I have no use for the Koch brothers. I think they are undermining democracy and trying to build an oligarchy in the United States. I believe that progressive groups should continue to shine a light on their activities and hope that the news media will report on their activities.
But I don’t believe candidates running for Congress or Senate should engage in a battle with the billionaire brothers. If they do, they are hurting their chances of winning. Not because voters love the Koch brothers but because people voting in elections make a choice between two candidates, not between the wealthy groups or people who support or oppose them.
Throughout my career in politics, I’ve tried to lure opponents into fights with straw men. Savvy opponents have taken a pass and stayed focused on the real contest. Lesser candidates and organizations have bitten and spent money and resources in fights with people or organizations not on the ballot. That’s where Democrats are today.
By attacking the Koch brothers, Democrats have fallen into a trap. They would be wise to re-read the African-American folk tale of Br’er Rabbit and the Tar Baby. In that parable, Br’er Rabbit got into a fight with an inanimate object and got stuck, leaving him vulnerable to his real enemy, Br’er Fox. In the end, Br’er Rabbit was saved by his wits when he tricked Br’er Fox into throwing him into the briar patch. Democrats shouldn’t count on that ending.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
Would it be fair and accurate to say that when you were working in campaigns, the rules concerning funding and PAC’s were vastly different than they are today and that the money today flows more freely and in larger quantities than it ever has?
Yes, Democrats might have themselves an independently wealthy patron or two floating around, but you don’t have to query “Open Secrets” 1,000 times a day to know which party the upper tier set contributes to; and that party doesn’t start with the letter ‘D’.
I’m certainly not an insider, but I do hear these arguments postulated frequently among the every day people out here. Most of the discussion surrounds the theme that we have the best government money can buy. Then if you marry transgressions to campaign contributions and the politicians running interference (think Duke Energy) that concept comes just a little bit more into focus. The recent 5/4 decision by the venerable US Supreme Court not only followed political partisanship of that body, but flies in the face of that long nurtured and oft told ideological truism, “…government of the people…” except today the people being referred to are those that can pay the price of admission and access. In today’s world, that’s a hefty sum.
I do agree that perhaps too much time is being spent vilifying the Kochs. But it does need to be done and their ties and dollars to the candidates and their ambiguous PAC fronted ads need to have a bright and constant beacon on them. What we don’t need to do is adopt an ‘everybody does it’ approach to campaign funding. And of course, they are spending millions in North Carolina not because they are champions of freedom and individual liberty, oh no. They’re doing it because it’s an investment in the future for themselves and their companies.
Since I might be the only one here who reads both sides’ blogs, I can assure you that when you say, “But it does need to be done and their ties and dollars to the candidates and their ambiguous PAC fronted ads need to have a bright and constant beacon on them” you will find common ground over one the Right / conservatives.
And they’d mutter something about an old rich guy who used to used to help round up Jews for the Germans, and about the Tides foundation, and oh yeah, the union money thing.
So I ask you — if you say that about the GOP funding sources, are you saying that about ALL funding sources like it? ‘Cause at that point, you can’t be partisan. ‘Cause both sides have their big money and power brokers and I’m gonna go out on a limb here and thing that NONE here who read this are one of those people.
Mongo is truly just a pawn in game of life.
They can mutter all they please. The first utterance has absolutely zero relevance in this discussion. The second point conceded as long as you can point to some political advertising paid for by Tides, that can be attributable to Tides, in a North Carolina election for, say, any of the last 4 election cycles. As for the third, North Carolina has the lowest number of workers being represented by unions in the entire United States. Given that fact and that NC is a ‘right to work’ state, I fail to see the over-reaching influence of the “union money thing.” NC will never be a unionized state. Something I consider to be ironic and kinda sad actually, given the sub-standard wages and benefits people labored for most of the last century in this State. A trend that doesn’t appear to be reversing itself.
Having said that, I have no problem listing ALL funding sources for all candidates. I’d likewise say that those contributing the funds should be listed as well, and the directors of every PAC contributing those funds should be listed along with the various other boards they sit on, and what firms and businesses they are also involved in and how often they do business with Government…at any level. Now, some candidates may have a problem with that as well as some contributors.
But let me say this. Two things make this world go. Money and Power. When you have one, you can acquire the other. The whole point to election and campaign rules was to keep those two from joining hands. Just like the whole idea of a 90% tax rate on the upper tiers was to prevent the amassing of wealth among a very small group of people. And now for some reason, we seek to enable the conjoining of political power with wealth and amassing wealth to the point of buying a country among a select and privildeged few. In the meantime, the people, the ones who actually vote and enable this to happen, stay distracted with non issues/events keep defaulting their choice to the one they find ‘likeable’ for their representative; lose. And right now, the people are losing big.
So, in the words of Pogo, “I have seen the enemy, and he is we.”
You lose credibility when you ignore the facts. Yes democrats have a few big donors, soros is a fav of yours, but the republicans attract more large individual donors than democrats. Your middle ground tactic is transparent, you continually pretend like your arguing from the center but all you do is toss around the same republican talking points by trying to excuse their actions bc “everyone does the same” please stop it is tiresome.
All said w/o quoting a fact — you know, some authoritative source that has numbers and stuff. Not just an assertion by people coming to terms with the fact that their gains of 2006 and 2008 have, with the notable exception of the POTUS race, been ripped from their grasp. IF you’d like, I’ll get out Open Secrets and stuff, and then we’ll talk about the wealthy Dems in Congress, and then we’ll discuss how union bosses are pumping in a lot more money than pretty much everyone else.
I’m not arguing a middle ground. I’m saying, “Gosh, gee, this is the petard*, constructed by those making this argument, and I wonder if it will hoist both sides.” As it turns out… yup, it does.
*BTW, for those not familiar, a “petard” is a French word for a bomb, itself a derivative for “fart” (“Petar”). Kinda like a suicide bomber that gets blown up on the way to work for their last time. That flying body was said to be “hoisted.” Or as Hamlet said, ” For ’tis the sport to have the enginer Hoist with his own petar'”
Again, zero substance and incredibly off topic but thanks for the English lesson, couldn’t have been more unnecessary.
Presenting facts to a conservative or a bother is pointless, since they construct their own reality. This has been proven time and time again, since they will use their own sources that outright lie, and then ignore sources that blatantly prove them wrong. At BEST you will end up with a detente where they throw up their hands and say, “Well everyone lies, how can we really know?”
The only people fighting transparency are conservatives except union boards. If it means exposing the Koch roaches to the light of day means annoying the teamsters, so mote it be.
You are talking about governing issues. I’m talking about campaign issues. We’re not going to stop the Kochs or redirect money in politics if we don’t win elections. In the hearts and minds of most voters, particularly those who decide elections, there are far more important issues than who funds campaigns. They are not likely to either make or beleive the Koch connection even if it’s true. And they are certainly not going to believe it in the context of a political campaign.
I know and you’re right. To me however, the two are synonymous. But I too realize that campaign promises are just that and differ universally from what can actually be done, unless of course, you have the votes to make those promises stick, just to re-state your commentary.
But I know too that as influence grows from big money, so do those concerns. Like I said, in many a barber shop and store in a thousand different places all across this state, that topic is batted back and forth like so many tennis balls. And while campaign funding might not be a main stream or hot button topic that drives people to the ballot box, it does serve the apathy and ire that keeps people disconnected and fuels their disdain for politics and politicans generally.
Polls and focus groups might tell candidates what it is they need to be talking about. While it might be an accurate picture of what people are talking about, depending on the variables and the means of measure used to query the data, it doesn’t give context. And that is hard to gauge without looking at someone while you’re talking to them.
Troy — I think we agree. Those who contribute lots of money expect something in return. Probably even those Buddhist monks back in the Clinton years.
I think we *disagree* on how to solve the problem. I suspect that you believe some law can be passed that will work. I don’t believe that. I believe that the way to lessen this problem is to lessen the money and power at stake.
Of course, I can do that. Liberals can’t ’cause the answer for every issue they care about is “some big honking powerful, expensive government program.” If liberals believed otherwise, I might still count myself among them.
Your entire last paragraph is nothing but a straw man. Not every answer is a government program, I am a liberal and have thus destroyed your argument that every liberal answer requires a big government program. Please a little bit harder to make a point without resorting to such tiresome rhetorical devices.
What is to be done, if not by law? There is no way to remove the power from politics. Power is innate to that premise and the institution itself. It’s when we allow the two to mingle and then be allowed the unrestricted infusion of cash into the mix that it takes on the semblance of being bought. And we had that going until the Supreme Court in all of it’s finite wisdom decided that wasn’t the case and simply because it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and walks like a duck, doesn’t mean that it’s a duck; it might be a chicken. We don’t know without definitive proof and a DNA analysis.
Am I to think and then believe that candidates and campaigns are going to govern and police themselves with regard to whose money they accept and how much they spend? Nah, I was born at night, it wasn’t last night. So yes, a law. Restricting how much money can be spent by any particular candidate per election cycle and restricting the amount that can be donated per person and per corporation to any candidate per election cycle. Hamstring the PACs and their redheaded stepchildren, lobbyists.
Just a couple of weeks ago, Sheldon Adelson had a parade of 2016 GOP presidential hopefuls pay homage to his money bags. And according to US News, he spent $150 million and reported $54 million in the 2012 election cycle. Now, the doddering old fool didn’t get rich by ‘giving’ money away and he isn’t doing so now; he expects something in return on his investment. Quite frankly, if he has that much money to ‘donate’, he isn’t paying enough in taxes.
As for this liberal/progressive v. conservative/nutjob values system in Government and governance. First of all, government shouldn’t be run like a business; it’s government. The moron who coined that phrase should be tarred and feathered. Government does not share the end objectives of business and vice versa. They do share some similarities in accounting but that is where the similarity stops. Government should be the equalizer and provide for fairness to all people. Government is the law keeper and law giver as well as judge in matters of dispute. And government helps in those times when its people have no where to turn in the face of some catastrophy or calamity. We have never been a pure system of anything, despite what the zealots scream and quote Jefferson on. Ours is a plurality, a synthesis and that is what has made us work for as long as it has worked. But now, its about purity; pure Capitalism, pure Democracy, purity of beliefs, and on and on, ad nauseum.
Speaking of on and on, I’ve run on and on and completely off topic of what this post was originally about. Yes Thomas, I don’t like the Koch brothers either nor anything they stand for.
Treating the wound from a snake bite absolutely involves removing the poison rather than chasing down the snake…unless the snake is still wrapped around your neck and killing you. If not NOW exposing those who want to kill all life on earth for their coal, WHEN?
Tom and I agree, but for different reasons.
The Dems have their own stack of billionaires who fund lots of stuff. Not to mention big organizations that pull the candidates to positions they wouldn’t otherwise care about.
Unless we want to get into the usual “rah rah my side is great and your side is evil” discussions (which never sway a single vote nor win a single election). Then by all means, tell us all how your side’s funded by pure innocence but uber moral $100 donations and it’s never swayed by big money and even those billionaires are pure of heart and clear of thought.
Comparisons between Soros and Silicon Valley Billionares vs the cadre of Frankensteins chipping away at our very constitution by allowing foreign corperations unlimited influence in our elections is the height of tomfoolery.
Bother – Moderate who refuses to see the difference between both sides, no matter how much evidence is presented. See also Truther and Birther.