When preparing to travel, lay out all your clothes and all your money. Then take half the clothes and twice the money.
June 18th, 2012
John McCain calls Supreme Court ‘uniformed, arrogant, naive’ for Citizens United: Says he’s “worried” that billionaire Sheldon Adelson, who reportedly may contribute up to $100 million in support of GOP hopeful Mitt Romney, much of it from foreign sources, could have an undue influence on elections…
Former Republican presidential nominee John McCain says he’s “worried” that billionaire Sheldon Adelson, who reportedly may contribute up to $100 million in support of GOP hopeful Mitt Romney, and others could have an undue influence on elections as a result of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision.
“I’m not only worried about him, I’m worried about may others,” McCain told NBC’s David Gregory on Sunday. “I’ve always been concerned about the labor unions who take money from their union members and without their permission, contribute to causes that they may not support. So am I concerned about the incredible amount of money that’s washing around? Yeah.”
“Sheldon Adelson makes money from a foreign casino as well,” Gregory noted. “You said this week it’s tantamount to foreign money getting into the [Romney] campaign.”
“I think there will scandals as associated with the worse decision of the United States Supreme Court in the 21st century,” McCain explained. “Uninformed, arrogant, naive. I just wish one of [the justices] had run for county sheriff. That’s why we miss people like [former Chief Justice] William Rehnquist and [former Justice] Sandra Day O’Connor, who had some experience with congressional and other races.”
“Do you think Adelson himself will have undo influence on Mitt Romney?” Gregory pressed.
“Not any more than other people who give lots of money,” McCain replied. “The whole system is broken and it’s a wash. I don’t pick out Mr. Adelson and more than I pick out [AFL-CIO President Richard] Trumka.”
“So the fact is that the system is broken. I predict to you that there will be scandals and I predict to you that there will be reform again.”
In a Friday interview on PBS, McCain had said that Adelson’s contributions to Romney’s presidential ambitions amounted to “foreign money” influencing a U.S. political campaign.
I don’t agree with McCain on unions (or a lot of other subjects) but he’s spot on here.
Obama campaigned on getting money out of politics, which is really where we need to start if we care to fix anything else. That’s how corrupted our system has become.
Unfortunately, Obama hasn’t done a thing yet… but should he team up with John McCain, his former opponent, he could finally start a conversation about something the entire country agrees is fundamentally damaging to our political system. Until we get money out of politics, everything else is a band-aid until then.
March 3rd, 2012
February 17th, 2012
Youths are passed through schools that don’t teach, then forced to search for jobs that don’t exist and finally left stranded in the street to stare at the glamorous lives advertised around them.
Huey P Newton (via warriorsrise)
(via shannonloveslove)
February 16th, 2012
If money is speech, poverty is silence.
OWS (via d-roth)
(via shannonloveslove)
February 3rd, 2012
January 12th, 2012
The 20 Biggest Donors of the 2012 Election (So Far)
The 2008 presidential election was the most expensive on record, but this year’s contest promises to break that record, due in part to the new rules of political fundraising.
December 12th, 2011
Scott Gessler wants corporate money back in Colorado politics
Secretary of State Scott Gessler has proposed a wholesale rewrite of Colorado campaign-finance rules — changes Gessler says are long overdue but critics call a heavy-handed attempt to allow big money to dominate elections.
Gessler, who represented Republicans as a campaign-finance lawyer before he was elected last year, said the proposed changes are needed to make the rules clearer. He also said they reflect case law issued since most of the current rules were written nearly a decade ago, after Colorado voters approved a constitutional amendment on campaign finance.
“These rules have sort of grown up since 2002,” Gessler said.
Critics say Gessler is once again overstepping his authority, trying to alter state statutes and the Colorado Constitution through rule-making to reflect his political beliefs.
“Secretary Gessler has made no secret of his disdain for campaign-finance regulation,” said Martha Tierney, a campaign-finance attorney who has represented organizations such as the Colorado Democratic Party.
“This rewrite of the rules furthers his goal of rolling back campaign-finance laws,” Tierney added…
Among the more significant changes, the proposed rules would:
• Limit the total fine that may be charged for late or incomplete campaign-finance reports to $9,000 — or $50 a day for up to 180 days. Currently, there is no limit to the number of days that fines may accumulate. In some cases, this leads to groups or candidates racking up huge fines that Gessler’s office says many groups cannot realistically pay.
• Maintain a $5,000 contribution-and-expenditure threshold for issue-committee reporting that Gessler created through rule-making earlier this year. Last week, a Denver district judge ruled that Gessler did not have the authority to raise the threshold from the $200 set in the Colorado Constitution. Gessler is appealing that ruling, saying a recent 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision found the $200 threshold unconstitutional.
• Require political groups known as 527s to limit the amount of money they accept from any person to $500 every two years, but only if the 527 “expressly advocates” for a particular candidate. To expressly advocate, an advertisement has to use certain words to explicitly ask people to vote for or against a particular candidate. Gessler and supporters say the rule would protect free speech, while critics say it provides a way for 527s to influence elections by collecting unlimited donations.
This is so blatantly transparent that I’m astounded it’s working.
October 5th, 2011
Follow the Money: Behind Europe’s Debt Crisis Lurks Another Giant Bailout of Wall Street
If Greece goes down, investors start fleeing Ireland, Spain, Italy, and Portugal as well. All of this sends big French and German banks reeling. If one of these banks collapses, or show signs of major strain, Wall Street is in big trouble. Possibly even bigger trouble than it was in after Lehman Brothers went down.
That’s why shares of the biggest U.S. banks have been falling for the past month. Morgan Stanley closed Monday at its lowest since December 2008 – and the cost of insuring Morgan’s debt has jumped to levels not seen since November 2008.
It’s rumored that Morgan could lose as much as $30 billion if some French and German banks fail. […] $30 billion is roughly $2 billion more than the assets Morgan owns (in terms of current market capitalization.)
But Morgan says its exposure to French banks is zero. Why the discrepancy? Morgan has probably taken out insurance against its loans to European banks, as well as collateral from them. So Morgan feels as if it’s not exposed. But does anyone remember something spelled AIG? That was the giant insurance firm that went bust when Wall Street began going under. Wall Street thought it had insured its bets with AIG. Turned out, AIG couldn’t pay up.
Haven’t we been here before?
Republicans and Wall Street executives who continue to yell about Dodd-Frank overkill are dead wrong. The fact no one seems to know Morgan’s exposure to European banks or derivatives – or that of most other giant Wall Street banks – shows Dodd-Frank didn’t go nearly far enough.
Regulators still don’t know what’s happening on the Street. They have no clear picture of the derivatives exposure of giant U.S. financial institutions. […]
One of the many ironies here is some badly-indebted European nations (Ireland is the best example) went deeply into debt in the first place bailing out their banks from the crisis that began on Wall Street.
Full circle.
In other words, Greece isn’t the real problem. Nor is Ireland, Italy, Portugal, or Spain. The real problem is the financial system — centered on Wall Street. And we still haven’t solved it.
It’s always the money…
(via kateoplis)
August 3rd, 2011
EPA Report: Fracking Contaminated Drinking Water
Contrary to the drilling industry claim that hydraulic fracturing has never contaminated groundwater, the Environmental Protection Agency concluded in a 1987 study that “fracking” of a natural gas well in West Virginia contaminated an underground drinking water source. That all-but-forgotten report to Congress, uncovered by Environmental Working Group and Earthjustice, found that fracturing gel from a shale gas well more than 4,000 feet deep had contaminated well water.
June 1st, 2011
Who has a $62 million investment in a chain of walk-in clinics that perform drug tests in Florida?
Rick Scott’s wife does! How did that happen? Oh, Rick Scott transferred ownership of all of that to her before he got to be governor. Convenient, huh? You know, wouldn’t want to have a conflict of interest or anything while you’re trying to suck 50 bucks a pop out of poor people seeking benefits. Nothing conflicty or odd about that, right?
And hey, if there does seem to be something fishy about it, just plead the fifth a record number of times. It’s cool, Florida likes it’s politicians crooked.
Always follow the money…
How is this legal? Conflict of interest, anyone?
The Florida courts have already ruled that this is completely legal.
Florida sucks. I’m sorry if you live there and you enjoy it, but seriously first they cost us the 2000 election and now they allow politicians to push for legislation that directly adds to their immediate family’s income? GTFO.
It’s always about the money. always.
