10/21/2007

One reason why anonymous political donations should be allowed

This deluge of corporate dollars comes at a time when congressional Democrats aren't the least bit bashful about their agenda. Should they win the White House they'll raise tax rates, pursue a trade protectionist policy under the guise of "fair trade," and enact as much of Big Labor's wish list as they can, from doing away with secret ballots in union certification elections to piling on more labor, environmental and health regulations. "There's almost nothing in the Pelosi/Reid agenda that we favor," one long-time industry government affairs representative tells me. "But we're still giving the bulk of our money to them." . . . .

When Republicans were in control, Ms. Pelosi and company denounced the "K Street Project," run by former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. They protested that corporate lobbyists were allowed to become a fourth branch of government--and in some cases their protests had merit, as Republicans curried favor with money interests.

Meanwhile, Democrats under Rep. Rahm Emanuel and Sen. Schumer have quietly erected their own K Street Project, and employ some of the same strong-arm tactics they once deplored. "I've never felt the squeeze that we're under now to give to Democrats and to hire them," says one telecom industry representative. "They've put out the word that if you have an issue on trade, taxes, or regulation, you'd better be a donor and you'd better not be part of any effort to run ads against our freshmen incumbents." . . .

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2 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hey, how about linking to the source of the political donation story?

The link goes to some likely flawed poll that shows 99 percent of the candidates have 45-50 percent "would never vote for" ratings.

10/21/2007 12:43 PM  
Blogger John Lott said...

link fixed.

A little extreme here in saying that "99 percent" fall in the 45 to 50 percent range. You have candidates from the high 30s to 50 percent. That seems pretty believable to me. How many candidates have gotten over 60 percent of the presidential general election vote?

10/21/2007 2:02 PM  

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