This is why I don’t get to excited about the Dems taking over
As Power Shifts, So Do The Dollars
The Democrats are getting more PAC funds this election season
Casino operators have switched their bets to the party newly in power on Capitol Hill. And defense contractors are not staying the course: They’ve flipped from giving 62% of their donations to Republicans before the election to 67% to Democrats now.
Among the businesses that have given a majority to Democrats this year after backing mostly Republicans in the 2005-2006 cycle: Aflac (AFL ), Anheuser-Busch (BUD ), ConocoPhillips (COP ), General Dynamics, Harrah’s Entertainment (HET ), Home Depot (HD ), Honeywell International (HON ), MGMMIRAGE (MGJ ), Miller Brewing (SBMRY ), and United Technologies (UTK ), which switched from 62% Republican to 59% Democratic after the election. Home Depot has shifted its PAC contributions from 71% Republican in 2006 to 55% Democratic in 2007.
Not every company has reversed gears. ExxonMobil, Halliburton, PricewaterhouseCoopers, and U.S. Bancorp have remained loyal to the Republican Party
You are fooling yourself if you don’t think that $$$ isn’t everything these days. Like I said over at my “home” site, the difference between capitalism and democracy in this country is blurred. The two are seperate and not equal though and too many Americans have forgotten this. One allows the other to happen, not vice versa.
I am happy that the corruption created by the GOP is going to subside, but in the end corporations (huge ones) contribute to the problem in Washington. Once, the Dems gain a strong majority then the rats will come with their money. It is our job as citizens to make sure we hold people accountable. It is our job to make sure we educate citizens the difference between capitalism and democracy.
It is our job as citizens to make sure we hold people accountable.
You are right to be cynical, but I think your second to last sentence holds the key.
The Republican Congressional majority was (at long last) held to account, and the Republican President is now being held to account.
The utter lack of accountability during the Republican years grew out of the fascist impulse in Republicanism that yearns for a stern “daddy” figure to protect us.
The Democrats will not laboring under that flawed and anti-American paradigm.
Not only that, but when the populace sees the Cheneys making literally billions off the no-bid contract scenario, and the Enrons ripping off hundreds of thousands of employees, and the Tom Delays raping Indians while saying “Praise Jesus” every other sentence, and the Attorney General taking a few peeks at peoples’ finances, its hard to keep all of us from saying, “fuck it, our leaders are stealing, must be ok”.
Basically, Bush has almost turned us into a third-world country run by a few military juntas. The only thing keeping us in the running as a big country is we got more bombs than anyone else.
Enron was a Clinton watch scandal. The good old corporate Clintons and the PAC loving Democrats are back in the saddle now. Look out America!
What a joke to say that the corporate lobbyist culture is about “Republicanism”. The Democrats invented it lock stock and barrel. You just can’t stand it that the nastiest Republicans the party has ever produced ran with it. They don’t represent “Republicanism” if there is such a thing. Now they are either gone or on their way out. Good riddance too. But we will see how accountable the ruling Democrats are with their grubby fingers in every pie.
Democrats are basically fascists except they hide it behind a simpering “nanny” figure called big government to protect us. It is an even bigger joke that Democrat partisans dare bitch that the sprawling massive national government they created and got all fat from was turned against their own special interests. We will see that change soon as they line up at the trough with the power in their hands now. The Democrats’ idea of government is flawed and anti-American. Bush would never have been able to do his dirty deeds had it not been for the Democrats laying the seeds of such uncontrolled power and then going along with him every step of the way.
Bush will not be around for much longer for them to hide behind. The war will not last much longer if the Democrats are worth a shit. Then what? Back to ducking and feeding.
Same shit, different party.
“ame shit, different party.”
I couldn’t agree more. Although the dems aren’t run by the religious right. A group that I have to say is by far more dangerous to this country then a bunch of tree huggers.
Viti –
That “pox on both houses” is a pretty simplistic way of looking at the past ten years.
Modern Republicanism is based on a systematic corruption of our electoral system for the economic benefit of very narrow constituency.
The politicization of the Justice Department and Government agencies like the GSA are not shocking because they the Republicanists (c) were upfront about what they were doing.
You might not like many Democrats, but you can’t say that public corruption is part of the party platform the same way it is for the Republicans.
“but you can’t say that public corruption is part of the party platform the same way it is for the Republicans.”
no you are correct I cannot say that, I can say the corporate corruption is blind to which party it supports as long as it is the one in power
BTW – my new coinage “Republicanist” refers to people who regard themselves as Republicans first and Americans second. They don’t give a crap about the Constitution, and have utter contempt for American democratic institutions, history and traditions.
I don’t think all Republicans are Republicanists. Dave Burris and Tyler Nixon come to mind.
The temptation to be corrupt must haunt every public servant. One party has welcomed that temptation with open arm as a part of its normal operating procedures.
The other party has members that succumb to that temptation.
There is a big difference in my view.
(BTW – turns out I did not coin “republicanists”)
“ut you can’t say that public corruption is part of the party platform the same way it is for the Republicans.”
Unless you live in Delaware where Democrat corruption is institutional top to bottom.