I just heard on Meet the Press (yeah, but nothing else was on) that in toto, we will have spent about $3.2 billion this year on elections. That is a staggering amount of money. Certainly the TEA Party related amounts, given in normally small donations, have been the big surprise this year. Given the "final nail in Conservativism coffin" that the Left crowed about (even as the same was said for the Left during Bush), this two year old movement has been the surprise of recent political history.
With the Citizens United decision by the Supreme Court that allowed corporations to "speak" for their own self-interests, coupled with enthusiasm gap, the Progressives are wailing – who is giving the money??? They forget one thing – they’ve owned the Presidency, the House, and the Senate for the last two years – if they REALLY wanted to put the stopper back in the bottle, they could.
Simple fact: they don’t want to. Of course they don’t! They won’t tell you and they will hide behind the veil of disclosure for two mere reasons:
- they wish to appear to be "for the little guy" in this area – even as they deconstruct, for example here in NH, the Right To Know law (elsewhere, known as FOIA, Freedom of Information Act).
- they aren’t getting the same amount of money, the same way, this cycle
And it is those last two words, this cycle, that makes the difference. The Dems know…
that perhaps next cycle, they will be the recipients and have no intention of sealing up that spigot. Until then, demagogy works for them.
F’instance, Carol SEIU-Porter here in NH carefully (or stupidly) chooses her words in saying that she doesn’t take money from special interests and gives the impression that any corporate PAC money is the ONLY definition of special interests. Walk through some of Steve’s posts where he has done yeoman’s work on digging up the money trails.
F’instance, ask NH Governor, Democrat John "Lynch lied" Lynch who among the Gay Billionaire Club has given him how much money, and who in the GillPac were behind the donations given to him and to the head of the NH Democrat Party, Ray "Hitler should have bombed it" Buckley.
So, look at this and think: who REALLY has been spending the money? They sure ARE special interests – and the Democrats sure ARE getting the bulk of that union money:
The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees is now the biggest outside spender of the 2010 elections, thanks to an 11th-hour effort to boost Democrats that has vaulted the public-sector union ahead of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the AFL-CIO and a flock of new Republican groups in campaign spending.
The 1.6 million-member AFSCME is spending a total of $87.5 million on the elections after tapping into a $16 million emergency account to help fortify the Democrats’ hold on Congress. Last week, AFSCME dug deeper, taking out a $2 million loan to fund its push. The group is spending money on television advertisements, phone calls, campaign mailings and other political efforts, helped by a Supreme Court decision that loosened restrictions on campaign spending.
“We’re the big dog,” said Larry Scanlon, the head of AFSCME’s political operations. “But we don’t like to brag.”
(H/T: The Corner)
