"Maher pledges $1 million to Obama super PAC
WASHINGTON - Political satirist Bill Maher got into the act Thursday night, pledging $1 million to a political committee supporting President Obama.
Maher announced during a Yahoo webcast special, “CrazyStupidPolitics,’’ that he was giving $1 million to Priorities USA Action, a super PAC backing the president.
A cynic on politics who often takes liberal stands on issues on his HBO talk show “Real Time,’’ Maher joins Dreamworks Animation executive Jeffrey Katzenberg and the Service Employees International Union as the committee’s top funders.
Katzenberg gave the group $2 million, and the union donated $1 million.
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He's going to need more than that:
"Obama donations fall short of 2008" February 22, 2012|Brian C. Mooney, Globe Staff
President Obama did not raise as much money from supporters last month as he did during January 2008 in his first campaign for the White House, a Globe analysis of campaign finance reports shows, suggesting a lower level of enthusiasm for the president in traditional Democratic quarters.
Contributions to Obama and the Democratic National Committee combined were down 30 percent last month compared with January four years ago. Together they raised $29.1 million in January. That is down from $41.7 million in January 2008.
Soon after last month’s fund-raising results were in, the president changed positions and encouraged contributions to his so-called super PAC, a fund-raising tool he previously shunned. The campaign did not answer directly when asked whether the sluggish fund-raising may have prompted Obama’s call for contributions to Priorities USA Action, which can accept unlimited contributions from individual supporters or corporations. Without that encouragement, the super PAC raised just $59,000 in January.
Obama’s and Democrats’ drop in contributions compared with 2008 in part reflects dramatically different circumstances: Back then, Obama was locked in a furious battle with Hillary Rodham Clinton for the party nomination.
Yeah, I thought that just before the lead story turn-in's lead paragraph there.
The Obama campaign, in an e-mailed statement to the Globe, sought to tamp down the impression that it is not generating as much excitement among financial backers....
But the Obama campaign is using up cash at a far greater rate than the last incumbent to seek reelection, George W. Bush in 2004, a Globe analysis of campaign finance reports shows. Moreover, the Bush campaign in 2004 set fund-raising records, even though Bush’s renomination was uncontested.
Then that's trouble.
The Obama campaign in recent months has been downplaying fund-raising expectations fanned by Republicans who have warned their base that the president is seeking to spend $1 billion in an effort to win a second term. In late December, Obama campaign manager Jim Messina called those estimates wrong, and there were reports that the target is closer to that of the 2008 campaign, when Obama raised about $750 million.
Yeah, what's a quarter-of-a-million, give or take?
Earlier this month, Obama did a U-turn and announced he is encouraging large donors to support Priorities USA Action, a super PAC formed by former aides to help his reelection campaign. Previously he had criticized the 2010 Supreme Court ruling that opened the doors to super PACs, which must spend independently of candidates and parties but may take in unlimited contributions from wealthy individuals, corporations, and labor unions. At that time, he called the development “a threat to democracy.’’
In an interview last week with a Charlotte television station, Obama sought to justify the turnaround, saying: “The challenge is we’ve got some of these super PACs that have pledged to spend up to half a billion dollars to try to buy this election and what I’ve said consistently is we’re not going to just unilaterally disarm.’’
No, we only ask that of Palestinians.
Republicans pounced, however, on Obama’s weaker fund-raising numbers, saying they reflect a lack of support for his campaign.
“It’s pretty clear that across the range from small to large, there have been a lot of people who bought in [to Obama] last time that aren’t buying in four years later,’’ said Sean Spicer, spokesman for the Republican National Committee.
Related: Obama Gets Old
The campaign’s emphasis on collections from small-time contributors, he said, is an attempt “to not focus on the fact that all those folks that gave big to them last time are not coming back.’’
Related: Obama's Donors Down
Simple mathematics, meanwhile, demonstrates why the Obama team has shifted to a super PAC strategy of gathering unlimited, million-dollar contributions - even while trumpeting its $57 average contributions to the main Obama account.
To offset a $10 million donation, like the combined contributions last month by Las Vegas casino mogul Sheldon Adelson and his wife to a super PAC supporting Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, a candidate would have to coax 2,000 individuals to donate the $5,000 maximum that can be given directly to a campaign. At the Obama average of $57 a pop, it would require 175,439 contributions to neutralize largess of the Adelsons’ magnitude.
Republican super PACs, mostly aligned with individual candidates, far outraised their Democratic rivals during 2011. Obama’s Priorities USA Action raised $4.4 million last year, about one-seventh of the $30.2 million taken in by Restore Our Future, a super PAC backing Republican candidate Mitt Romney. GOP-backing American Crossroads, a super PAC, and its affiliated Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies, a nonprofit “social welfare’’ advocacy group that does not have to disclose its donors, reported raising a combined $51 million in 2011.
The ratio of fund-raising between the Obama campaign committee and the DNC also indicates changing dynamics for the incumbent. In January 2008, the Obama campaign reaped $36 million and the DNC collected $5.7 million. Four years later, the DNC performed better than the Obama team. The Obama campaign took in just $11.9 million in January, while the DNC gathered up $17.2 million....
What was cut from the web piece (sigh):
Ron Paul's committee said it had raised $4.5 million last month, and had $1.6 million in the bank at the end of the month. Paul has raised more than $30 million in total, second only to Romney.
But somehow money never translates into votes when it comes to Ron Paul.
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"GOP ‘super PACs’ buoyed by mega donors in Jan." February 20, 2012|Jack Gillum, Associated Press
A pair of “super’’ political action committees supporting top Republican presidential candidates spent nearly $24 million in January, drawing upon major gifts and repeat donations from wealthy business executives, according to financial reports the groups filed Monday with the government.
The super PACs — Mitt Romney-leaning Restore Our Future and Newt Gingrich-supportive Winning Our Future — raised a combined $17 million last month. That financial strength allowed the groups to hit the airwaves in key primary states with millions of dollars in expensive TV ads.
The groups’ fundraising offers a periodic behind-the-scenes glimpse into the identities of the wealthy supporters who will help elect the next president, along with details on how the tens of millions of dollars they donated have been spent this election season.
The reports likely will rekindle criticism of the groups, which were made possible under a 2010 Supreme Court ruling in the Citizens United case. The super PACs must legally remain independent from the candidates they support, but many are staffed with former campaign aides who have intimate knowledge of the campaigns’ strategies.
Those reports provided a snapshot of fundraising for President Barack Obama’s early campaign and for Republican candidates as they battled during important primary elections in January. During the month, GOP candidates Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum had briefly surged ahead of front-runner Mitt Romney but trailed the former Massachusetts governor in fundraising. Since then, Santorum has climbed remarkably in polls as support eroded just as stunningly for Gingrich following his disappointing showing in Florida.
Restore Our Future has been a boon for Romney, who has benefited greatly from the group’s TV ads attacking Gingrich in particular. Such ads were purchased thanks to the financial help of repeat donors, including Marriott International Chairman J.W. Marriott Jr., who has given the super PAC $750,000 to date.
That's where Mitt stays when he is on the road.
The super PAC also reported new donors, including Hewlett-Packard CEO Meg Whitman. Romney mentored Whitman, recently an unsuccessful candidate for California governor, during the 1980s at Boston-based Bain & Co., the private equity firm Romney headed. Whitman’s $100,000 check to Restore Our Future came days after she joined Romney at a celebration of his victory in the New Hampshire primary....
Related: Money Can't Buy You Guv in California
Endorse Liberty, the group supporting Texas Rep. Ron Paul, reported roughly $2.4 million in donations, including $1.7 from the billionaire founder of PayPal, Peter Thiel of San Francisco. Thiel, who runs a hedge fund, is a libertarian who has supported Republican causes and candidates and also has donated to California’s marijuana legalization ballot measure.
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"Ruling allows major political donors to hide identities; Paper firms keep source of money secret" by Brian C. Mooney | Globe Staff, February 15, 2012
When the Supreme Court ruled two years ago that corporations could make unlimited political donations, the justices probably did not have in mind big checks from paper corporations operating from an address at a postal box or an accounting firm.
It’s one aspect of a phenomenon known as “dark money’’ to super PACs that help specific candidates even though they technically operate independently. The other shade of dark money involves funds flowing to super PACs from several tax-exempt “social welfare’’ advocacy groups, which do not disclose any information about donors.
Candidates on both sides of the political aisle are benefiting.
Meanwhile, a super PAC supporting President Obama, and another that is allied with the Tea Party, are among those that draw funds from their affiliated “social welfare’’ organizations, often referred to by the part of the federal tax code under which they are organized, section 501(c)(4).
By law, the tax-exempt 501(c)(4) organizations cannot be forced to disclose to the public where the money came from and super PACs are not required to investigate the bona fides of businesses that contribute — thus the “dark money’’ reference to donations that obscure the original source of the funds.
In a few instances, the source of the donations has turned into a who-done-it game.
The New York Times, attempting to identify the individuals who controlled several businesses that gave money to the pro-Romney PAC, had appealed to its readers for help in unmasking a $250,000 contribution last August from “Glenbrook LLC,’’ a company that appeared to exist only on paper in Redwood City, Calif. As the Globe reported on its website last week, Restore Our Future, the super PAC supporting Romney, had amended its latest report to the Federal Election Commission, solving the mystery. The donation from Glenbrook LLC was replaced with a pair of $125,000 contributions from Jesse Rogers, a Palo Alto investment fund manager, and his wife, Melinda.
This hidden-identity case resembles another instance last year when Edward Conard, a former executive at Bain Capital, acknowledged he and not a dummy business was the real source of a $1 million contribution in April to Restore Our Future.
The stream of interested money gushing into the 2012 campaign — more than $41 million and counting spent by super PACs in the Republican presidential contest — has alarmed watchdogs. There are rumblings about seeking a constitutional amendment that would take years and be difficult to pass, and congressional Democrats led by Maryland Representative Christopher Van Hollen have filed legislation that would increase disclosure requirements and compel social welfare groups engaged in political activity to reveal their donors. A similar bill failed in the Senate in 2010.
“We don’t believe there should be all this secret money funding campaigns,’’ Van Hollen said. The bill would require, among other things, that the organizations list their top five donors as part of the disclaimer at the end of ads.
Obama, who was critical of the high court’s ruling and called the proliferation of super PACs “a threat to our democracy,’’ last week did an about-face and indicated he will encourage big Democratic donors to support Priorities USA Action, a super PAC formed by former White House aides to help Obama. The group has struggled to raise funds compared with its GOP counterparts.
Spokesmen for Restore Our Future, Priorities USA Action, and FreedomWorks for America, which often helps the Tea Party, all said they are operating within the law....
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Related: We Love You Super PAC
MAD PACs
Choo$e Your $uper PAC
Also see: Obama shifts focus to college costs, value
Well, being in debt slavery and service to the banks is a good education for later in life, kiddo. Growing up real quick.
