(Source: kileyrae)
REQUIRED READING: Great piece about fundraising in Congress
Ryan Grim and Sabrina Siddiqui have an incredibly important piece in the HuffingtonPost about the time Members spend raising money.
One picture captures it all. This is a slide taken from a PowerPoint deck, given to incoming freshman congressmen about how they are to allocate their time.
Four hours of call time — and even this doesn’t include the time at fundraisers in the evening, or late afternoon or lunch. (As one Member told a Harvard audience last year, in his 6 years in Congress he had had lunch with a colleague 8 time — “if you’ve got time for lunch, you’ve got time to raise money”).
Read the piece. It is a great work of investigative journalism, filled with reflections and commentary by Members and others, about a system literally no one in good faith can defend anymore.
Indeed, by the end, you’re even feeling sorry for these Members. As Representative Larson put it, “it’s the only system they have to work with.”
Yes, true, unless, um, you were to change the system. (See, e.g., the SarbanesGrassroots Democracy Act, or the AA Act).
And people wonder why Congress primarily serves the rich.
Great monologue from Chris Hayes on his Sunday show about Romney’s 47 percent video and what it says about the increased influence of money in politics.
Sheldon Adelson reportedly pledged $500,000 to just one House candidate. Sounds like a lot, but when your net worth is almost equal that of the combined GDP of 24 countries, it’s just chump change.
I think if Romney wins the election, Sheldon Adelson should just get to live in the Lincoln Bedroom if he wants. Like he could sublet it when got tired of it.
Bodie Broadus - The Wire - “Final Grades”
This was really the only thought crossing my mind after hearing the news that Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker had easily avoided being recalled. The Center for Public Integrity analyzed the fundraising totals:
How do you get your message out when the campaign finance numbers look like that? In what universe is that a fair fight?
Big picture: Yes, recall elections are strange and not usually predictive. And no, this doesn’t mean Obama and Democrats are doomed in the state in November. The exit polls (admittedly not always reliable) actually had voters who went to the polls today supporting Obama, 52-43.
But I don’t know how anyone could look at that graphic and not be concerned about the ability of Democrats to win elections in a world in which they will consistently outspent. Again: thanks a bunch, Supreme Court.
Bad election nights suck most when they’re happening. I get that. But the now inevitable acceleration of the labor movement’s decline hurts on a deeper level. Put simply: tonight was one of those nights when I questioned whether liberals would win the war.
The dark side of the Democratic Party
Long thoughts on the Cory Booker situation below the fold.
A Super PAC hell-bent on unseating President Obama this fall has unveiled their genius plan for convincing America that its current Commander-in-Chief is unfit to lead. Get an “extremely literate” black Republican to appear on a commercial and refer to the President as a “black, metrosexual Abe Lincoln.” That would be a brilliant plan if a black, metrosexual Abe Lincoln didn’t sound like the coolest fucking person ever, and calling for an “extremely literate” black person didn’t sound totally fucking racist.
(Thanks to Meghan for showing me this)
via Politico (Matt Wuerker)
This is a couple of weeks old, but This American Life did a great show about the influence of money in American politics. Listen if for no other reason than the fact that John McCain is featured at the end and is surprisingly likable, which I didn’t think was possible after the 2008 campaign.
