Following the Money

Until the financial crisis of 2008, regulations such as the Glass-Steagall Act (and its demise under the Clinton administration--courtesy of Phil Graham of my home state of Texas) had barely registered on my radar. I had certainly seen how lack of sufficient regulation caused all kinds of problems (I did read history), but the political maneuvering that created an environment ripe for the financial predator and toxic for the ordinary citizen was in that realm of eye-glazing statutes that I was required to recall for government and civics classes and that I then promptly forgot. Since 2008, however, I've been paying a lot more attention to the Republican claim that markets should be less regulated than they currently are and to the influence of the wealthy people who benefit from that lack of regulation.

Now that the Supreme Court has more thoroughly provided ammunition for the wealthy in its ruling on Citizens United v. Federal Election Committee, my eyesight has sharpened, and it has begun following the money much more closely. Wealthy individuals and corporations have even more opportunities to influence elections and government legislation. As John Dunbar and Michael Beckel write in Forbes, in its Citizens United decision,

[t]he conservative majority of U.S. Supreme Court justices ruled that spending on independent messages that support or oppose federal candidates by corporations and labor unions does not lead to corruption. A few months later, a federal court cited this rationale in SpeechNow.org v. Federal Election Commission. That decision led directly to the creation of super PACs. It said that outside spending groups — like American Crossroads, for example — could accept unlimited contributions from corporations, unions and individuals to be spent on political ads. Previously, if a group wanted to expressly advocate for or against a federal candidate, it could only collect $5,000 per person per year. If an independent group were to raise $5 million for high-profile TV ad campaign advocating against the president or members of Congress, it would need at least 1,000 donors in a year to give the legal maximum. Now, one wealthy individual can single-handedly give a super PAC the cash it needs — and change the political dynamics of a race overnight. [in "Top ten donors make up a third of donations to super pacs," 16 April 2012]

That kind of big money, most of it from Republican donors, is already having a huge impact on elections. Take, for instance, the recall election of Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin. Most of the money for Walker's fight against recall came from out-of-state very wealthy individuals. Just look at the roll call of wealthy contributors, from the $100,000 contribution of billionaire hedge-fund trader Louis Bacon to the $490,000 contribution from Houston home builder Bob Perry, along with the hundreds of thousands of dollars in contributions from members of the Koch brothers' million dollar club. As Clare O'Connor wrote in Forbes before Walker's successful fight against recall:

If Scott Walker wins Tuesday’s recall election, he’ll have 14 of America’s richest people to thank. Wisconsin’s Governor has out-raised opponent Tom Barrett, the Mayor of Milwaukee, by almost 8 to one: $30.5 million to Barrett’s $3.9 million. Of that huge haul, $1.68 million — or, almost half Barrett’s total — came from 14 members of the Forbes billionaires list, all but one of whom live outside Wisconsin. [Clare O'Connor, "Gov. Scott Walker's Big Money Backers Include 13 Out-of-State Billionaires," Forbes 5 June 2012]

These contributions are disclosed, but you can bet, however, that wealthy individuals are looking for ways to support the candidates who will legislate their views without having to disclose their contributions, as Alec McGillis points out in The New Republic:

[I]t's likely that more and more mega-donors indeed are going to seek out ways to give that are undisclosed—it is the reason why Karl Rove's Crossroads GPS group is raising so much, because, as a group that focuses on “issues,” not “elections,” it does not have to name its donors. But this shift is a travesty, not a solution, and it's why anti-disclosure loopholes like the “issues” groups need to be closed. [in "About that Obama Enemies List," posted 16 May 2012]

Many of the extremely wealthy individuals who are now donating so generously to political campaigns have in the past remained out of the usual limelight. Some, such as Louis Bacon, have a reputation for being reclusive. (Bacon, in fact, sued in a London high-court to get several publishers--Wikipedia, WordPress, and the Denver Post--to track down and to reveal the identities of folks who had posted online what he determined to be libelous comments about him.) Yet, as Alec McGillis also rightly reminds us:

When you are giving on the level that Citizens United and related rulings allow you to give, you not only invite scrutiny, you demand it. When you are giving at levels hundreds of times larger than the $2,500 maximum for a regular donation to a campaign, or thousands of times larger than the size checks regular people send to candidates, then you are setting yourself apart. And the only thing that the rest of the citizenry has left to right the balance even slightly is to give you some added scrutiny—to see what personal interests, biases, you name it, might be prompting you to influence the political system in such an outsized way. It's all we've got, really—the Internet, the phone call, the visit to the courthouse. And yes, this applies to everyone. Why does everyone on the right know so much about George Soros? Because they were outraged at the scale of his giving in 2004 and 2006 and dug up everything they could on him. As is only right and proper. And now people are going to look into Frank VanderSloot, Harold Simmons and Paul Singer and the rest of Romney's million-dollar club.

As more and more news organizations are cutting back--for instance, the New Orleans Times Picayune is planning to publish only three days a week and is cutting half of its newsroom staff--the eyes doing the research and following the money are being severely curtailed. So it's up to us ordinary citizens to be alert, to determine how our government is being influenced by those with almost unlimited supplies of money.

For instance, it's important to know that nearly half of the money that the Mitt Romney Super-Pac Restore Our Future has raised has come from Wall Street contributors. According to OpenSecrets.org, Restore our Future is at the tip-top of the list of money-raising Super-Pacs. Organizations such as OpenSecrets give us some insight into how wealthy individuals spread their influence. You can track individual contributors to see where their political allegiance lies and to surmise, perhaps, what those contributors hope to gain from their out-sized contributions.

Try it. Your eyes may glaze over with the information, but you'll be a better citizen for it. Or maybe you'll just be depressed. 

See also:
Dave Weigel, "Pity the Poor Multimillionaire Campaign Donor," posted on Slate, 15 May 2012.
Stephanie Mencimer, "Get-Rich-Quick Profiteers Love Mitt Romney, and He Loves Them Back," in Mother Jones, May/June 2012 issue.
Benjy Sarlin, "Whitehouse: 'Very Little Hope' for Bipartisan Push to Roll Back Citizens United," TPM, posted 18 June 2012.
Monika Bauerline and Clara Jeffery, "How to Sweep Dark Money out of Politics," Mother Jones, July/August 2012 issue.