June 2012
61 posts
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Don’t miss this paragraph buried in today’s Politico story, “Dems go AWOL in class war”:
Damon Silvers, policy chief at the AFL-CIO, portrayed the economic crash of 2008 and the Citizens United case as a cruel convergence for the cause of populism. “Citizens United has opened the tap on an ocean of money,” Silvers said. “The fear of that money is a trap. It stops...
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New York Times: Inquiry Looks Into a Shield for... →
Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman of New York has begun investigating contributions to tax-exempt groups that are heavily involved in political campaigns, focusing on a case involving the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has been one of the largest outside groups seeking to influence recent elections but is not required to disclose its donors.
Mr. Schneiderman issued a wide-ranging subpoena...
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Louisville Courier-Journal: Sen. McConnell's... →
“But the latest political stunt of Sen. McConnell, Senate minority leader and one of Washington’s most powerful Republicans, is more audacious and far more sinister.”
A Montana case gave the Supreme Court a chance to... →
motherjones:
SCOTUS didn’t weigh in on health care reform today. That doesn’t mean there wasn’t news.
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Public Campaign: Supreme Court Once Again Sides... →
Washington, D.C.—Today’s decision in American Tradition Partnership, Inc. v. Bullock is just another example of the Supreme Court siding with wealthy interests and against common sense and everyday people, said campaign finance watchdog Public Campaign. In its decision, the Court overturned Montana’s law banning direct corporate expenditures in elections.
“A day after Mitt Romney and his big...
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Politico: Obama taps overseas donor pool →
“Obama is tapping the network of American citizens living outside the 50 states more than any other presidential campaign has before, with more than a dozen bundlers who have pledged to raise as much as $4.5 million.”
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Washington Post: Republicanpalooza →
“Campaign finance laws don’t require candidates to release the names of their bundlers, except in the case of registered federal lobbyists. But the Romney campaign’s refusal to identify those who bring in a quarter-million dollars or more differentiates it not only from the Obama campaign but also from those of the past two Republican contenders for the White House, President George W. Bush...
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“The Republican effort to restrict voting isn’t just anti- Democrat, it’s...”
– Jonathan Alter, Bloomberg View, “Republicans’ Voter Suppression Project Grinds On”
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Prison, Privatization, Patronage
Paul Krugman’s column today focuses on the many problems of prison privatization, highlighting one reason for it that we’re all familiar with:
But the main answer, surely, is to follow the money. Never mind what privatization does or doesn’t do to state budgets; think instead of what it does for both the campaign coffers and the personal finances of politicians and their friends. As...
Members Who Supported Massive Giveaway To Big Oil... →
“A ThinkProgress analysis of Center for Responsive Politics data shows how that oil and gas money overwhelmingly went to the votes for gutting safeguards from air pollution, drilling regulations and public lands protections.”
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Los Angeles Times: Pro-Obama super PAC picks up... →
“The folks at Priorities USA Action, the group formed by two White House aides, seemed chipper Wednesday about their latest fundraising figures filed with the Federal Election Commission: the group raised $4 million in May, its best month yet, and is on track to exceed that amount in June.”
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New York Times: Romney's Personal Touch Pays Off... →
“To a remarkable degree, interviews with donors, fund-raisers and staff members show, that financial haul has hinged on Mr. Romney’s clout in the business world and his relentless personal cultivation of contributors, a political ritual for which Mr. Obama has shown little enthusiasm and Mr. McCain, the last Republican presidential nominee, displayed outright disdain.
“Mr. Romney has...
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Mother Jones: Follow the Dark Money →
The down and dirty history of secret spending, PACs gone wild, and the epic four-decade fight over the only kind of political capital that matters.
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WatchDaily Show: “Samantha Bee considers attending Sarah Jessica Parker’s $40,000-a-plate fundraiser for Barack Obama in New York City, but isn’t sure the President cares about her needs.”
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“There are so many problems with our current campaign finance system that the...”
– Public Campaign Communications Director Adam Smith on the White House’s less-than-enthusiastic response to a petition by reform groups.
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Record Political Contributions From Defense...
National Journal reports:
The nation’s biggest defense contractors are on pace to make record amounts of political contributions this election cycle. Unfortunately for Democrats, the vast majority is going to the GOP.
In 2008, defense contractors made $24,607,268 in political contributions, with 51 percent going to Democrats, according to Opensecrets.org, which tracks such spending. This...
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“I think there will be scandals associated with the worst decision of the United...”
– Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) on the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision and the big money flooding our elections.
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PCAF: Spring Break, Mitch McConnell Style →
When Sen. McConnell talks about deregulating our campaign finance system (as he’s doing today at the American Enterprise Institute), or says disclosure will lead to intimidation (even though he once supported it), it’s really just out of political self-interest. He’ll cloak his arguments in high-minded language about the First Amendment, but what he will truly be proposing is further deliverance...
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Politico: Inside the Koch World convention →
The Koch brothers’ political operation has increasingly come to resemble its own political party — and later this month in San Diego, it will hold what amounts to its most ambitious convention to date.
Many of the dozens of rich conservative invitees are expected to write huge checks to a pool of cash distributed among Koch-approved groups, potentially boosting the Kochs’ 2012 spending plan...
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“It’s hard to say who gets more out of Mitt Romney’s increasingly cozy...”
– (Roll Call)
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“The ties between Romney’s campaign and his super PAC are well documented and...”
– David Donnelly, Public Campaign Action Fund Executive Director, on reports that casino mogul Shel Adelson is giving $10 million to the Romney-aligned super PAC.
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NYT: 2 Campaigns Chasing Funds at Frantic Pace →
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Oops (via ThinkProgress):
Mitt Romney spent this morning in Florida trashing the stimulus, saying the Obama administration “borrowed almost a trillion dollars but used it to protect government.”
But just hours after the speech, Romney boarded a plane to Tennessee to fund raise with a a beneficiary of Obama’s stimulus funds.
1:20, 2:35, 3:45, 6:10, 7:45 & 9:05. Movie theater schedule? No, it’s President’sfundraisers today in Baltimore & Philly
— West Wing Reports (@WestWingReport) June 12, 2012
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Lobbyists for Romney!
Are you a “Young Professional for Romney” in DC? Have $5,000 to spare? Then this event is perfect for you:
PI SCOOP… PORTMAN, RYAN HEADLINE ROMNEY YP EVENT: The official invite is out for the June 25 Young Professionals for Romney fundraiser, inviting ‘Supporters of All Ages’ to a reception at the rooftop of The Homer Building with special guests Sen. Rob Portman...
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Sunlight Foundation: This Week's Fundraisers: From... →
“If the person you’re sitting opposite knows you have a gun, and it has bullets...”
– Public Campaign President Nick Nyhart on the role super PACs could play in meetings and negotiations members of Congress have with lobbyists.
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Washington Post: Mitt Romney's Secret Bundlers →
“THE DIFFERENCE between President Obama and presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney when it comes to fundraising is not only that Mr. Romney managed to outraise the president last month. A more troubling difference is that Mr. Romney provided almost no information about the key ‘bundlers’ who helped his campaign vacuum up such huge sums.
“This omission...
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Renacci, Gibbs, Johnson raise cash from "at least... →
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USAdelson
Politico:
Sheldon Adelson is back on the market with talk of giving at least $1 million - and possibly much more - to the Mitt Romney-affiliated super PAC Restore Our Future, POLITICO has learned. Romney sat down with the casino mogul for 45 minutes at his Venetian Resort in Las Vegas last week before Restore Our Future held a fundraiser there. This week, Rudy Giuliani and veteran operative...
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“This is just another example of big money winning. The strategic question is...”
– David Donnelly, Executive Director of Public Campaign Action Fund, on the Wisconsin results. (Washington Post)
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Are nuclear weapons contractors’ millions in...
From iWatch:
Employees of private companies that produce the main pieces of the U.S. nuclear arsenal have invested more than $18 million in the election campaigns of lawmakers that oversee related federal spending, and the companies also employ more than 95 former members of Congress or Capitol Hill staff to lobby for government funding, according to a new report.
The Center for International...
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Scott Brown Pushed to Weaken Wall Street Reform...
The Boston Globe reported yesterday that after the passage of financial reform, Sen. Scott Brown and his office reached out to the Treasury Department and “advocated for a loose interpretation of the law so that banks could more easily engage in high-risk investments.”
How much campaign cash do you think Scott Brown got from Wall Street during the period of that correspondence? We...
