Study: Finance industry execs rule political spending

By John Tomasic 

Friday, January 27, 2012 at 4:51 pm | More from The Colorado Independent

Over the last 30 years, political contributions made by financial industry executives increased by 700 percent, according to new analysis by the watchdog Sunlight Foundation. Roughly 5,500 members of the finance, insurance, real estate sector (FIRE) gave $178.2 million to political committees and candidates during the 2010 election cycle, up from $15.4 million in the 1990 cycle.

Giving was concentrated most among securities and investment executives and, although tilted slightly toward Republicans, the finance-industry greenback geyser gushes in both directions of the political spectrum. Although the finance sector gave 54 percent of its cash to Republicans in 2010, it gave 51 percent of its cash to Democrats in 2008.

“Though it’s very difficult to directly measure the influence that finance and other elite donors are having, it seems fair to say that, to the extent that candidates and parties are eager to court these donors, they will want to keep them relatively happy, since they know that without the support of these donors, raising the money needed to compete electorally is more difficult,” wrote Sunlight analyst Lee Drutman.

In recent months, the Sunlight Foundation has zeroed in what it calls the “1 percent of the 1 percent,” by which it means the very small number of people who participate at the highest level of the out-of-control political-spending arms race that has beset the United States and that has escalated exponentially over the last few years.

This elite class of spenders consists of people who give at least $10,000 per election cycle. In 2010, the average 1 percent of 1 percenter spent $28,913 on politics, which incidentally is more than the $26,364 median annual income earned in the country. Candidates have become dependent on these big spenders, Sunlight reports, often eschewing local fund-raising efforts to court the wealthy donors in the major urban neighborhoods where they live and at events where they gather, like the meeting organized by the oil-magnate Koch Brothers at the Bachelor Gulch Ritz Carlton in Colorado last year.

Diminishing local campaign-finance ties likely matter when it comes to setting a representative’s agenda. Do Manhattan securities traders and Los Angeles movie producers care about local water quality and Main Street business collapse? Probably less than do congressional district residents.

As Sunlight puts it, the result of the narrowly based outsized spending is “a political system that could be disproportionately influenced by donors in a handful of wealthy enclaves,” a fairly safe assessment that the group’s analysts ramp up by adding that their research also demonstrated that “some of the heaviest hitters in the 2010 cycle were ideological givers, suggesting that the influence… on federal elections may be one of the obstacles to compromise in Washington.”

“Unlike the other 99.99 percent of Americans who do not make these contributions, these elite donors have unique access,” writes Drutman. “In a world of increasingly expensive campaigns, the 1 percent of the 1 percent effectively play the role of political gatekeepers. Prospective candidates need to be able to tap into these networks if they want to be taken seriously. And party leaders on both sides are keenly aware that more than 80 percent of party committee money now comes from these elite donors.”

As the political-finance reform group Root Strikers notes, Wall Street has spent $700 million lobbying Washington in the past decade and the oil and gas industry gave $13 million to lawmakers in the last election cycle alone. The group calls for elections to be publicly funded, for all independent expenditures to be limited and open to public scrutiny, and for Americans to vote to restrict the right to spend on politics to citizens, barring the participation of corporations.

Image: PoliticalMuse

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My Thoughts:

As one can clearly see from the various articles I've posted on this blog and that you can find by simple Google searches, that our political system is now strongly influenced, if not absolute control by those who have the money to spend on lobbying, election contributions and super PACs. As humans, we are highly responsive to the messages that these organizations push to us and we believe in these messages, even if the long term outcome is detrimental to our well being. A very strange logic in humans, I must say.


BTW: Even though our representatives claim to be representing we the PEOPLE. Consider this, should you call your representative to talk about some pending legislation and you have not contributed more than $10,000 to their campaign and hosted them on special travel engagements, parties, and golf outings, then you will talk to an answering machine or a low ranking staffer, like an intern. But if you have given any of the above, you will be patched right through, guaranteed, even if its on the reps, cell phone. And of course they have that direct line phone number and cell phone number already, so they don't even have to go through the switch board or staff.

The longer the PEOPLE allow this to continue, the more entrenched it will become to the point that the PEOPLE may not be able to change it. Regardless of your political ideology, if you hold to the ideal of FREEDOM AND LIBERTY and a DEMOCRATICALLY elected by the PEOPLE representative government, then you should join arms with the PEOPLE to change this outcome and return the power back to the PEOPLE.

However, if your ideology and ideal for this country is to have an Oligarchy Republic form of government, then you have achieved what you believe in. But unless you are in the 1% group, you will be very disappointed in your life because it is very rare that those in the 99% will be able to move into the 1% group. 

The odds are better that you will be hit by lightening than be in the 1%. Additionally, as the wealth is accumulated among the 1%, you have less of the countries wealth to acquire through your hard work and business acumen. Can you make a living? Yes, but there will be a high price because of the wealth migration to the very wealthy.

So think about that when you go to the polls in November. Pick a Senator or Representative that will vote for a constitutional amendment banning all corporate or non-voting person money both in elections and in lobbying. Only registered voters can give up to say $500 to any candidate and party in any election cycle, period. No other money is available, not even the candidates own money can exceed the $500 cap. In that way, the representative must seek their money from the voters and not from anyone or any corporation or other entity that is only created by law on paper.