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themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 2750
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, March 31, 2006 - 12:28 pm: | 
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http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/03/31/politics/main1459542.shtml |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5472
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Friday, March 31, 2006 - 12:54 pm: |
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Lots of that stuff out there. Let the guilty swing. All of them.
6 AIDES TO CONGRESSMAN SUBPOENAED IN BRIBERY CASE A federal court has subpoenaed six aides to Representative William J. Jefferson, Democrat of Louisiana, in connection with a bribery case. The aides notified Speaker J. Dennis Hastert that they had been served with grand jury subpoenas from the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, in Alexandria. A former aide to Mr. Jefferson, Brett Pfeffer, has pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting bribery of an official and conspiracy and is awaiting sentencing. Mr. Jefferson, above, who is not charged, said he had never demanded or accepted anything to perform a service for which he was elected. (AP)
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/31/us/31brfs.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all&oref=slogin |
Hoops
Citizen
Username: Hoops
Post Number: 1028
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Friday, March 31, 2006 - 1:10 pm: |
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cjc, I fully agree with you.
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cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5473
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Friday, March 31, 2006 - 1:55 pm: |
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Wow. Foj agreed with me yesterday. Gotta run out and play the lottery. |
themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 2751
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, March 31, 2006 - 2:53 pm: |
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Jefferson, Jefferson, Jefferson. Ever heard about Jefferson?
I think you got a beeeeg problem coming your way, GOP.
Do you understand the way things worked:
http://www.thinkprogress.org/2006/01/13/k-street-project/ |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5477
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, April 1, 2006 - 3:38 pm: |
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To insist that the people working your offices from K Street are Republicans instead of the virtuous (ahem) Democrats when you finally assume power makes absolute sense in the system as we have it. Dem lobbyists working for various interests and trying to influence legislation in Republican offices who then turn around and shaft the very Republicans being lobbied by funding Democrats? You'd have to be an idiot to let that continue
Is the natural order that K Street only be in the hands of Dems and funding Dems? I know the press and Washington thinks so, but I say no. 'Bout time it changed.
This is altogether a different issue from the illegality and corruption that we've seen happening on both sides of the aisle. And it's this shared percentage of corruption that makes the "Culture of Corruption" charge by Democrats in order to take back the House feeble. That is probably why Democrats have dropped it lately. Harry Reid won't give up his 67K of Indian money that went to lobby against certain non-contributing tribes and for certain contributing tribes in states outside of NV. |
Bob K
Supporter
Username: Bobk
Post Number: 11122
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, April 1, 2006 - 7:06 pm: |
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Since Bush's election in 2000 and the "For Sale" sign went up in Washington, the number of lobbyists has more than doubled. I will go way out on a limb and assume 98% of them are associated with the GOP. Hell, even John Ashcroft is getting in on the deal. Bob Dole is flacking for the UAE as well as Viagra. |
Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1074
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Saturday, April 1, 2006 - 8:54 pm: |
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BobK, there are no DEM lobbyists on K street. Most are ex-Legislative aides from Repub reps & Senators. |
Eponymous
Citizen
Username: Eponymous
Post Number: 161
Registered: 6-2004
| | Posted on Saturday, April 1, 2006 - 11:51 pm: |
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The K-Street Project, anyone? |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5478
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 9:59 am: |
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"There are no Democratic lobbyists on K Street......" Are you saying that within the last year or so, everyone one of them has been fired, Foj? I think not.
http://www.hillnews.com/news/062304/lobbyists.aspx
"Democratic lobbyists are giving House Republican aides and lawmakers closely held information about the voting intentions of congressional Democrats in exchange for access to private meetings with GOP officials on Capitol Hill." |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4667
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 10:03 am: |
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Quote:To insist that the people working your offices from K Street are Republicans instead of the virtuous (ahem) Democrats when you finally assume power makes absolute sense in the system as we have it.
But that would be for the individual lobbying organizations or industries themselves to decide. The problem with the K Street Project was that DeLay was forcing this choice on them, and then using it to extract large amounts of cash. The fact that he had to force it indicates that maybe it's not such a good choice after all.
Bills contain many provisions that aren't especially ideologically driven and the lobbying process is all about getting the ones you want in, and the ones you don't want out or modified. If you've got a specific regional or technical issue, it would in fact make no sense at all to rely strictly on Republican votes to get what you want.
Some narrow provision in the next banking law may only be comprehensible to a few Senators and their staffers. Some of them are going to be Democrats. Or your particular issue may be something that runs against the Republican grain. You can probably get your state's Republican delegation on board, but you need to work with both sides or else you're never going to get it through committee. There are a lot of issues that don't break down along party lines.
DeLays demand that lobbying organizations follow his orders is not in their best interest at all, but only in the best interests of DeLay and the Republican party. Hijacking these organizations works against the interests of the stockholders and other private citizens whom the lobbyists are supposed to be representing. |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5480
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 10:35 am: |
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DeLay wasn't dictating how they had to lobby on any legislation. He said if they're going to lobby Republicans and then donate to defeat them that those days were over now that they're in power.
It seems like practise was perfectly acceptable before this project when Congress was run by Democrats and K Street reflected that in terms of it's hires and where it directed it's money. It's the equivalent of now that Republicans are in power people are horrified there's (suddenly!) gambling in the casino. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4668
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 11:24 am: |
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Nobody was strongarming lobbying groups, dictating hires, and threatening to deny access when the democrats were in power.
And it works the same way for donations as for hires. To get access you have to donate. Much of the face-to-face time lobbyists get with Congresspeople is at fundraising events. If you go to a fundraiser you're expected to be making a contribution in exchange for your opportunity to get a word in.
By the same principles outlined in my previous posts, you need access to both sides, because your particular issue is likely to cut across partisan lines. By demanding that lobbyists contribute to only one side, Delay interferes with their private business and makes them less effective in servicing their clients. |
Southerner
Citizen
Username: Southerner
Post Number: 873
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 11:34 am: |
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Okay tom, we get it, Republicans are evil. Let's see your side do something about it.
I'm still waiting for Plamegate to explode and for Abramoff to lead to 2/3's of Congress resigning. The dire predictions of 2005 have all fizzled out. This is quite a boring political time. When will the real mid-term election begin? Or are the Dems to scared to do anything these days? At least Feingold had a week of coverage. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4669
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 11:41 am: |
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The only word that bears any relevance in your post is "boring." Go play outside with the other kids. |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5481
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 8:44 pm: |
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tom -- Well, Democrats really didn't have to dictate hires when they ran Congress for 40 years and it just happened to be that most lobbyists, the press and the DC social circuit were run by Democrats then, did they? And it was sheer coincidence that most of the money went to Democrats then too, not that Democrats would have altered their support of some legislation if they knew that the firm lobbying them was planning to fund a 3 month hit piece targeting their reelection. Yeah right. "Senator Reid, a former congressman Rogan was wondering if he could stop by."
Republicans in essence said to a lobbying firm that represented XYZ Manufacturing "Hey, we'll listen to what you have to say. Just don't send someone who is trying to defeat us politically to do your talking. Keep that guy in the shop. Send us someone who's on our side. And if you are sending a Democrat, we want some information on how they're voting on this very bill you're trying to get us to push to see if we'd be alone on it, if Democrats would obstruct it, etc etc."
This is not to say that lobbyists didn't steer money ONLY to Republicans, nor that there weren't democrats on K Street. Harry Reid obviously got his share of cash from Indians, didn't he?
I can't believe you're upset Republicans got the trappings of power that used to belong to Democrats. What I think might surprise the general public is that the party for the common man used to be rolling in the majority of cash that came from Big Business. Like the Big Pharma Skybox and receptions by Altria at the Democrat National Convention weren't a tip-off. Democrats will resume the lion's share of the haul if they take back Congress. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4670
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 10:07 pm: |
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You seem to be saying that there is no such thing as the K Street Project. Naturally, the party in power gets the lion's share of donations; and naturally that party is more represented among the lobbyist ranks. But that's not what has been happening.
Your other two mistakes are one, assuming that all issues important to lobbyists divide strictly along party lines. With an extremely narrow margin in the House you cannot assume that some arcane clause deep inside a trade bill that you want is necessarily going to break Democrat/Republican. It's easy to think of regional issues, for one, that break differently. The 2nd Ave. Subway. Homeland Security funding. NOLA reconstruction.
The second is that lobbying organizations don't know what's good for them and have to be told what to do. Everybody knows you lobby the party in power hardest. If you don't, you don't get results. What DeLay et al were doing was far beyond that. As opposed to a free choice that public companies and interest groups make on their own, they are being dictated to by the government in whom to hire. And this is being done not to further the interests of the people paying the lobbyists' salaries, but to steer more cash into Republican campaign funds and to employ more partisan loyalists regardless of their interest in whatever it is they're really supposed to be lobbying for. As Washington Weekly states,
Quote:The corporate lobbyists who once ran the show, loyal only to the parochial interests of their employer, are being replaced by party activists who are loyal first and foremost to the GOP. Through them, Republican leaders can now marshal armies of lobbyists, lawyers, and public relations experts--not to mention enormous amounts of money--to meet the party's goals.
And therein lies the problem: You, the stockholder, think you're funding a lobbying arm in Washington to further the goals of XYZ corporation, but that is not what's happening at all.
Quote: One seminal moment, never before reported, occurred in 1996 when Haley Barbour, who was chairman of the Republican National Committee, organized a meeting of the House leadership and business executives. "They assembled several large company CEOs and made it clear to them that they were expected to purge their Washington offices of Democrats and replace them with Republicans," says a veteran steel lobbyist. The Republicans also demanded more campaign money and help for the upcoming election. The meeting descended into a shouting match, and the CEOs, most of them Republicans, stormed out.
Emphasis added. Let's be clear here: lobbying firms, whatever you think of them, ought to make their own personnel decisions. I defy you to identify anything resembling what is common knowledge about the strongarm tactics of the K Street Project while the Democrats controlled congress.
The K Street Project's own Web site shares this anecdote about its founding:
Quote:What is the K Street Project?
The K Street Project began in the late 1980s in response to an advertisement in Roll Call newspaper placed by a fortune 500 company, looking to hire someone to represent the company in Washington. The firm's major concerns were promoting free trade, reducing the abuse of tort law, and lowering taxes. The advertisement said that the firm was looking for a Democrat. Only a Democrat.
Well with the Democrats controlling Congress that is unsurprising. Notice, though, who is making the decision here. The company. They pay the salary, they know their business, and that was their choice. The difference now is, that choice is being dictated by the government. Whatever happened to freedom of association?
Let me also point out the delicious irony of Tom "I AM the government" DeLay, who feels any government regulation at all is equivalent to theft, feels free to hijack the manpower and resources of these corporations to serve himself. You can talk about Harry Reid until you're blue in the face, but the fact that he received contributions is only a crime to the most blindly partisan among us, those who, like DeLay, feel entitled to all the money andall the jobs, and if a Democrat gets something that's just plain wrong. You're the same people who got all in a twist because Clinton and Gore spent time fundraising, but are pleased when Bush attends a fundraiser when he instead should be riding herd on his incompetent minions on hurricane relief.
If you like one party rule there are still countries where you can get it. The American system cannot work that way. |
Southerner
Citizen
Username: Southerner
Post Number: 874
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 10:23 pm: |
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Sounds to me tom is having some growing pains being in the minority. Or is it that you are upset that the Republicans are much better controlling lobbyists than the Dems. Either way, I love to read this type of hand wringing. Don't worry tom, eventually, you will grow into your new found role. Why don't you email Pelosi and have the Dems run on the K Street Project theme. That would be a winner to take back Congress. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4672
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 10:39 pm: |
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You're presuming that it's the job of the majority party to control lobbyists. Why would that be the case? Lobbyists should be controlled by the people paying their salary. Or are you now in favor of the government controlling public and private companies?
Let me put it in local terms. You run a Maplewood business, and Vic DeLuca and Dave Heumer tell you that you must fire a person that works for you, and hire a Democrat of their choosing and pay his or her salary, or else you can't talk to the township government. Zoning issues, street cleaning, whatever, they don't want to hear from you.
Are you happy with this arrangement? If the answer is a straight "yes, period" then you win the argument. If the answer is anything else, including something that starts with "yes but..." you lose. |
Southerner
Citizen
Username: Southerner
Post Number: 875
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 10:54 pm: |
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It isn't an argument to win or lose. If you want to fight that battle then good luck. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4673
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, April 2, 2006 - 11:04 pm: |
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Thanks for playing. |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5482
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 3, 2006 - 11:24 am: |
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tom -- who was dictating that choice in the 80s that prompted the K Street Project???? Democrats were, not lobbyists.
Businesses can still employ lobbyists of their choosing. Republicans are only saying if you're going to lobby us, you won't have the same access without a Republican lobbyist. It's perfectly justifiable in my view. When Democrats used to lobby Republicans, do you think they gave inside information to their Democratic friends on what Republicans were doing and the strategy they were developing? Besides donating heavily to the opponents of the Republicans they were lobbying? Sorry -- those days are over, until Democrats get back in power and you can bet your bottom dollar that Democrats will demand the same fealty that Republicans have required now.
I assume no such thing that issues being lobbied on break Republican or Democrat. Could go either way, and could be lobbied effectively with a Repub or a Dem. I'm saying that Republicans are demanding that those lobbying them adhere to the new rules of K Street regardless of the position of the corporation. Nor do I say that lobbying organizations have to be told what's good for them. Lobby any way you'd like on an issue, but the guy coming into the office has to be a republican or at least not hostile to Republicans if they're Democrats. It's your choice. Just as Democrats gave you that "choice" in the 80s.
And if DeLuca required that I get a Democrat lobbyist, I would recognize it as the rules of the road until the politics changed.
Lobbyists still do control who they hire. That doesn't mean it won't effect the outcome of their efforts. Lobbyists can say "you MUST listen to my man when he comes by"? The legislator can say "Why? He's trying to run me out of office by contributing to my opponent, the company he's representing is doing the same thing, and I'm supposed to take a position benefiting his client? No way." |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4674
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Monday, April 3, 2006 - 3:52 pm: |
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You're mixing apples and oranges. It's not Democrats or lobbyists calling the shots. The lobbyists are hirees, at the service of some larger interest, not hirers. They were never calling the shots at all.
It's Republicans vs. corporations. In the '80s there was no diktat to hire one or the other. Today there is. All you have to do is compare the proportion of contributions going to Dems vs. Repubs in the '80s -- roughly 50/50 -- to what it is now -- nowhere close -- to see it's not simply a matter of the swinging pendulum of political power, it's something wholly new.
And I'm incredulous, to put it politely, that you'd stomach a government official demanding you hire a certain type of person. You who throw a hissy fit over a few bucks deducted for Social Security are all of aa sudden ready to put an entire person on the payroll? Please.
And don't forget that lobbyists are not a self-contained interest group of their own. They represent public interests, corporations, states, metropolitan areas, hobbyists, gun collectors and just about anything else you can think of. The legislator might well say, your union represents a very large block of votes in my district but Tom DeLay says you've got to hire a Republican to represent you. Is a Republican Representative from the Silk Stocking District going to refuse to talk to a lobbyist from New York City because he or she is a Democrat? Only if DeLay is twisting their arm.
By the way, all of this is only going to prolong the partisan logjam in Congress. If you guys want any of your pet projects to go anywhere, and have no immediate plans for establishing a dictatorship, the time may come when you have to play nicely, or at least legally.
The Constitution guarantees the right to "petition the government for redress of grievances." It doesn't say anything about paying an admission fee. Tom DeLay is standing at the turnstile. |
kendalbill
Citizen
Username: Kendalbill
Post Number: 171
Registered: 6-2002
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 9:35 am: |
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I have a different view of lobbyists, cjc. Yes, there is a republican and democratic dynamic at play in DC, but it is subordinate to trying to keep a power structure afloat. Outside of the "true believers" of which there are few, most workers of any type just want to keep a job. Their highest purpose is keeping the flow of money going and keeping the status quo for their interests. In seven years of living in the DC area, I never met an idealist, much less an real ideologue. There were just a whole bunch of careerists. And I wish, tom, that applied only to corporate lobbyists but I saw that detatchment in public interest groups as well.
Thats why the K Street project was so insidious. It created a dynamic where lobbyists had to sell their souls (declare Republican) to do business, even if they were originally democrats. And since their souls had no value, it was easy for them to give it away.
In the end, the K Street project was no worse than the "industry" they were trying to influence. And it was far from the worst thing Delay came up with. As if we need something else to make us cynical about the whole mess. |
ae35unit
Citizen
Username: Ae35unit
Post Number: 33
Registered: 2-2006
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 9:45 am: |
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Cjc-Harry Reid obviously got his share of cash from Indians, didn't he?
Did he?
That's a nice Republican throw away line, and the difference in the money he received from Indian tribes and any things he may have done for those tribes is an obfuscation. You love your party, ahead of the country. Your ideals come before human life. Idiots talk about William Jefferson and McKinney, but it's about Cunningham, election theft, Ohio coin scandal, lies that sent us to Iraq, 9/11 cover-ups, Delay, the K Street Project under Abramoff, Enron led energy scams to have a special election in California, Katrina failures, cuts for veterans dying for lies of those who would not go, or send their children to war, energy policies that could have changed to benefit the people long ago, paid off media, propaganda, and I can go on and on and it's almost all Republican all the time. You're not an American or even a Republican, you just lay with your goats under your bridge. Wake up! Side with the founders and America.
Bbbububut………Clinton did it. The Democrat's did it forty years ago. Government doesn't work…because Roosevelt… Grow up.
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cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5485
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 11:04 am: |
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 yeah thanks, Unit. Is that you is your kid posting in your name?
tom -- you seem to think that lobby firms now have to hire strictly republican employees. NO. Just republicans that will by lobbying republicans. Democrats can continue their cozy relationship with Democrat lobbyists just fine.
Think of it as affirmative action for Republicans. It's easy to stomach -- just think of the Black Congressional Caucus not allowing a black republican in their midst. It's about politics, in all it's ugly glory.
And ask yourself -- why wasn't there a diktat to hire Democrats when they ran Congress in the 80s. Because they mostly were Democrats? Donating to Democrats and the odd republican who held sway in a minority capacity? You don't have to demand something you already have. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4679
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 11:28 am: |
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Quote:You don't have to demand something you already have.
c'mon, then why was something like the "K Street Project" necessary? What were they trying to accomplish that wasn't accomplished already? Big Hint: A lot of people around DeLay are under indictment.
You're being way too coy about this. |
ae35unit
Citizen
Username: Ae35unit
Post Number: 34
Registered: 2-2006
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 11:35 am: |
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Cjc- was that your response or one of the goats?
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cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5487
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 11:52 am: |
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tom -- demanding republicans as lobbyists isn't a crime, is it? Do the indictments say so? Graft and bribery are crimes, I'll give you that.
The K-Street Project had to be used to change things over from the way things operated (and benefited) Democrats. Without the project, Democrats would still have been lobbying republicans and then try to screw them come reelection time. Democrats never had to deal with that type of situation, and they'd be idiots to have allowed it.
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themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 2758
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 12:02 pm: |
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"The dire predictions of 2005 have all fizzled out."
Delay = gone goose. Not that one.
Have the rosey war predictions from the GOP done much better?
How many months before Delay is a registered lobbyist? Then he can cash in on a lot of favors. He is moving to Arlington.
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themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 2759
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 12:05 pm: |
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"The K-Street Project had to be used to change things over from the way things operated (and benefited) Democrats. Without the project, Democrats would still have been lobbying republicans and then try to screw them come reelection time. Democrats never had to deal with that type of situation, and they'd be idiots to have allowed it. "
For a smart guy, you really will go out on a limb. The democrats never had that type of control over lobbyists. The project was part of a new idea of one party government working in absolute unity with business. It was dangerous to our system. |
Southerner
Citizen
Username: Southerner
Post Number: 876
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 12:41 pm: |
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themp,
It really won't matter unless the Dems win that seat. Otherwise, we lose one Repub and gain another. I'm not happy with all the Delay stuff, but as long as we maintain Congress then it is all water under the bridge. It's all about November and the Dems still have a long way to go. |
Joe
Citizen
Username: Gonets
Post Number: 1201
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 1:04 pm: |
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Gee Southerner, I seem to recall you repeatedly telling us, “DeLay isn’t going anwhere.”
Since you’re so great at prognosticating why don’t you tell us the likelihood that the Republican’s will keep DeLay’s seat.
Of course if a repub takes the seat DeLay’s departure is meaningless. He’s just your garden variety congressmen. Just another voice in the crowd.
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tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4680
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 1:14 pm: |
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one very inconvenient point for DeLay fans: the vast majority of lobbying money does go and always has gone to incumbents. Someone lobbying a Republican might be giving money to a Dem in another district, but it would be highly unlikely they'd be giving money to someone running against him. Lobbyists are after votes, and incumbents are the ones that have them.
Any corporate lobbyist talking to someone on the banking committee is going to be giving money to that member, not to some no-name who might be running against him. |
Hoops
Citizen
Username: Hoops
Post Number: 1044
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 1:18 pm: |
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by resigning now Delay is able to use his campaign funds towards his legal defense. He knows he will need that cash and that is the only reason he took the dive at this point.
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cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5488
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 1:25 pm: |
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Money just doesn't go to incumbants. It goes to power. If an incumbant isn't in the majority then their ability to help you is limited.
You don't have to go against a republican by donating to his opponent directly. There are others ways to defeat him -- give to Moveon.org, or to a PAC of another Senator who then gives money to the incumbant republican's challenger, or generally donate to the DNC to take away the power of the majority from Republicans and that incumbant. |
themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 2761
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 2:14 pm: |
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"You don't have to go against a republican by donating to his opponent directly. There are others ways to defeat him --"
Stake through heart, decapitation, and loud hip hop are the only safe methods. |
Alleygater
Citizen
Username: Alleygater
Post Number: 1553
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 3:00 pm: |
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If only it was that easy themp. Haven't you heard, they regenerate like the undead that they are. Also, with their lack of sex education they tend to breed like cockaroaches. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 4681
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 6:22 pm: |
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Some statistical pages from FEC. on the 2002 races: top 50 senate campaigns listed by contributions from PACs. Notice that only three of the top 25 are challengers.
top 50 house campaigns listed in order of PAC contributions. Notice that not a single one is a challenger.
Money goes to incumbents. Party power definitely helps in some instances: here you can see how money for open seats flowed disproportionately to Republicans. But since most incumbents get re-elected these days, you try to get in good with the guy who's got the vote today. Idology drives the front-page-news votes, but it doesn't so much when you're trying to get a certain provision that helps your local utility/steel plant/construction project/bank, in or out, of larger legislation.
That is, unless some partisan is blackmailing you (and by extension your industry, state or city).
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Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1084
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 10:07 pm: |
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TOM scores from 3 point range, swish. And he is fouled, and will go to the line.
Nice one -- TOM. |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5494
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 11:21 pm: |
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Sure PAC money goes to incumbants. I allowed as much in my post of 1:25PM. You can give to, say, Harry Reid's PAC and say "but Congressman Thune, I'm not giving money to Senator Johnson. I gave it to Reid's PAC -- the Searchlight Leadership PAC that donates 99% of it's money to Democratic candidates. I'm sure none of that went to Johnson. And I'm sure other PACs didn't give more to Johnson because we took their place in funding other candidates. There's absolutely no coordination or communication on these things. It's a farm issue, and...well....you know....."
And yes money flowed 'disproportionately' from some likely lobbyists to Republicans in the 2002 cycle. The K-Street Project was up and running.
Republicans were insisting upon the spoils that come to the majority. It's upsetting to some that they didn't ask for them and take a polite 'no' in some cases, but that's not how the game is played. Democrats will echo Republicans should they retake the majority as it wasn't really an issue for them pre-1994. |
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