Super PACs

About: super pacs could change historic winnowing pattern of candidates � usatoday.com

source: ...

Leading the spending was Restore Our Future, a Super PAC that supports Mitt Romney, with $7.8 million worth of expenditures on behalf of the former Massachusetts governor.

Winning Our Future, a Super PAC allied with Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker, was ranked second with $4.2 million in spending.

Rounding out the top five were Super PACs backing Texas Gov. Rick Perry ($3.8 million), former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman ($2.5 million) and Texas Rep. Ron Paul ($1.1 million).

... what to do?  In McCain-Feingold the idea was to even out the effect of money in politics. Yet Obama outraised McCain by more than double & won the election in 2008. It certainly does have an effect.
Money is used for:
  • Advertizements of all kinds - TV, radio, Internet, newspapers, billboards etc.
  • Mailers
  • events
  • travel
  • & more ... see the list at OpenSecrets here.

What to do? There are too many lawyers to make any one of these things illegal & the Supremes said money is free speech.  Have the taxpayer pick up the difference between the final two? (just joking)
 - I say we can take the stand that there is nothing wrong here & then invent a bottom up process which enhances the probability that good people represent us in government by weighting such factors as:

  1. leadership
  2. previous accomplishments
  3. character
  4. an ability to make & publish a detailed "business plan" to solve the needs of a government of the people but nothing more
  5. ... tbd

All these should be considered evidence of a real product & all else as false advertizement.


Tags

  1. super pacs
  2. money in politics
  3. pac

Comments

Mark de LA says
Hmmm.. maybe election by facebook & blogs instead?
http://allthingsd.com/20120112/facebook-gives-politico-deep-access-to-users-political-sentiments/

Mark de LA says
Why is false advertizement acceptable in POLITICS?
Mark de LA says
The challenge - yet another intended consequence - with lawsuits is that they take time & are up to judges who may be in the pockets of politicians.  For example, Tony Rezko (an obama associate) was finally sentenced 3 years after the the election. Lies can be told, people can cheat, steal votes etc & will only be put in jail long after the elections are over. No election has been reversed on such lawsuits that I know of. Lawsuits just prove that more laws will not be any answer.
 
Mark de LA says
seth 2012-02-08 10:08:46 15770
Yep he could have zagged the other way.  Cranked up opposition to super pacs and deceitful advertising. 
Yeah?  it's hard to do that while being deceitful & having already failed in doing that already!

Mark de LA says
... & in his usual style of the ends-justifies-the-means & WINNING Obama dives all in for SUPERPACs which he was against before he was for them:
Robert Reich : ... (a Bill Clinton pol)

But would refusing to be corrupted this way really amount to unilateral disarmament? To the contrary, I think it would have given the President a rallying cry that nearly all Americans would get behind: “More of the nation’s wealth and political power is now in the hands of fewer people and large corporations than since the era of the robber barons of the Gilded Age. I will not allow our democracy to be corrupted by this! I will fight to take back our government!”

Small donations would have flooded the Obama campaign, overwhelming Romney’s billionaire super PACs. The people would have been given a chance to be heard.

The sad truth is Obama has never really occupied the high ground. He refused public financing in 2008. Once president, he didn’t go to bat for a system of public financing that would have made it possible for candidates to raise enough money from small donors and matching public funds they wouldn’t need to rely on a few billionaires pumping unlimited sums into super PACS. He hasn’t even fought for public disclosure of super PAC donations.



Read more: http://robertreich.org/post/17251255054#ixzz1loGUeGod
... no INTEGRITY for him, eh? .... buying elections sounds reminiscent of Atlas Shrugged the final act.
As an aside, because I am too lazy to develop another item to be unread, apparently parts of countries are also for sale like Greece & parts of South America .  Hmmm..  I wonder how much of the good old USA are virtually for sale? (ports, timberland, etc.)


Mark de LA says
& this kinda crisps it up:

Mark de LA says
http://www.opensecrets.org/outsidespending/summ.php?cycle=2012&chrt=V&type=S - the tally so far for super pacs.

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