Deep Pockets Carry The Day

[JLB]

Money didn't just talk in Tuesday's election. It screamed.


The year's biggest spenders — and biggest winners — were the oil and tobacco industries. In almost every contest, candidates and issues with the most money trumped the side with less, even if the losers raised bags full.

[Gibby]

This is news because?

[JLB]

Why not?

[JLB]

Although final numbers won't be known until January, contributors spent a record sum on California campaigns in 2006, more than $600 million. The record was about $500 million, in 1998.

By comparison, the cost of this year's federal campaigns is expected to be $2.6 billion, the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics estimates. And Ed Bender, executive director of the Institute on Money in State Politics in Helena, Mont., predicts that once the money is calculated sometime next year, all state campaigns nationwide will have cost about $2.4 billion.

[JLB]

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/politics/cal/la-me-money9nov09,0,397013.story?coll=la-home-headlines

"California cements its position as a state that is very different from any other," Bender said Wednesday. "It has a lot of character, a lot of flair and a lot of money."

The oil industry spent $95 million to beat back Proposition 87, which would have imposed a new extraction tax of up to $485 million a year. Proponents of the measure spent $57 million, of which $50 million came from Hollywood millionaire Stephen L. Bing. The result was the nation's first $150-million ballot-measure campaign.

"The money spent is obnoxious. It is bad," said Scott Macdonald, spokesman for the No on 87 campaign. "No one says $150 million spent on a proposition is money well spent. But our people spent the money because they were under attack."

Proposition 86, which would have added a $2.60 tax to a pack of cigarettes, was the second-costliest initiative in 2006. In any other year, the $66.6 million that tobacco firms spent to defeat it would have been eye-popping.

"Pretty good investment," said Jim Knox of the American Cancer Society of California, a champion of the tobacco tax. Backers raised $14 million. "This is their biggest market, and they were going to fight with everything they had."

[Meathead]

bite my shiney metal ass

[chickie]

This is just a thought that I am going to throw out.

Why don't we hear the Liberals slamming the big corporations that are funding political parties, and not funding the American people who truly need the help?

Liberals are always the one to sit back an whine that our goverment is not doing enough to help the less fortunate Americans, but you never hear them calling out the big corporations who are willing funding them when the money can be used to help the less fortunate??

Am I making sense here? If not I apologize....like I said this is what I am thinking and I am just tossing it out here.

[micknaboz]

This is just a thought that I am going to throw out.

Why don't we hear the Liberals slamming the big corporations that are funding political parties, and not funding the American people who truly need the help?

Liberals are always the one to sit back an whine that our goverment is not doing enough to help the less fortunate Americans, but you never hear them calling out the big corporations who are willing funding them when the money can be used to help the less fortunate??

Am I making sense here? If not I apologize....like I said this is what I am thinking and I am just tossing it out here.

You should quit thinking.
IMHO, and as this post of your indicates, you're not very good at it :)

If you never hear liberals calling out the corporations, its because you're too sheltered in your little republican fantasy world.
And yeah surprise surprise the dems take money from corporations too. Its all about money, if you really want to do some good start pestering your congresspeople to truly reform the whole election process, and to reduce the
influence pedaling by the lobbyists and corporations they represent.

[sukie]

Corporations, gopchick, are not in any way required to give a shit about the less fortunate. Why should they. If the liberals cried about the lack of compassion from corporate America, that would be so far to the left they would kiss their own ass. Even liberals know that corporate america drives this country.

[chickie]

You should quit thinking.
IMHO, and as this post of your indicates, you're not very good at it :)

If you never hear liberals calling out the corporations, its because you're too sheltered in your little republican fantasy world.
And yeah surprise surprise the dems take money from corporations too. Its all about money, if you really want to do some good start pestering your congresspeople to truly reform the whole election process, and to reduce the
influence pedaling by the lobbyists and corporations they represent.

I suppose you are looking for a reaction out of me at this point.

I so love the insults from some of you guys! Does it make you feel more manly or something?

I should quit thinking?? What side of the brain did you use when making your post?

[chickie]

Corporations, gopchick, are not in any way required to give a shit about the less fortunate. Why should they. If the liberals cried about the lack of compassion from corporate America, that would be so far to the left they would kiss their own ass. Even liberals know that corporate america drives this country.

Thank You Sukie.