by Deb Cupples | Our public policy is taxpayer-funded; thus, it should serve us taxpayers. Instead, it often serves the industries, corporations, and individuals who buy
"access" to our politicians.
If money is a sign of corruption, then our nation has been on the wrong path for years. The table below shows the increasing flood of money into our presidential elections (data from Center for Responsive Politics). The 2008 totals will likely grow because McCain, Obama, and the other current candidates are still raising money.
| Election | Amt Raised by All Candidates |
| 2008 | $942 million (so far) |
| 2004 | $880 million |
| 2000 | $528 million |
| 1996 | $426 million |
| 1992 | $331 million |
| 1988 | $324 million |
Inflation wasn't high enough to account for the near tripling of presidential election costs from 1988-2008.
I suspect the increase had something to do with 1) growing political savvy on the part of cash-wielding individuals wanting to influence our public policy, and/or 2) growing willingness of our politicians to do favors for big donors -- especially big donors who can be counted on to raise more money for future elections.
Those of us who've given politicians a few-hundred dollars likely never will have a direct phone call or five minutes alone with a senior staffer -- let alone with a president, senator, or congressman. People who've raised hundreds of thousands of dollars likely will have such "access" to our politicians.
Taking money from corporations has been illegal since 1907, so smart politicians avoid doing it. That said, how do politicians know which corporations and industries to thank for donations?
Loopholes in our nation's campaign finance laws make the gratitude trail easy to follow (computer technology also helps).
Instead of taking checks from corporate accounts, our federal politicians take money 1) from people tied to corporations, and 2) from corporate or industrial PACs (political action committees).
That said, check out the table below. It shows industry-connected donations that went to Barack Obama and John McCain from individuals and PACs giving more than $200.
| Industry |
|
||||
| Pharma | Obama | $845,251 | McCain | $342,375 | |
| Oil & Gas | Obama | $394,465 | McCain | $1,332,033 | |
| Lawyers/ Law Firms |
Obama | $20,722,629 | McCain | $6,874,124 | |
| Casinos/ Gambling |
Obama | $117,189 | McCain | $193,825 | |
| Hedge Funds/ Priv. Equity |
Obama | $1,795,813 | McCain | $1,295,165 | |
| Phone/Util. | Obama | $249,072 | McCain | $379,835 | |
| Securities invest. |
Obama | $8,905,777 | McCain | $6,277,757 | |
| Commercial Banks | Obama | $1,883,058 | McCain | $1,698,978 | |
| Insurance | Obama | $1,144,386 | McCain | $1,301,305 | |
| Real Estate |
|
$5,816,677 | McCain | $5,795,797 |
Data is from the Center for Responsive Politics, updated July 28, 2008.
I highlighted in red the candidate who got more from a given industry but didn't highlight where the difference was under 10% (I consider that a virtual tie).
Legal Loopholes
Simply put, corporations are legal entities through which money passes to human beings.
Corporate and industrial PACs are legal entities that get their
money from human beings who are tied to corporations and industries.
In short, PACs are just an extra step in the process of moving
corporate cash to candidates.
Federal law allows individuals and PACs to give no more than $2,300 per election cycle to any federal candidate. Thus, a person or PAC could give $2,300 to a candidate for the primary and another $2,300 for the general election. That's only $4,600.
Given that thousands of people and PACs give $4,600 to their chosen candidates, how can these donors make themselves stand out?
By bundling. That's where one person collects checks from dozens (or hundreds) of other people -- each check within the legal limit -- then present the checks to the candidate in a bundle. The basic message is this:
"Sen. So-and-So, here's a bundle of checks worth $150,000 that I collected for you -- and I could conceivably collect more for you during your next campaign if things go well."
It would be just as effective if the bundler simply urged friends to send checks to candidates on their own, but then the candidate wouldn't know that the bundler deserved thanks.
Both major, current candidates have taken bundled donations. President Bush elevated bundling to an art form. For the 2000 election, Bush asked his bundlers to raise $100,000 each for his campaign. Those who met the quota were distinguished by the label "Pioneers." For the 2004 election, Bush upped the quota to $200,000 and labeled those bundlers "Rangers."
Texans for Public Justice compiled a list of Bush's "Pioneers" and "Rangers" and reported what some of them got from the Bush Administration -- everything from government contracts to favorable policies to White House sleepovers.
Of course, unless some of these gift-receiving Pioneers or Rangers were stupid enough to put in writing evidence of a quid pro quo (i.e., bribe), we'd never be able to prove that the Bush Administration had essentially sold our public policy to the highest bidder.
That's one reason that our system is so susceptible to corruption.
Articles that Brought this to Mind
Today's Washington Post focused on John McCain's fund raising, seeming to imply that some of McCain's bigger donors (who have already donated the limit) might have gotten around donation limits by funneling money to other people (called "straw donors") and having them donate to McCain. Townhall blog would like to know
I'd like to see further investigation of that one.
Today's New York Times focused on the importance of big donors and bundlers to Barack Obama's campaign. This wouldn't be news if Obama's campaign hadn't repeatedly given the false impression that its coffers were overwhelmingly filled by ordinary folks contributing small amounts (i.e., under $200 -- which was the Obama campaign's and the FEC's cutoff point, not mine).
But Obama's campaign did give those misleading impressions, so it is a story. The Obama campaign also misled the public into believing that it refused to take lobbyist-tied cash -- which is another story.
According to data from the Campaign Finance Institute, Obama has taken more in actual dollars from small donors than any other candidate ($165 million). That's impressive.
At the same time, Obama has taken more in actual dollars from big donors than any other candidate ($158 million).
The upshot: as the table above indicates, both candidates have what campaign-finance junkies consider to be "tainted" money: i.e., they took money from corporate- or industry-tied people, some of whom might want a political return on their investment.
This is one of the roots of our political system's corruption: the incentive for politicians to grant favors to big donors in order to keep the donations rolling in.
Our politicians will continue to be tempted by such incentives, as long as our campaign finance system continues to allow the flooding of our elections with special-interest cash.
There may be other ways, but the only one I can think of is publicly funded elections. Period. I can already hear certain family members of mine waxing indignant over the prospect of us taxpayers paying for our politicians' campaigns.
Here's the real choice: 1) we periodically pay a legally limited amount for the campaigns of 536 politicians, or 2) we pay the long-term costs of expensive or failed public policy that grew out of campaign-finance-related corruption.
My bet is that bad public policy costs us taxpayers waaaaaay more in the long run.
Related Buck Naked Politics Posts:
* McCain Gets Rewards from Oil Companies?
* ABC Ignores Obama's Misleading Message about Lobbyists' Money
* Why Alan Grayson is The Congressional Candidate for Florida's Dist. 8
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