Money Talks

In 1972 five men were arrested at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, DC, while attempting to break in to the headquarters of the Democratic national committee. As the story unfolded the country would discover that Nixon was using both the CIA, and especially the FBI to spy on domestic opponents of his policies. Nixon’s Committee to Re-elect the President (CRP, or Creep in the vernacular of the day) used ex-CIA to do the break in.

G. Gordon Liddy, an ex-CIA wingnut, and later a right wing talk show host was found to have masterminded much of the shenanigans. But it was also determined that White house aides including Chuck Colson, Edward Haldeman (Chief of Staff at the time) and John Ehrlichman were all aware of the details of the plot and all were eventually convicted for trying to cover up the plot, as was John Mitchell the Attorney General of the United States, who also had a moonlighting job at the time as Chairman of Creep.

In addition to the break ins and surveillance the committee was found to have engaged in dirty tricks designed to shape or tarnish the Democratic Party opposition. In one particularly egregious circumstance it was said that a letter had been faked and then leaked by Creep.  The Canuck letter, as it was known was a silly forged document that suggested Edmund Muskie a candidate for President at the time, didn’t particularly like people with French accents. That letter put then candidate Muskie in a particularly bad light. The candidate handled the whole letter deal pretty poorly, crying in the snow and all, and soon dropped from the race. There was much conjecture at the time that Creep was molding the election to get the candidate they wanted. That was never directly proven, but there was broad consensus that Creep was manipulating the entire process.

It came to light at the time that no less than AG John Mitchel maintained a slush fund in a safe in his office and that the funds contained therein  were provided by among others a fugitive financier named Robert Vesco—then living in Cuba-- trying to curry favor with the administration. Vesco had put at least $200,000 into the fund. Mitchell was found guilty of conspiracy, obstruction of justice, and perjury and sentenced to two and a half to eight years in prison. The sentence was later reduced to one to four years by Judge John J. Sirica. Mitchell served only 19 months of his sentence.

The slush fund itself was…Wait for it… $500,000.

How quaint.

Immediately following the Watergate convictions, Nixon’s resignation and so forth, strict campaign finance laws were passed. Later in 2002 recognizing that the reforms put in place after Watergate had been far outpaced by the lawyers for both parties and that money was pouring into the system, Congress passed McCain Feingold.

Yet the 2008 election for president and Congress cost more than $5.0 Billion (with a “B”) according to the Center for Responsive Politics. The presidential election alone cost more than $2.0 billion with the candidates themselves raising about $400 million each, and $1.0 billion-plus additionally being poured in by business, labor and other special interest PAC’s.

Obama’s top twenty contributors or bundlers raised $14 million alone of his almost $400 Billion haul. Of this top level bundled contributions about 30% came from Wall Street , Banks and Finance firms, 26%  from institutes of higher learning, 16% from tech companies, 12% from lawyers, and  9% from media companies. GE which as someone pointed out paid no taxes this year contributed $500,000 alone.

While it should be pointed out that the money came from employees of the firm or their vendors. There are limits to what the companies can directly contribute to candidates, but those limits were largely eviscerated by the Jan-2010 Supreme Court decision which qualified “money” as speech and so eliminated most restrictions on corporate contributions to campaigns through PAC’s. This court of apparently activist judges from the right overturned elements of the McCain Feingold bill passed by Congress. As we know activist judges are only activist when they overturn your preferred legislation.

McCain, not to be outdone, also rose close to $400 million. Though the overall funds total were similar, Obama’s actually raised more direct contributions than McCain. His top twenty bundlers still raised close to $4.0 million with almost three quarters coming from finance firms including Citibank, Goldman and so forth which funded both candidates.

There are NO labor unions on either candidate’s list of top top contributors. Though we can be sure that democrats especially draw substantial support from unions, we also know that it is no longer their biggest source of funds. Corporations especially those in certain industries far outspend labor.

This is before PAC money is counted. The Supreme Court did maintain the requirement that the corporations had to publish their contributions and how they raised the cash so the info is easily available on the net. Citibank’s PAC raised and spent an additional million dollars, making their total contributions for the cycle close to $2 million dollars. Goldman Sachs, a major proponent of privatizing social security contributed in hard (direct to candidate) and soft (PAC’s) money almost $6 million in the cycle, supporting both candidates and both parties with their contributions. According to Open Secrets the three headed monster of Finance, Real Estate, and Insurance has already committed nearly $100 million this year to candidates and PAC’s with more to come in an election cycle which has barely started and is still more than a year away.

Pharmaceuticals contributed $32 million in 2008 and an astoundingly similar amount in the non-presidential year 2010 of over $30 million. The health care lobby is also quite active on the lobbying side spending over $200 million in lobbying in 2008, 2009, and 2010. That is $600 million in lobbying in three years.

The critics of OWS and apologists for Wall Street know these truths, but they toss Molotov cocktails of smoke and illusion designed to distract or wear down a public that is massively confused by the theatre they have been witnessing. Obama is all over Wall Street and slyly taking up the OWS cause, hoping that no one looks peeks behind the curtain and sees the piles of cash on which he rests.

Romney, a former scion, a founding partner even, of Bain capital an investment fund which puts money into underperforming companies, spruces them up and resells them to the street for a profit now says he understands the OWS protesters, whatever that means. This firm invested in some great, or near great retail giants in the US including Staples, Michael’s crafts, and others, so it cannot be argued that the funds entire growth has rested on the heels of layoffs and deteriorating worker conditions. In the odd way they make the case for why capitalism can be a good thing in America with well-directed and well researched investment capital enhancing companies with great ideas to thrive and grow. But to suggest that Bain is anything other than another Wall Street Player is absurd. The current value of the Bain fund is $66 Billion. Bain through its partners and employees by the way has contributed over $4.0 million since 1989.

Nixon, Creep, and that old gang of black bag men were amateurs. The system is completely corrupted by this wash of cash that soils everything it touches. Perhaps the OWS crowd can’t articulate their rage well, but they know a rat when they see one and as with millions of other American’s there is such a general sense that power lies in someone else’s hands, just out of our line of sight or field of reach. It is the corruption of this money which led the SEC and the Fed to look the other way, which allowed all these firms to engage in a riotous Ponzi scheme investing in sub-prime loans and then bundling them as hi-grade derivative investments, insured by AIG, and sold to Fannie and Freddie. The market, deregulated by Clinton, and heated up by low interest rates put in place right after 9-11 ran amok and everyone was making so much money no one wanted to look at the rot and corruption behind the curtain. Capitalism itself, always morally weak when left on its own, was corrupted by an overabundance of cheap money and lack of regulatory zeal.

The reason that nothing gets done in Washington is that there is always a financial interest on the other side that doesn’t want it to get done. This is not republicans and democrats, tea party and OWS. America built this. We created this system where hard right and hard left squabble while millions in the middle struggle. We fight, we bicker, we lose track, and while we weren’t watching someone stole our house, actually came in during the dark of night and took it away.