Queasy
Moderator<br>Console Gaming
- Aug 24, 2001
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Originally posted by: CPA
Looks like Obama has you folks fooled again.
Lobbyist money and the fine line
Significantly, the Center?s lobbyist sector excludes in-house lobbyists who work solely for one company, union, trade association, or other group. These people may lobby, but their contributions are grouped in the totals for the various industries they represent, along with contributions from other employees in the sector, their relatives, whatever PAC money has been raised, and donations from trade and professional associations which, of course, carry lots of weight in the horse trading that occurs when legislation is drafted. (Corporations cannot contribute directly to candidates.)
Contributions made by the various industry sectors tell the real story in a presidential race. And Opensecrets.org shows that Obama is picking up gobs of money put on the table by these special interests?including those involved in health care, which will surely have a lot riding on the outcome of the election and will expect to be heard after the election is over.
Consider the sector called lawyers and law firms. Clearly, lawyers and law firms lobby on behalf of their own interests?like fighting malpractice reform, which could again surface as a thorny issue for the new administration. Clinton and Obama have raised similar amounts from lawyers and law firms?$11.8 and $9.5 million. McCain and Huckabee have taken far less. The health sector has also given to Obama, Clinton, and McCain. In the pharmaceutical and health product industries, contributions to Clinton total $349,000 and $338,000 to Obama. Again, McCain trails in donations at about $98,000, an indication that the sector sees the real action on the Democratic side of the ballot. Health professionals, which include doctors, nurses, and dentists, have given Clinton some $2.3 million and Obama $1.7 million.
Last August The Boston Globe, in a piece by Scott Helman, took a hard look at Obama?s contributions, noting that ?behind Obama?s campaign rhetoric about taking on special interests lies a more complicated truth.? That truth revealed that as a state legislator in Illinois, a U.S. senator, and as a presidential aspirant, Obama had collected hundreds of thousands of dollars from lobbyists and PACs. Helman quoted an Obama campaign spokeswoman saying that after he experienced firsthand the influence of Washington lobbyists, he was taking a different approach to fundraising than he had in the past, and that ?his leadership position on this issue is an evolving process.? If Obama?s leadership on campaign financing is indeed evolving, more news outlets should be following the evolution.
And for your viewing pleasure
Yep. Who needs lobbyists when you can have bundlers that remove all transparency?