14 Pierre and Pamela Omidyar ***15 Art Pope ***16 Paul Singer ***17
Peter G. Peterson ***18 Marc Andreessen ***19 Donald Trump ***20 Alice Walton
Get Money out of Politics:top lobbyist bribery, End secret money & Empower voters
STOP POLITICIANS FROM TAKING BRIBES
Prohibit members of Congress from soliciting and receiving contributions from entities,
special interests, and lobbyists from industries they regulate.
LIMIT SUPER PAC CONTRIBUTIONS AND “COORDINATION”
Require SuperPACs to abide by the same contribution limits as other political committees.
Toughen rules regarding SuperPACs’ and other groups’ coordination with political campaigns and political parties.
PREVENT JOB OFFERS AS BRIBES
Close the “revolving door” so that elected representatives and their senior
staff can no longer sell off their legislative power in exchange for high-paying jobs when they leave office: seven years
for all members of Congress, five years for senior congressional staff. (Currently two years for Senators, one year for Representatives,
and one year for senior staff.)
CALL ALL PEOPLE WHO LOBBY, LOBBYISTS
Significantly expand the definition of and register all lobbyists to prevent influencers
from skirting the rules.
LIMIT LOBBYIST DONATIONS
Limit the amount that lobbyists and their clients can contribute to federal candidates,
political parties, and political committees to $500 per year and limit lobbyist fundraising for political campaigns. Federal
contractors are already banned from contributing to campaigns: extend that ban to lobbyists, high-level executives, government
relations employees, and PACs of federal government contractors.
END SECRET MONEY
Mandate full transparency of all political money. Require any organization that spends
$10,000 or more on advertisements to elect or defeat federal candidates to file a disclosure report online with the Federal
Election Commission within 24 hours. List each of the donors who gave $10,000 or more to the organization to run such ads.
This includes all PACs, 501c nonprofits, or other groups that engage in electioneering.
LEVEL THE PLAYING FIELD WITH A SMALL DONOR TAX REBATE
Empower voters by creating an annual $100 Tax Rebate that can be used for qualified
contributions to one or more federal candidates, political parties, and political committees. In order to be eligible to receive
Tax Rebate contributions, candidates, political parties, and political committees must limit the contributions they receive
to no more than $500 per contributor per calendar year or contributions from entities that are funded exclusively by Tax Rebates
and small-dollar contributions.
DISCLOSE “BUNDLING”
Require federal candidates to disclose the names of individuals who “bundle”
contributions for the member of Congress or candidate, regardless of whether such individuals are registered lobbyists.
ENFORCE THE RULES
Strengthen the Federal Election Commission’s independence and strengthen the House
and Senate ethics enforcement processes. Provide federal prosecutors the additional tools necessary to combat corruption,
and prohibit lobbyists who fail to properly register and disclose their activities from engaging in federal lobbying activities
for a period of two years.
Trial lawyers, dentists and Realtors — perhaps Georgians’ three most-beloved professions
— had the deepest pockets as state legislators convened today for 2013, an analysis of campaign disclosures shows. Between
them, trade groups for those three professions donated more than $1.1 million to Georgia politicians and parties over the
past two years...
Lawmakers may not accept donations during the legislative session, so they like to hold fund-raisers
in the week or two beforehand, which also happens to be when special interests’ lobbyists are preparing to push their
own agendas. It’s win-win on both sides of the equation...
Among this year’s top donors, trial lawyers
are watching for any effort to bring up any sort of so-called
“tort reform” that could depress damage claims. Dentists are always looking to improve
insurance coverage for their services. Realtors focus on a range of issues, from limiting local governments’ attempts
to registered foreclosed properties to blocking a proposal to levy a sales tax on their commissions.
Members of other trusted occupations and institutions — including
insurance salesman, title pawn lenders, lobbyists and the phone company — were also among Georgia’s biggest political
donors in the 2011-12...
$191,850 Georgia Health Care Association (nursing homes) $181,900 Select Management
Resources & CEO Rod Aycox (title pawn lender) $162,600
Georgia Credit Union League
One of the saddest consequences of the Westminster expenses revelations
is that sensible people are now wondering whether there might, after all, be something in the idea of state funding for political
parties. Perhaps you are one of them. Perhaps you imagine that, for all its disadvantages, it would at least take some of
the sleaze out of the system. Perhaps you have reluctantly concluded that it would be a lesser evil than making parties dependent
on trade unions and wealthy donors. If your thoughts are trending that way, my friend, look at what is happening in Brussels.
Since 2003, the European Parliament has paid for pan-European
political parties. There are currently 13, and each is funded in proportion to the number of MEPs who support it. The little
ones might get a couple of hundred thousand euros a year. The behemoths – the Party of European Socialists and the European
People's Party – qualify for several millions.
Europe's various fascist movements recently buried their mutual
loathing for long enough to set up such a party, which means that they qualify for, by my reckoning, a little under €300,000
a year. Most MEPs have reacted with drooling horror. But, under the current system, there is no question that the BNP, Jobbik
and the rest are eligible for their share. The best legal brains in the European Parliament examined the matter, but could
find no loophole. Shaven-headed losers who spend their time trolling blogs from their mothers' basements are as entitled to
representation as anyone else, and their representatives can't be distinguished in law from other duly elected MEPs.
When the law doesn't serve their purpose, Euro-integrationists
are quick to discard it. They are currently amending the rules so that a party can be deprived of funds if it fails to uphold
'European values'. Who will determine whether it meets the criteria? In the last analysis, a plenary vote of the European
Parliament. In other words, the question of whether a party qualifies will be in the hands of its political opponents, who
will have a direct financial interest in barring it since, if it is dissolved, its share of the funding will be divided among
the other parties.
If that doesn't alarm you, it should. The de-registration of
opposition movements is the favoured tactic of dictators the world over. Most autocracies now hold regular elections: Iran,
China, Zimbabwe. But participation in those elections is restricted to approved parties. A Polish MEP, shocked by the current
proposal, told me: 'This is exactly what the Communists did. They didn't ban elections. They just banned the people they didn't
like from contesting the elections'.
Successful Senatecandidates
raised an average of more than $14,000 per day during the last election cycle — a sum that campaign finance reform advocates
said shows a system begging for an overhaul.
According toMapLight, a nonprofit group that tracks money in
politics, those who won election to theSenatelast
year raised more than $10 million, which translates to the staggering $14,000-a-day figure.
Senior
executives, on-air personalities, producers, reporters, editors, writers and other self-identifying employees of ABC, CBS
and NBC contributed more than $1 million to Democratic candidates and campaign committees in 2008, according to an analysis
by The Examiner of data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics.
The
Democratic total of $1,020,816 was given by 1,160 employees of the three major broadcast television networks, with an average
contribution of $880.
By
contrast, only 193 of the employees contributed to Republican candidates and campaign committees, for a total of $142,863.
The average Republican contribution was $744.
A tally of the money raised and spent through September by the presidential candidates, the national party
committees and the primary “super PACs” whose sole purpose is to support a candidate. Contribution and spending
totals do not include money raised or held by each candidate’s “victory fund,” a joint fund-raising committee
that will distribute funds to the campaigns and party committees. In addition to these committees, nonprofit groups that do
not have to file with the Federal Election Commission and other super PACs have spent at least $65 million more on television
advertising, almost all of it against President Obama or in support of Mitt Romney.
In the 2012 election, one candidate took advantage of the loosening of campaign
finance to rack up over a billion dollars in donations, spend nearly three times as much as his opponent on mostly negative
ads, and break records for total amount of spending. His name was Barack Obama. Two
years ago, the Supreme Court handed down the landmark case of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, a case heralded
by many as a step forward for free speech and denounced by just as many as a decision that would sell America down the river
to corporate interests for as long as it was considered binding law. The
explosion of money in politics gave birth to Super PACs, a new class of billionaire donors, and even (arguably) the Occupy
Wall Street mass movement, which consistently placed the reversal of Citizens United at or near the top of all unofficial
lists of demands it released. There is little
doubt that the explosion of money in this year’s race has fundamentally altered the dynamics of campaigning in American
politics. Both the Obama campaign and the Romney campaign have raised money in the neighborhood of a billion dollars just
on their own (Obama just a little over, and Romney just a little under).
Super PACs and nonprofits unleashed by theCitizens UnitedSupreme Court decision have spent more than$840 millionon
the 2012 election, with the overwhelming majority favoring Republicans, particularly GOP presidential nomineeMitt Romney. An
estimated $577 million, or roughly 69 percent, was spent by conservative groups, compared with $237 million spent by liberal
groups, or about 28 percent, with the remainder expended by other organizations. Of
all outside spending in the 2012 election, more than $450 million was dedicated to the presidential election with more than
$350 million spent helping Romney and about $100 million spent to help President Barack Obama.
Congressional leaders and campaign committees have raked in nearly $2.3 million in
contributions since 2009 from companies seeking tariff waivers on products they import, according to an analysis byThe Washington Examiner.
Ten House and Senate leaders, including the chairmen of two congressional panels that approve
the waivers known as Miscellaneous Tariff Bills, together got more than $1 million of the total.
Five party organizations set up to get their partisans elected to Congress split another
$1.2 million.
GRECO, a top European anti-corruption body, wants
the U.S. to increase transparency of political funding through outside groups that donate millions to support candidates,
warning that they could be used to skirt long-established disclosure rules. The Council of Europe’s Group of States
against Corruption — known as Greco and which counts the U.S. as a member — warns “soft money” political
financing vehicles appear to be increasing in America....authors were concerned about the potential fallout from super PACs,
which were born out of a 2010 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that stripped away prior restrictions on some election spending. Click below for more information.
The Center for Public Integrity's iWatch
News is offering a variety of ways to follow the money this election cycle, particularly the flood of funds that
have come in the wake of the Supreme Court'sCitizen Uniteddecision.
Get breaking news from iWatch staff on Twitter at @iWatch and follow politics reporters Michael Beckel at @mjbeckel, Aaron Mehta at @AaronMehta, and engagement editor Cole Goins at@colegoins.
And read substantive investigations into the presidential candidates and the elite donors to “super
PACs” backing them at the Consider the Source project.
Super PACs can collect unlimited amounts of money from individuals,
unions and corporations to spend on advertising to elect or defeat candidates. Each of the major presidential candidates has
at least one super PAC backer.
The Consider the Source project profiles each
of these groups, as well as several that focus on both the White House and Congress.
If you want to run for Congress, you need money. A lot of
money.
To win election, U.S. House members raised, on average, $1,900
per day, every day, for an entire two-year term—including weekends and holidays. That’s $1.4
million per House member, on average.
Winning senators raised $7.5 million, on average—$3,400
per day.(These figures are for the 2008 election, from the nonpartisanCenter for Responsive Politics.)
The main source of this campaign money is interest groups
that want something from government. Once elected, politicians often pay back their campaign contributors with special access
and favorable laws. This common practice is contrary to the public interest. MapLight's research tools help shine a light
on the connection between money and votes, to help citizens hold legislators accountable.
Money
and Votes
MapLight connects money and votes. We bring together, in one
website, the money given to politicians with each politician's votes.
We providedata,research services, andonline toolsthat work together to make patterns of money and influence more transparent.
Connections between campaign contributions, interest groups and votes that would have required days or weeks of manual research
are now available at the click of a mouse.
The Supreme Court on Monday (June
25, 2012) reaffirmed its 2-year-old decision allowing corporations to spend freely to influence elections. The justices struck
down a Montana law limiting corporate campaign spending.
By a 5-4 vote, the court's conservative
justices said the decision in the Citizens United case in 2010 applies to state campaign finance laws and guarantees corporate
and labor union interests the right to spend freely to advocate for or against candidates for state and local offices.
The majority turned away pleas from
the court's liberal justices to give a full hearing to the case because massive campaign spending since the January 2010 ruling
has called into question some of its underpinnings.
The same five justices said in 2010
that corporations have a constitutional right to be heard in election campaigns. The decision paved the way for unlimited
spending by corporations and labor unions in elections for Congress and the president, as long as the dollars are independent
of the campaigns they are intended to help. The decision, grounded in the freedom of speech, appeared to apply equally to
state contests.
But Montana aggressively defended
its 1912 law against a challenge from corporations seeking to be free of spending limits, and the state Supreme Court sided
with the state. The state court said a history of corruption showed the need for the limits, even as Justice Anthony Kennedy
declared in his Citizens United opinion that independent expenditures by corporations "do not give rise to corruption or the
appearance of corruption."
Twenty-two states and the District
of Columbia, as well as Sen. John McCain and other congressional champions of stricter regulations on campaign money, joined
with Montana.
"What has changed in the last few years are two things. The price of campaigns is going through
the roof. The pressure to raise money for those campaigns because of TV advertising is just enormous. Congressman, Senators
spend as much as two, three days of every week dialing for dollars or going to fundrarisers." - Filmmaker Alex Gibney
interviewed about his Abramoff lobbyist corruption film.
Summary of Legislation
Introduced in Response to Citizens United Decision
The legislation introduced by Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY)
and Representatives Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) and Mike Castle (R-DE) addresses problems that arise from the Supreme Court's
destructive decision in theCitizens Unitedcase
to empower corporations and unions to make unlimited expenditures to influence federal elections and government decisions.
The core provisions of the legislation establish new transparency
and accountability requirements for corporations and unions that make expenditures in federal elections. The Schumer and Van
Hollen - Castle bills are similar. This is a summary of the Schumer legislation.
Comprehensive disclosure by corporations, labor unions, trade
associations and non-profit advocacy groups of campaign-related expenditures
IN
THE 21ST CENTURY ONLY THE WEALTHY AND/OR THE CORRUPT CAN AFFORD TO RUN FOR PUBLIC OFFICE
Freshmen
in 112th Congress Exceedingly Wealthy
Sixty percent of Senate freshman and more than 40 percent of House freshmen
are millionaires, the Center’s study finds. Roughly 1 percent of Americans at large claim the same lofty financial status.
“Even
though millions of Americans continue to struggle financially, most of the nation's newest congressional representatives are
a world away from such constituents' financial realities," said Sheila Krumholz, the Center's executive director.
Freshmen
congressmen also appear generally immune to the nation’s persistently soft economy, in which joblessness still hovers
around 9 percent and many of the country’s regions continue to claw their way back from the recent recession.
The Center calculates that the median estimated
wealth for Senate freshman is $3.96 million. For House freshmen, it’s $570,418.
A vast majority of Americans -- 80 percent -- oppose last month's Supreme Court ruling that lifted restrictions on corporate and union spending in political elections. Though most other areas of
national politics may be paralyzed by partisanship, the opposition to the decision cuts across Republican, Democratic and
independent lines.
Sixty-five percent of those polled said they "strongly" opposed the ruling. Only 17 percent strongly
or somewhat favored it, with 6 percent in the "strongly" camp.
Seventy-two percent favor action by Congress to reinstate
campaign spending limits on corporations and unions (with 52 percent "strongly" supporting such a move) while 24 percent oppose
doing so.
Voters believe that special interests are still running the
show and that voters’ voices are being drowned out by those who help fund politicians’ campaigns...strongly oppose
recent Supreme Court decision allowing unlimited corporate contributions by a stark 64 to 27 percent margin...strongly support
proposals to limit corporate influence and develop a program that would allow politicians to run campaigns using small contributions
from their constituents. (Click on ballot box for more)
DOLLARCRACY HAS REPLACED DEMOCRACY ACROSS THE PLANET...
ONE MAN, ONE VOTE
HAS BEEN REPLACED BY ONE DOLLAR, ONE VOTE
or perhaps ten, fifty, 1,000, or 100,000 dollars, one vote depending on the economic capacity of
the country.
(NOTE: On this page most current news is about the party in power in the USA at this time,
the Democratic Party; however, the Republican Party has done the exact same things over the years...BOTH
PARTIES FAVOR DOLLARCRACY AND ARE EQUALLY TO BLAME FOR IT)
Democracy has been replaced
by dollarcracy across the world but especially in the USA
_____________________
Dollarcracy at work
How political campaigns
are financed under
dollarcratic governance:
.............................
Pre-election contributions =
post-election
paybacks
............................
Post-electioncontributions =BRIBES
Both are ...LEGAL!
Both are shameful
High court unleashes political spending
In a decision
with profound implications for the role of money in American campaigns, the Supreme Court on Thursday gave interest groups,
unions and corporations the right to pour money into issue advertising in political races - reigniting the passionate battle
over the influence of cash on the electoral process.
The 5-4 decision
punched a hole in the complex web of federal campaign-finance laws and rules in finding that those groups should have the
same rights to spend money on political ads as any person. Direct contributions by corporations and unions to individual candidates
are still forbidden.
Supporters
cheered the ruling, which they said returns the country to the core free-speech precept that political speech should be protected,
no matter who or what is speaking.
Critics warned
that the foundations of American democracy are at stake and that big businesses will be able to spend enough money to influence
elections.
In stark language,
the court acknowledged that it was overturning its own precedents, but Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, writing the majority opinion,
said the justices were now returning to "ancient First Amendment principles."
"The government
may regulate corporate political speech through disclaimer and disclosure requirements, but it may not suppress that speech
altogether," Justice Kennedy wrote in an opinion overturning a 1990 case and part of a separate 2003 case that upheld most
of the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance laws, enacted in 2002.
President
Obama State of the Union Address:
“I don’t think American
elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities.”
Last
week’s Supreme CourtCitizen’s Uniteddecision
opens the floodgates to special interests and foreign countries and companies bankrolling national campaigns. The
President called for bipartisan support for legislation that will remedy the Supreme Court’s unprecedented and troubling
decision.
Secret Financing and the Campaign Finance Reform Battles to Come
by Fred Wertheimer, President, Democracy 21
The Supreme Court, in Citizens United, eliminated one of
the nation's principal laws to protect against government corruption and opened the door to campaign finance scandals which
began to play out in the 2010 congressional races. As a result of the decision, one of the worst in Supreme Court history,
this is the first election in more than 60 years where corporations and labor unions were free to spend money to influence
federal elections.
As a result of the Citizens United decision, and the failure of five Justices to understand the nation's
campaign finance laws, this also is the first election in nearly 40 years where hundreds of millions of dollars in secret
money has flooded federal elections.
Major campaign finance reforms are essential to protect the integrity of our elections and the interests of the
American people in honest government. The battle for these reforms will begin immediately.
Campaign finance reform victories can be won regardless of who controls Congress or the Presidency.
In 2000, legislation to require 527 groups to disclose their campaign contributions and expenditures was enacted
with Republicans in control of the House and the Senate and a Democratic president.
In 2002, legislation to ban unlimited or "soft money" contributions to the national parties was enacted with Republicans
in control of the House, Democrats barely in control of the Senate, 51 to 49, and a Republican president.
Secret contributions in political campaigns are a formula for influencing-buying corruption. It has happened before
and will happen again.
You cannot have secret $100,000 or $1,000,000 contributions going to outside spending groups, without having the
influence-seeking donors who provided this secret money also trying to buy influence and votes from the federal officeholders
they have helped elect.
Unless we enact new disclosure laws, secret contributions to outside spending groups are bound to dramatically
increase in the 2012 elections, when both presidential and congressional races will be at stake.
In addition to new disclosure laws, Congress also must take steps to prevent the blatant abuse of the tax laws
that took place in this election, such as the misuse of the tax exemption for 501(c)(4) organizations by political groups
like Karl Rove's brainchild, Crossroads GPS.
Just as history tells us secrecy results in scandal, history also tells us that scandal results in reform.
The Watergate campaign finance scandals in the 1970s resulted in the creation of the landmark presidential public
financing system which served the nation well for most of its existence until it became outdated when Congress failed to modernize
it. The Watergate scandals also led to the enactment of limits on individual contributions to candidates and parties, upheld
by the Supreme Court as necessary to prevent corruption of federal officeholders and government decisions.
The soft
money scandals in the 1990s led to the ban on unlimited contributions to the national parties upheld by the Supreme Court
in 2003, a decision that was reaffirmed by the Supreme Court earlier this year. The soft money ban continues to serve the
country well in preventing a system of legalized bribery of federal officeholders.
Similarly, major campaign finance reform battles lie ahead. The most immediate reform to be pursued involves passing
the DISCLOSE Act to ensure that organizations spending money to influence federal elections are required to disclose to voters
the donors financing those expenditures.
The Act passed the House in June and in September fell just one vote short of the 60 votes needed to reach the
Senate floor for action. Another effort must be made in the post-election session to pass the DISCLOSE Act in the Senate and
enact it into law.
If this cannot be accomplished, however, the battle for the DISCLOSE Act will begin immediately in the next Congress.
A New York Times/CBS News poll recently found that 92 percent of Americans support disclosure of the contributions
financing campaign expenditures. Opponents of disclosure cannot sustain the practice of secret influence-buying contributions
being spent to influence federal campaigns, in the face of overwhelming public support for disclosure of the contributions.
An
expected Republican-led effort to reinstate the soft money system must be defeated. The corrupt soft money system was banned
by Congress in 2002 and the ban was upheld as constitutional by the Supreme Court in 2003 and again by the Court this year.
The argument will be made by proponents that the limits on contributions to the national parties should be eliminated
or greatly increased so that parties can "compete" with outside spenders.
But you cannot solve the problems caused by the corrupting role being played by outside spending groups by legalizing
much greater and more direct corruption in the form of huge influence-buying contributions made to the national parties to
benefit federal officeholders. It should be noted, furthermore, that even with the soft money ban, the national parties will
raise as much as $1 billion or more for the 2010 congressional election cycle, far more than the amount spent by outside spending
groups.
In testifying in support of the soft money ban in 2003, former Republican Senator Warren Rudman said:
Individuals on both sides of the table recognize that larger donations effectively "purchase" greater
benefits for donors... Large soft money contributions in fact distort the legislative process. They affect what gets done
and how it gets done. They affect whom Senators and House members see, whom they spend their time with, what input they get,
and make no mistake about it, this money affects outcomes as well.
Former Republican Senator Alan Simpson also testified in support of the ban stating that a system of unlimited
contributions "prostitutes ideas and ideals, demeans democracy, and debases debates." Simpson said, "Too often, Members' first
thought is not what is right or what they believe, but how it will affect fundraising. Who, after all, can seriously contend
that a $100,000 donation does not alter the way one thinks about - and quite possibly votes on - an issue?"
In the next Congress, the fight will continue for fundamental reforms to repair the presidential public financing
system and create a similar system for congressional races. The goal of the new systems is to make citizens who donate small
contributions the key players in financing our federal elections. Small donor contributions raised on the Internet and magnified
in importance by public matching funds have the potential to revolutionize the way we finance our campaigns.
These reforms will be vigorously pursued in the new Congress. A serious effort also will be made to address the
absence of enforcement of the campaign finance laws caused by the dysfunctional Federal Election Commission, and in particular
by the three Republican FEC commissioners who are ideological opponents of the laws and have shown no interest in enforcing
or properly interpreting them.
If the voices and interests of average citizens are to be heard in Washington, then the role and importance of
small donors in financing our elections must be greatly enhanced and the role of influence-seeking larger donors, bundlers
and outside spenders must be greatly diminished.
Insurers Gave U.S. Chamber $86 Million Used to Oppose Obama's Health Law
By Drew Armstrong - Nov
17, 2010
Health insurers last year gave the U.S. Chamber of Commerce $86.2 million that was used to oppose the
health-care overhaul law, according to tax records and people familiar with the donation.
The insurance lobby, whose members include Minnetonka, Minnesota-based United Health Group and Cigna
Corp of Philadelphia, gave the money to the Chamber in 2009 as Democ rats increased criticism of the industry, according to
a person who requested anonymity because laws don’t require identifying funding sources. The Chamber got the money from
the America's Heath Insyrence Plan as the industry urged Congress to drop a plan to create a competing government-run insurance
plan.
“Clearly the secrecy was important to industry,” Sheila Krumholtz executive director
of the Washington-based Center for Responsive Politics, said in an interview. The group tracks money in politics and isn’t
affiliated with a political party. “Eighty-six million dollars is an astonishing sum,” she said.
The spending on the Chamber exceeded the insurer group’s entire budget from a year earlier and
accounted for 40 percent of the Chamber’s $214.6 million in 2009 expenditures. The spending reflects the insurers’
attempts to influence the bill, which the Congressional Budget Office estimates will provide coverage to 32 million previously
uninsured Americans, after Democrats in Congress and the White House put more focus on regulation of the insurance industry.
(Webmaster Note: I disagree with the following video and consider it a gross exaggeration,
but it is worth trying to understand - JW)
Corporation Says It Will Run for Congress
Following the Supreme Court decision implicitly granting corporations the right to free speech (by determining that political spending is
a kind of speech), a corporation has decided to take what it believes to be “democracy’s next step”: It
is running for Congress.
With more than a twinge of irony, Murray Hill Incorporated, a liberal public relations
firm, recently announced that it planned to run in the Republican primary in Maryland’s 8th Congressional District.
Here is the company’s first “campaign” ad:
DOLLARCRACY
= ACCESS TO POWER
The top 10 individual donors
to House and Senate members from New York include some of the nation’s leading figures in real estate, energy, finance
and law. Together, they gave slightly more than $381,000 last year.
Among organizations, the city’s
white-shoe law firms and labor unions were the biggest givers, collectively contributing $1.5 million last year.
Nearly $370,000 of that came
from two Manhattan law firms ...whose partners and employees gave heavily to a
notable alumna of both firms...Five major labor unions gave nearly $740,000 total
to New York’s representatives in Congress, while a trial lawyers’ group...gave
$176,000 to New York’s delegation.
The donors’ motivations
vary widely, from a desire to protect their business interests to ideological allegiance to personal loyalty to concern over
foreign policy. And they enjoy a level of access to the government that is unavailable to most people.
From 2004 to 2008, the Congressional Black Caucus’s political and charitable
wings took in at least $55 million in corporate and union contributions..."All eight open House investigations involve caucus members, and most center on
accusations of improper ties to private businesses." The bottom line is that it appears the Congressional Black Caucus is
devoted to two things -- spending millions of dollars on lavish parties and raising money from corporations and lobbyists.
And many of the caucus' fundraising arrangements are suspect at best.
The report, co-authored by Anthony J. Corrado, Michael J. Malbin, Thomas
E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein, seeks to change the ongoing national dialogue about money in politics.
The political
world has been arguing about campaign finance policy for decades. A once-rich conversation has become a stale, two-sided battleground.
The time has come to leap over this gulf and, as much as possible, move the disputes from the courts.
The 2008 elections showcased the power of the Internet to generate enthusiasm, mobilize volunteers and increase
small-donor contributions. The digital revolution has altered the calculus of participation. Instead of further restricting
the wealthy few, therefore, this new report presents detailed recommendations to help activate the many.
In
addition to extensive new information about the role of small and large doors in federal and state elections, the fifty-five
page report contains this report offers a new vision of how campaign finance and communications policy can help further democracy
through broader participation. Key recommendations, which are meant to apply to state as well as federal elections, include:
Ensure open and accessible communications and informationby (1) expanding affordable broadband access, (2) carriers providing full access
for political speech and (3) creating a one-stop portal for all of a citizen's election-related public information;
Improve transparencyby
(1) making all disclosure reports be filed and available to the public electronically, (2) filing advertising logs electronically
with the FCC and (3) developing a single disclosure Web site;
Refining contribution limitson
contributions to candidates and political parties;
Redefining public fundingby
(1) providing multiple-dollar matching funds for small donors in general elections and primaries and , (2) doing away with
spending limits as a requirement for public funding, (3) requiring candidates who accept public funds to abide by lower contribution
limits instead of spending limits, (4) offering early money sooner, (5) using tax credits or rebates; and
Enhancing party-candidate relations an electoral accountabilityby allowing unlimited coordinated expenditures for political parties from small-donor
contributions.
Lobbying
industry booms in recession
BIG SPENDERS
More than half of the 20 groups and companies that spent the most on lobbying last year increased
their lobbying expenses over 2008. Totals include lobbying subsidiaries.
Name
Total 2008
Total 2009
U.S. Chamber of Commerce
$91,725,000
$144,456,000
ExxonMobil
$29,000,000
$27,430,000
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America
$20,220,000
$26,465,520
General Electric
$19,379,000
$25,520,000
Pfizer Inc.
$12,180,000
$24,619,268
AARP
$27,900,000
$21,010,000
American Medical Association
$20,555,000
$20,830,000
Chevron Corp.
$12,994,000
$20,815,000
Blue Cross-Blue Shield{+1}
$16,300,165
$20,067,939
National Association of Realtors
$17,340,000
$19,497,000
ConocoPhillips
$8,459,053
$18,069,858
Verizon Communications
$18,020,000
$17,820,000
FedEx
$9,335,000
$17,050,000
Boeing
$17,540,000
$16,850,000
American Hospital Association
$18,902,684
$16,300,000
National Cable and Telecommunications Association
$14,500,000
$15,980,000
Northrop Grumman
$20,743,252
$15,180,000
Lockheed Martin
$15,981,506
$13,533,782
Business Roundtable
$13,320,000
$13,410,000
Altria Group
$13,840,000
$12,770,000
1Fourth-quarter reports are still
being talliedSources: Center for Responsive Politics, U.S. Senate
The recession has battered
the U.S. economy, but the lobbying industry is humming along in the nation's capital, even for companies that have shed thousands
of jobs in the past year.
The 20 trade associations and companies that spent the most on lobbying increased
their spending by more than 20% in 2009 to $507.7 million, up from $418.2 million a year earlier, according to a USA TODAY
analysis of reports compiled by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics.
The top 20 include oil giantConocoPhillips, which announced nearly 1,300 layoffs in January 2009, and drugmakerPfizer, which shed 4,200 jobs since completing its merger with drug companyWyethlast fall....
TheU.S. Chamber of Commerceled spending, pumping $144.5 million into
lobbying last year, according to the center's tally. That's a nearly 60% increase over 2008 and came as the business federation
battled Congress and the White House over legislation dealing with health care and financial regulation.
Spending jumped because the chamber also launched an advertising campaign last
year, including TV ads slamming a congressional proposal to create a new consumer-protection agency to oversee lending, said
R. Bruce Josten, the chamber's executive vice president for government affairs. The chamber needed to respond to "critically
important, top-tier issues to the business community" coming out of Congress, he said.
More than half of the top 20 companies increased lobbying activity in 2009.
Others, includingVerizon,BoeingandLockheed Martin, curtailed spending. Struggling automakerGeneral Motorstumbled out of the top 20 altogether.
GM, which has cut 21,000 U.S. jobs and has received more than $50 billion in
government aid — spent $8.7 million on lobbying last year, down from $13.4 million in 2008
_______________________________________
Health
care groups lobby at record pace
The drug and insurance industries
have dramatically amped up their efforts to lobby Congress, spending millions over a three-month period to influence legislation
aimed at reshaping the nation's health care system, new reports show.
ThePharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of Americareported nearly $7 million in lobbying expenses from July
through September. Overall, the group has spent nearly as much during the first nine months of 2009 as it did during the entire
previous year. Individual drug companies also have sharply increased lobbying.Pfizer, for instance, has spent more than $17 million in lobbying during the first nine months of this year,
nearly twice its lobbying budget during the same period in 2008. Pfizer spokeswoman Kristen Neese said the spending reflects
a commitment to "making our voice heard."
“It leaves room for a little cynicism that money
buys votes, but realistically, it’s the engine of the process.”
To eke out an election victory over the city’s low-key comptroller,
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg spent $102 million of his own fortune
— or about $174 per vote — according to data released Friday, making his bid for a third term the most expensive
campaign in the city’s history.
Mr. Bloomberg, the wealthiest man in New York City, shattered his own records: He poured $85 million into his campaign
in 2005 (or $112 per vote) and $74 million into his first bid for office in 2001 ($99 per vote).
And the $102 million tab is likely to rise, because the mayor has not yet doled out postelection bonuses to campaign workers,
which have routinely exceeded $100,000 a person in years past. That spending will not be reported until after his inauguration
in January.
Mr. Bloomberg has now spent at least $261 million of his own money in the pursuit of public office, more than anyone else
in the United States.
It will take some time to assess the costs and benefits of Jon Corzine's nine years as an elected official.
But how much money his political career cost him is now known.
He spent $131 million of his own money on three
runs for political office since 2000, including primaries, according to an Associated Press analysis of federal and state
campaign finance data, including a report issued Tuesday by the state ElectionLaw Enforcement Commission.
That's enough money to pay the entireproperty tax billfor a year for everyone in Corzine's hometown ofHoboken.It's
nearly as much as theNHLpaid
last month to buy thePhoenix Coyotesand
rescue the franchise from bankruptcy.
"After $130 million, what he got out of it was
a term in theSenate,a
term in the Statehouse and a portrait in the outer office," saidPeter McDonough,an
adjunct professor at Rutgers University's Eagleton Institute of Politics and a former communications director for Republican
former Gov.Christie Whitman.
Sheila Krumholz,executive
director of theCenter of Responsive Politics,says
it's safe to say that Corzine has spent more of his own money to run for office than anyone in U.S. history other thanNew YorkMayorMichael Bloomberg.The
mayor has spent about twice as much as Corzine in his three elections, all of them victorious.
Corzine is known for running overwhelming campaigns
in a state where doing that requires lots of pricey airtime on New York and Philadelphia television stations.
He was pushed out of his job at the helm ofGoldman Sachsin
1999 and used his fortune to help him burst onto the state's political scene. In 2000, the Democrat was elected to theU.S. Senate.In
2005, he was elected governor. And last month, after spending $27 million on a bitter campaign—$25.3 million of it his
own—he lost to RepublicanChris Christie,who
spent $11.4 million.
WAPO 12/4/09 At least 30 of the president's 324 top bundlers -- those who raised $100,000 or more
-- have been nominated for ambassadorships or other senior administration posts, including some of the most consequential
and coveted American outposts. Some have also been given at least one opportunity to visit the White House, in venues such
as the St. Patrick's Day party in March or the first formal state dinner last week....The numbers pale in comparison to Clinton's administration -- during which coziness with donors was legendary
-- or to that of George W. Bush, who gave hundreds of jobs and other perks to wealthy supporters over the course of his presidency.
56%
Favor Regulation of Campaign Contributions, But 88% Say Special Interests Likely To Get Around It
The Supreme Court is expected to hand down a ruling this fall
that could loosen restrictions on contributions to political campaigns in a major way, but 56% of U.S. voters believe the
federal government should regulate how much money individuals can give to political campaigns.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 25% don’t
believe the government should regulate campaign contributions. Nineteen percent (19%) are not sure.
But 88% say it’s at least somewhat likely that special interest groups
will find ways to get money to politicians and influence their votes even if the government places limits on how much individuals
can give to campaigns. Voters feel strongly about this, too, because 69% say it is Very Likely.
Only five percent (5%) say it’s not very likely special interests will
find ways around the government regulations, and another two percent (2%) say it’s not at all likely.
There is very little partisan disagreement on the need for campaign finance
regulation or over the ability of special interests to get around that regulation.
At least one part of formerRep. Eric Massa’shourlong, train-wreck interview with cable-television hostGlenn Beckrang true to his fellow House freshmen Tuesday: the grim description of the
intense and time-consuming fundraising pressures that dominate the lives of junior members.
“Congressmen spend
between five and seven hours a day on the phone, begging for money,” Massa (D-N.Y.) told Beck, before launching into
a detailed account of thearduous fundraising routine— a demeaning process, Massa said — that includes filling out call
sheets, detailing the amount of money raised per hour and conferring with fundraising coaches who advise them on how to wring
even more money out of donor calls.
“I don’t have the life’s
energy to get up at 5 in the morning and work until midnight [and] spend five hours on the phone begging for money,”
saidMassa, estimating that he worked 120 hours a week as a congressman. “I have completely abandoned my family for five years.”
To his fellow members of the Class of 2008 — many of whom are also
looking to solidify their grip on newly won seats while convincing party leaders of their political chops —Massa’saccount was all too familiar.
In interviews with a dozen House freshmen,
nearly all of whom requested anonymity to discuss their fundraising practices candidly, members said Massa’s estimate
of five to seven hours of daily fundraising call time was something of a stretch. But they agreed that his account wasn’t
that far off the mark.
They described days packed with research about
potential donors, trips down the block to the boiler-room-style call centers operated by the campaign committees and hours
of mind-numbing calls dialed from cramped cubicles.
“How much
do I like doing it? I hate it. It’s the worst,” one House freshman remarked to POLITICO during a vote this week.
“I hate fundraising. I make no bones about it.”
“It’s
kind of like going from alpha to omega,” said the first-termer, pointing from the House floor to the direction of the
campaign committee headquarters where he makes his fundraising calls. “I don’t know many people who like it. And
if they do like it, there is probably something wrong with them.”
“It’s
actually sad,” lamented a freshman Democrat who spends one to two hours a day dialing for dollars. “I don’t
think most of us when we ran for office thought we’d be spending so much time raising money.”
Most
members interviewed for this article said they spend anywhere from 10 to 15 hours a week on the phone raising money or holding
fundraising events in the restaurants, offices or clubs that surround the Capitol — a remarkable time commitment, but
one that freshmen describe as the reality of the lives they lead.
“It’s no different than the campaign.
I’m in a tough district. It takes a lot of money to win,” said one freshman Democrat who said he schedules about
15 hours of fundraising time per week. “There’s a direct correlation to the time you spend on the phone and the
money you raise.”
“I don’t get a lot of sleep,” said the Democrat, noting that he spends time researching all the donors
he contacts in addition to practicing specific pitches that he thinks will increase the likelihood that a check will come
his way. “It’s just the reality.”
“We do a great
deal of fundraising. It’s part of the job,” said another House freshman who estimated spending about 10 hours
a week on the phone with donors. “My tolerance is such that I don’t do it for more than 1½ hours.”
“I am probably not the best fundraiser,” the freshman shrugged.
“I’m doing pretty well.”
The intense focus on fundraising
reflects the reality of running a campaign in the era of the 24-hour news cycle, with outside interest groups willing to spend
hundreds of thousands of dollars on efforts to dislodge incumbents. In 2008, House freshmen spent an average of about $1.8
million on their reelection campaigns, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
“It’s
gone up in recent years,” said former Texas Rep. Martin Frost, who served as chairman of the Democratic Congressional
Campaign Committee.
But the hours on the phone also reflect a Capitol
Hill culture that measures political sway by the size of a campaign’s bank account — not to mention one’s
margin of reelection. One freshman, who said he was contemplating a rise through his party’s leadership ranks, said
there was nothing worse than giving the impression to party bosses that he couldn’t fend for himself financially or
that he was somehow a financial weak link.
“You’ve got to
show you’re a player, and you’ve got to do that by being reelected. And fundraising is a big part of that,”
said Frost. “This is the real world. Politics is not for the faint of heart. And to anyone who wants to make a difference,
you’ve got to show you can be reelected.”
“The pressure
to get reelected, to climb the leadership ladder, to raise money for the party, is a big part of politics,” said former
Virginia Rep. Tom Davis, who once chaired the National Republican Congressional Committee. “Your reputation in politics
centers on whether you got reelected, and fundraising is a big part of that.”
The
expectations of the NRCC and the DCCC can be crushing, the freshmen say, further intensifying the fundraising pressures, with
both committees laying out specific benchmarks for members to meet in order for them to be eligible for committee assistance
down the road.
DCCC staffers and leaders “hammer” the importance of amassing cash at the beginning and
then “grill” new members if they don’t raise enough money or meet their goals, said a House Democrat who
is a member of DCCC’s Frontline program, which aims to provide fundraising and institutional support to vulnerable incumbents.
They talk about wanting to see “sweat equity.”
“You hear about it if you don’t,” the Frontline member said. “I worry that some [colleagues] go
overboard and have made it almost an obsession.”
For many freshmen,
most of the fundraising takes place at NRCC and DCCC headquarters. Members describe crowded rooms of metal folding chairs
amid cubicles set up to serve as call centers, where the din of fundraising calls makes it hard to think or concentrate.
“You’re on one side, and you’re overhearing the person
on the other side — and sometimes they’re talking to the person you just called,” said one freshman Democrat.
Members quietly converse on the side with staffers, and many take calls on
their cell phones between calls on the committee phones. Some have learned to talk on two phones at once while working off
call sheets that have been provided by fundraising consultants.
“It’s
sort of like a boiler room,” one Frontline House Democrat said. “It’s a sweatshop.”
“It’s
hardly what one imagines one ran for Congress to be and do. There’s not much romantic to it,” said the member.
To some, the notion of calling people they barely know and asking them to
open their checkbooks is hard to stomach. “I’m not good at cold-calling people who I don’t know,”
said one freshman. “I just wasn’t brought up to call people asking for money who I haven’t met.”
Some freshmen claim the fundraising demands don’t bother them.
“Given the needs of my district down there, I don’t have too
much time to fundraise,” said Rep. Anh “Joseph” Cao (R-La.), whose calm belies his status as perhaps the
most vulnerable member of the House. “There is pressure to fundraise, but my focus right now is simply to represent
the people of the 2nd District of Louisiana.”
First-term Rep.
Jason Chaffetz, who represents a safely Republican district in Utah, said he doesn’t have to spend much time fundraising
— the NRCC mandates that he raise only $125,000 each year.
“It’s
much easier to do without it,” Chaffetz said, adding that he spends only about two to three hours a week asking donors
for cash. “But it’s the reality of what you have to do for the job.”
NASA legend and former Sen. John Glenn (D-Ohio) would
prefer picking a fight with a primate to raising funds for a campaign, lamenting that clamoring for cash “was the most
onerous part of politics for me. I’d rather wrestle a gorilla right here on the floor than ask anybody for five bucks
— make it a dollar.” - The Hill, 1/11/12
The remaining big banks (in the
US) and big banks/corporates (elsewhere) are made invincible by campaign contributions, political connections, and everyone’s
reasonable fear of a great depression. It will be hard for outsiders to challenge that structure effectively –
either as new companies or with new ideas. But you won’t see a great deal of innovation, investment, and growth
coming from these survivors.
The health sector---eclipses all other sectors but the financial sector in lobbying spending since 1998, putting $3.4 billion into its efforts. Below
are health sector contributions to Congress over the years
The table below is from the Center for Responsive Politics' Open Secretes
Website. It lists the top donors to the two top candidates in the 2008 election cycle. The organizations themselves did not donate,
rather the money came from the organization's PAC, its individual members or employees or owners, and those individuals' immediate
families. Organization totals include subsidiaries and affiliates.
Because of contribution limits, organizations that bundle together many individual contributions
are often among the top donors to presidential candidates. These contributions can come from the organization's members or
employees (and their families). The organization may support one candidate, or hedge its bets by supporting multiple candidates.
Groups with national networks of donors - like EMILY's List and Club for Growth - make for particularly big bundlers.
More details on those organizations shown in BLUE may be obtained by clicking on their names.
Whenever you find you
are on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect
--- Mark Twain
We have never observed
a great civilization with a population as old as the United States will have in the twenty-first century; we have never observed
a great civilization that is as secular as we are apparently going to become; and we have had only half a century of experience
with advanced welfare states...Charles Murray
Kella
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