Stephen Colbert announces he is officially launching an investigation into a run for president, or at least a run for president of South Carolina, after transferring control of his SuperPAC to Jon Stewart. It’s a very funny bit but it highlights the absurdity of our election process post Citizens United, which makes it also kind of sad.
Browsing Posts tagged Campaign Spending
Have you noticed the ad buys on TV from the American petroleum industry recently? They feature ordinary Joes expressing concern over legislation that would raise taxes on the poor, beleaguered fossil fuel industry. Next time you see one of those ads or are buying gas for $4.00 a gallon, keep this in mind …
Booming crude-oil prices and improved refining profits are poised to put a firecracker under Big Oil’s first-quarter earnings and set the stage for a year that could come close to rivaling the industry’s record year in 2008.
First-quarter crude prices averaged about $100 a barrel, or about 20% higher than a year ago, pushed upward by oil-supply concerns due to political unrest in the Arab World and a recovering global economy. That spike is expected to lift earnings by about 50% at Exxon Mobil Corp., and about 33% each at Chevron Corp. and ConocoPhillips, compared with a year earlier.
And also this …
Source: Opensecrets.org
Since it was revealed that the Chamber of Commerce is spending millions this election cycle to defeat Democrats using money from undisclosed (and in some cases foreign) entities, the right and its media enablers have bent themselves into a pretzel trying to dismiss the charges and minimize the public relations fallout. One of their tactics is to present false equivalencies like this one from the Washington Post’s Marc Thiessen:
… Labor unions are spending millions to tar Republican candidates — and they take in far more foreign cash than the Chamber. If the GOP takes control of Congress, investigations into how organized labor funds its political efforts could be forthcoming.
… The U.S. Chamber says it receives about $100,000 from its affiliates abroad (out of an operating budget of about $200 million), none of it used for political campaigns. Compare that to one of the largest labor unions in America, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which is spending lavishly to elect Democrats.
There are several glaring problems with Thiessen’s argument.
I’ve always looked up to Rep. Mike Frame in District 105 for his tenacious fundrasing ability. He’s one of the best. He does it the old-fashion way. He pounds the pavement and phones his supporters constantly. Raising between $20,000 to $40,000 is within what I would consider to be a respectable range for a state representative district such as his, which takes in parts of eastern Franklin and western Jefferson counties. But Frame has exceeded that and has raised an impressive $55,000 so far this election cycle with total expenditures of about $34,000 and about $17,000 cash on hand. That’s pretty good for this stage of the campaign.
I only use Frame as a point of reference because when I looked at Dave Schatz’s Missouri Ethics Commission filing for his bid for State Representative District 111, which takes in parts of Franklin, Crawford and Gasconade counties, I had to pick my jaw off the floor.
ThinkProgress continues to upstage the traditional news media with its excellent sleuthing into the foreign contributions that The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Karl Rove’s group, Crossroads GPS, has been funneling into the production of misleading attack ads against Democrats across the country. Their latest entry breaks down how it works and provides a list of foreign corporations whose dollars have wormed their way into the Chamber’s general fund, the same fund used to finance political ads, and in some cases, made direct donations to the Chamber’s 501(c)(6).
… I visited the web of the Washington Missourian, “emissourian,com” which had details of the spending in the August primary election. One sentence caught my attention as it said, “The country and region are in a recession, but it appears someone forgot to tell local politicians.”
It then showed how three high spenders in the Republican race collected $691,040.64 and spent $586,389.99 to merely clutter up your TV with ads, your mail box with stuff and signs all over the landscape.
Mr. Nieves was credited with a total receipt of $314,175.16 with $31,400 plus in the bank. The next paragraph says he will face me in the November general election.
I attended several meet the candidates hearings and none of them had answers to what needs to be done, but were all against reckless spending. Perhaps my way to campaign was the old fashion way, by leading a life of service to the community state and nation and let the people decide as my costs were under $50.00 not counting filing fee.
I love this guy. In a campaign cycle where we are seeing obscene amounts a cash being tossed around to buy off Republican candidates, Boots sticks to his core principles and refuses to take campaign contributions. He’s like a breath of fresh air in a cesspool of corporate greed and special interest spending.
