Election results raise questions about impact of Citizens United

[ElNono]

http://newsandinsight.thomsonreuters.com/Legal/News/2012/11_-_November/Election_results_raise_questions_about_impact_of_C itizens_United/

[Winehole23]

Karl Rove burned up what, $300 million or so? and lost.

Will men in black suits be showing up at his door?

[Winehole23]

gfy, boutons. the people aren't such dummies as you think. money alone can't tell them what to think or how to vote.

[boutons_deux]

It was encouraging, and surprising, that C-U $Bs failed to buy the WH and Senate for the Repugs, but one thing the VRWC doesn't do, and that's quit. Repugs ran some horrible candidates, Bishop Gecko and the rape-baby Senator wannabes. But it was just as surprising how many $Bs Barry, etc raised to counter the C-U $Bs. An estimate is the election bill was $6B overall.

Is anybody saying the C-U $Bs had no effect on any Senate/House race, esp out-of-state money?

The 1% still owns and operates govt for fun and profit.

[scott]

Karl Rove burned up what, $300 million or so? and lost.

Will men in black suits be showing up at his door?

$400 million. And lost EVERY SINGLE election where he ran ads.

Ouch.

[ChumpDumper]

Megyn Kelly: Karl, Michael Barone is not well. We better call an ambulance.

Karl Rove: Fuck him! Now, you listen to me! I want voting reopened right now. Get those voters back in here! Turn those machines back on! Turn those machines back on!

[boutons_deux]

here's a surprise:

How Race Slipped Away From Romney

Mitt Romney is one of the wealthiest men ever to run for president. And yet the lack of money earlier this year stalled his campaign, and he never really recovered.


The GOP nominee emerged late last spring from a long and bruising Republican primary season more damaged than commonly realized. His image with voters had eroded as he endured heavy attacks from Republicans over his business record. He also felt compelled to take a hard line on immigration—one that was the subject of debate among his advisers—that hurt his standing with Hispanic voters.


More than that, Mr. Romney had spent ... paywall
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324073504578105340729306074.html

[Winehole23]

here's a surprise. well, for boutons, anyway:


After a year Democrats mostly spent fretting, freaking out, and fulminating against Citizens United--the 2010 Supreme Court decision that unleashed this year's flood (http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/10/the/309086/) of unfettered political spending--it was a bit unexpected to hear Michael Podhorzer, the political director of the AFL-CIO, say on Friday, "Super PACs are so awesome. It was long overdue that the Supreme Court recognized that corporations are people like everybody else."


Podhorzer, who spoke on a panel at the RootsCamp (http://rootscamp.neworganizing.com/) left-wing organizing conference, was being sarcastic--sort of. Progressives still really hate Citizens United. But in one of the most ironic turns of the 2012 election, groups on the left were some of the most skilled exploiters of the 2010 court decision.


Take Podhorzer, who got a new title this year: executive director of Workers' Voice, the super PAC the AFL-CIO started in April. Prior to Citizens United, under a 1947 law, unions were only allowed to communicate politically with their own members; they couldn't campaign to the general public. When the Supreme Court was hearing Citizens United, the AFL-CIO actually filed an amicus brief aimed at this provision--and got its wish.


The result, Podhorzer said, was like "taking off the handcuffs." The AFL-CIO and other unions conducted door-knocking, phone-banking and advertising campaigns this year aimed at the general public (http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/11/are-unions-obamas-secret-weapon-in-ohio/264516/) in elections they hoped to influence, and made a big difference.


It was a similar story for Credo, a for-profit phone company that supports progressive causes. As a corporation, it was subject to pre-Citizens United campaign-finance restrictions that prevented it from spending money on campaigns. But this election cycle, the company formed a super PAC and targeted 10 vulnerable Republican congressional incumbents with an intensive, volunteer-based campaign of field organizing in their districts. Five of them, including firebrand Florida Rep. Allen West (http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/11/the-case-for-liberal-compassion-toward-allen-west/265454/), were defeated.


"Allen West raised $17 million, spent $13 million and lost by a couple thousand votes," Becky Bond, political director of Credo Mobile and president of the Credo Super PAC, boasted. "With just a few hundred thousand [dollars], we made the difference."
At first, Bond said, the group worried that its members would recoil from the embrace of Citizens United that the super PAC represented. But they found exactly the opposite. "We got very little blowback at all," she said. "People were very excited that this was our super PAC. People thought the super PAC was super."


Both Workers' Voice and the Credo super PAC focused on ground organizing and eschewed paid advertising. They saw their ability to use data-based, person-to-person campaigning as an asymmetrical advantage against better-funded groups on the right. But another super PAC on the left, Priorities USA, focused on using television ads to discredit Mitt Romney; despite being massively outspent by GOP groups, including the $300 million-plus raised by Karl Rove's Crossroads groups (http://www.kfdi.com/news/local/181305691.html), Priorities has been widely cited for its superior effectiveness (http://thegrio.com/2012/11/14/bill-burton-behind-the-super-pac-that-succeeded-priorities-usa/). Its ads helped cement the image of Romney as a corporate raider that would prove such a liability in the general election.


This may be one of the major takeaways of the 2012 campaign: When liberals learned to stop worrying and love Citizens United, they benefited from it more than the conservatives who supported the decision.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/12/did-citizens-united-help-democrats-in-2012/265800/

[boutons_deux]

Corporations AREN'T people, my friends.

Serial tax felon Bishop Gecko lost, thanks to be being an asshole and severely stupid and severely outcampaigned staff, but over 30 states are one-party REPUG states where gerrymandering and suppression of DEM voters will continue, aided and abetted by laws and regs written by ALEC and financed by the VRWC, and C-U.

That the 1% and Wall St $100Ms poured into Repug SuperPACs failed to buy the WH for Gecko is noting but a little upturn in fucked and unfuckable American's permanent decline. The 1% never give up.

[Winehole23]

That the 1% and Wall St $100Ms poured into Repug SuperPACs failed to buy the WH for Gecko is noting but a little upturn in fucked and unfuckable American's permanent decline. The 1% never give up.nope. they bought it for Obama instead -- their guy won again.

[Drachen]

Megyn Kelly: Karl, Michael Barone is not well. We better call an ambulance.

Karl Rove: Fuck him! Now, you listen to me! I want voting reopened right now. Get those voters back in here! Turn those machines back on! Turn those machines back on!


Joe Biden: [after Ohio is called] Happy Election Day!
Michael Barone: [hoarsely] Biden.
Karl Rove: [stunned] Obama
Obama: Hey! How'd y'all make out today?
Karl Rove: How could you do this to us after everything we've done for you?
Obama: Oh, see, I made Biden a bet here. See, Biden bet me that we couldn't both get rich and put y'all in the poor house at the same time. He didn't think we could do it. I won.
Biden: [grinning] I lost... One dollar.
Obama: Thank you, Louis.
Biden: After you.
Obama: Certainly.

[boutons_deux]

nope. they bought it for Obama instead -- their guy won again.

bull fucking shit.

Look at the distribution of contributions to Barry vs Gecko. Again, Barry's ground game and small 99% contributions vastly beat the shit out of Bishop Gecko's 1% game. the 1% absolutely DIDN'T buy Barry's second term.

[Winehole23]

regardless, the 1% got their guy. they were gonna get their guy in no matter who won. Obama has been a useful lackey for the financial sector and a great benefactor to the 1%. I don't see that changing much.

[boutons_deux]

Wall St and 1%ers MUCH PREFERRED to have a financial guy in the WH rather than just a guy TOO CLOSE to the financial sector.

Wall St gave to Gecko about 10:1.

[Winehole23]

prove it

[boutons_deux]

prove it

Do You Own Research
--WC

it was reported that Wall St contributed vastly more to Gecko than Barry.

Just one of MANY similar articles over since the Repug primary was over

http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2012/08/28/Wall-Street-Gives-Up-on-Obama-and-Roots-for-Romney.aspx#page1

[Winehole23]

your zeal to denounce has made you loose with the facts. that's not a ten to one ratio. far from it.

[Winehole23]

Obama enjoyed and continues to enjoy substantial support from Wall Street. Less so than the first go around, but it's hardly been as minor as you've made out.

[boutons_deux]

I pointed out that Wall St went for Gecko about 10:1, not that it was minor or that Wall St doesn't own Barry and all of govt.

That "1" is still a lot of money shows how insanely, corruptly wealthy Wall St is.

With Gecko/Ryan + Repug controlling Congress, SS would be fully privatized and $Ts handed to Wall St crooks who what suck out $100Bs in fees annually as fund managers, taking 2% just for showing up, and 20% of any profits.

[Winehole23]

dark money can have a much bigger impact at the local level:


Secret campaign cash from groups that aren’t supposed to coordinate with candidates has over recent election cycles poured into state and local races where the impact can be much greater than at the federal level, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.


The New York-based nonprofit law and policy institute researched spending by outside groups in six states between 2006 and 2014. Instances in which donors could be clearly identified fell to 29 percent from 76 percent on average after a landmark 2010 U.S. Supreme Court decision that allowed unlimited and anonymous spending, according to the study (https://www.brennancenter.org/publication/secret-spending-states) released Sunday, billed as the first of its kind.


So-called dark money is more likely to be tied to a specific benefit for contributors at the state and local levels than in federal elections, the report said. Donations, for instance, may influence the selection of a regulator or the passage of a ballot measure affecting a company’s bottom line, and they can have a greater impact on the outcomes by dominating total spending in low-cost races.


“The problem is not that dark money will flood every state and local election or even most,” the Brennan Center report said. “It’s that dark money is most likely to turn up where the stakes are particularly valuable, in amounts that could make all the difference in persuading voters.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-06-26/secret-campaign-cash-gushes-into-u-s-state-and-local-elections

[boutons_deux]

The only people who can get (dark) money out of politics are the CORRUPT legislators and regulators already owned and operated by BigMoney.

iow, the money-corrupting-politics-and-govt disaster is without a solution. The "police" are as corrupt as the "criminals".

With no solution, the corruption will definitely get worse.

SCOTUS, Alito I think, just said, paraphrase, in the McDonnell corruption case

that "the (blatant) appearance of corruption of is not a crime",

and

"we can't have every govt official being policed for corruption"

(Alito, VRWC/BigCorp shill, and yet another extreme rightwing Catholic, just greenlighted even more govt corruption, just as the Repugs intended when they put him on SCOTUS)

[Wilt Chamberlain]

Hillary looks like she might dominate this election. She said that Citizen's United would be a litmus test consideration for any SCOTUS candidate she would nominate.

There is a fair chance it will be struck down in the next decade.

[Winehole23]

Chamber of Commerce now a wholly-owned subsidiary of the GOP:

http://www.citizen.org/documents/2016%2012%205%20The%20Republican%20Party%20and%20t he%20Chamber%20of%20Secrets%20final.pdf

[CosmicCowboy]

:lmao

Hillary outspent Trump 3 to 1.

Dark money didn't buy this election.

[Winehole23]

Helped buy the Senate. Did check the link?

[Winehole23]

jumped to conclusions so you could bray like an ass.

[boutons_deux]

:lmao

Hillary outspent Trump 3 to 1.

Dark money didn't buy this election.

goddam, you're stupid.

Dark money was ALL OVER the Congressional races. Months earlier, dark money was not going to Trash, but concentrating on the Congressional and state elections.

Even billionaire DeVos was fined $3.5M for cheating.

Congressional control is much more important than the WH. Congress people are much cheaper to finance and buy than the WH.

CosmicParasite also ignores the estimated $2B in free media coverage handed to Trash.

https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/graphics/2016-presidential-campaign-fundraising/

Of course, dark money is many $100Ms more present on the Repug/VRWC side. So CP's "hillary outspent trash" is pure bullshit.