Salon.com > Money in politics

Billionaire pledges to “destroy” climate skeptics

Wed, 03 Apr 2013 19:54:00 +0000

California billionaire Tom Steyer is setting himself up as a sort of anti-Koch. The retired hedge fund manager told the Hill that he will dedicate a fortune to fighting climate change through political donations -- "he wants to make climate change a campaign issue for years to come and Democratic support for environmental protections as widespread as support for gay marriage and immigration reform," noted the Hill.

Of course, activists concerned with campaign finance reform and the undue influence of money in politics will not welcome Steyer's pledge. Others might be pleased that the Koch support for climate skeptical policy will have a match. In the parlance appropriate to an aggressive financier, the green capitalist told the Hill that he planned to "destroy" climate skeptics and sought a "smashing victory." Via the Hill:

Don’t fall for Pentagon spin

Tue, 12 Mar 2013 15:27:00 +0000

If you believe the hype, sequestration is going to deal a catastrophic blow to the politically powerful defense industry.

It's a “doomsday mechanism,” former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta declared. The Aerospace Industries Association (AIA) – the leading advocacy group for Pentagon contractors – has also warned of the allegedly dire consequences of sequestration for their industry (which receives nearly $1 billion a day from the Pentagon), expressing “extreme disappointment that sequestration was not averted.”

Congress is awful because members spend all day long talking to rich people

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 20:13:00 +0000

Members of Congress don't know anything about "the issues" and they spend all their time fundraising, according to both a new Huffington Post story and "an easy inference to make after observing Congress for almost any length of time."

The HuffPo's Ryan Grim and Sabrina Siddiqui obtained a PowerPoint presentation given to incoming Democratic freshmen legislators by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and the DCCC's recommended schedule for House members includes four hours spent on the phone begging rich people for money and one hour spent begging rich person for money in person. This is the daily schedule.

As Kevin Drum notes, this leaves no time for studying or homework. Members rarely know much about anything, policy-wise. An unnamed member confirmed to HuffPo that these guys basically are exactly as ill-informed as you feared:

Post-election, politicos cash in

Fri, 09 Nov 2012 02:00:00 +0000

There are two types of money that corrupt our politics. After a national election that cost more than $2 billion, most of us know about the blatant kind that floods into politicians' campaigns, typically with quid pro quo strings attached. This is the most obvious form of legalized bribery — cash goes in, policy positions and legislative favors eventually come out.

As powerful as that money is, though, there's also a second, equally corrosive form of payoff — the kind that awaits campaign staff and outgoing government officials if and when they enter the world of influence peddling. This more secret form of influence, which will quietly shape the post-election period, tends to generate far less outrage than ho-hum rationalizations. For this reason, you almost never hear about it — that is, until the last few weeks, when a series of coincidental revelations provided a rare look at how this dark money really works.