Category: Campaign Finance

Why Am I Not Surprised?

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A leaked audio of a Senator Joe Manchin (DINO-WV) call with rich donors has revealed, among other things, that he asked donors at the group, “No Labels,” to bribe fellow Senator Roy Blunt.

Joe Manchin is not just a conservative Democrat, he is a disloyal one, and given that a recording of his call was leaked, one who who has people close to him looking to give him a well deserved shiv between his shoulder blades:

West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, in a private call on Monday with a group of major donors, provided a revealing look at his political approach to some of the thorniest issues confronting lawmakers.

The remarks were given on a Zoom teleconference session that was obtained by The Intercept.

The meeting was hosted by the group No Labels, a big money operation co-founded by former Sen. Joe Lieberman that funnels high-net-worth donor money to conservative Democrats and moderate Republicans. Among the gathering’s newsworthy revelations: Manchin described an openness to filibuster reform at odds with his most recent position that will buoy some Democrats’ hopes for enacting their agenda.

………

The wide-ranging conversation went into depth on the fate of the filibuster, infrastructure negotiations, and the failed effort to create a bipartisan commission to explore the January 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol, and offers a frank glimpse into the thinking of the conservative Democrat who holds the party’s fate in his hands.

Manchin told the assembled donors that he needed help flipping a handful of Republicans from no to yes on the January 6 commission in order to strip the “far left” of their best argument against the filibuster. The filibuster is a critical priority for the donors on the call, as it bottles up progressive legislation that would hit their bottom lines. 

OK, this is not an invalid comment, though a US Senator asking high dollar donors to act as his enforcers is pretty damn skeevy.

………

When it came to Sen. Roy Blunt, a moderate Missouri Republican who voted no on the commission, Manchin offered a creative solution. “Roy Blunt is a great, just a good friend of mine, a great guy,” Manchin said. “Roy is retiring. If some of you all who might be working with Roy in his next life could tell him, that’d be nice and it’d help our country. That would be very good to get him to change his vote. And we’re going to have another vote on this thing. That’ll give me one more shot at it.”

That is flat out corrupt.  He is asking, in an open Zoom call with big donors, that they condition any future employment for Roy Blunt on his current votes.

He is actively calling for a bribe, or at least extortion based on the threat of withholding a bribe, which is pretty much the same thing.

Karma, Neh?

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Postmaster, and Trump Evil Minion™ Louis DeJoy is being investigated for campaign finance violations.

It appears that he was using straw donors to launder his campaign donations.

I so hope that he goes away for a long, long, long time: 

The FBI is investigating Postmaster General Louis DeJoy in connection with campaign fundraising activity involving his former business, according to people familiar with the matter and a spokesman for DeJoy.

FBI agents in recent weeks interviewed current and former employees of DeJoy and the business, asking questions about political contributions and company activities, these people said. Prosecutors also issued a subpoena to DeJoy himself for information, one of the people said.

………

DeJoy — who was appointed to run the Postal Service by its board of governors last May — has been dogged by controversy for almost his entire time in office. Soon after starting in the job, he imposed cost-cutting moves that led to a reduction in overtime and limits on mail trips that mail carriers blamed for creating backlogs across the country.

Democrats accused the prominent GOP fundraiser, who personally gave more than $1.1 million to the joint fundraising vehicle of President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign and the Republican Party, of trying to undermine his own organization because of Trump’s distrust of mail-in voting. Two Democratic lawmakers, Reps. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) and Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), sent a letter to the FBI asking agents to investigate whether DeJoy or the Postal Service’s governing board “committed any crimes” in stalling mail.

………

In early September, The Washington Post published an extensive examination of how employees at DeJoy’s former company, North Carolina-based New Breed Logistics, alleged they were pressured by DeJoy or his aides to attend political fundraisers or make contributions to Republican candidates, and then were paid back through bonuses.

Such reimbursements could run afoul of state or federal laws, which prohibit “straw-donor” schemes meant to allow wealthy donors to evade individual contribution limits and obscure the source of a candidate’s money. In April, though, Wake County, N.C., District Attorney Lorrin Freeman (D) said that she would not pursue an investigation of DeJoy and that the matter was better left to federal authorities.

This behavior by Republican donors has a precedent, it’s what Dinesh D’Souza was convicted of a few years ago.  (Pardoned by Trump)

An extended stay at Club Fed should be in his future,

The First Flip on the Capitol Insurrection

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John Schaffer, a founding member of Oath Keepers, has copped a plea and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.

My first thought was, “Pass the popcorn,” and my second thought was, “Hopefully this can lead to more people to flip, and hopefully the rich funders who have nurtured this movement will end up in the dock.”

A founding member of the Oath Keepers arrested in the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol pleaded guilty Friday and agreed to cooperate against others in the case — the first defendant to publicly flip in the sprawling domestic terrorism investigation that has led to charges against more than 410 people.

The plea comes exactly 100 days after Jon Ryan Schaffer and hundreds of other supporters of former president Donald Trump stormed the Capitol, allegedly in an effort to prevent Joe Biden from being confirmed as the next president. Prosecutors hope Schaffer’s plea spurs others to provide additional evidence in hopes of avoiding long prison sentences.

The plea marks a new stage in the historic investigation, as prosecutors seek to work up the chain of defendants to gather evidence and better understand the full scope of any planning and organizing of the violence — particularly among groups like the far-right Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys. Dozens of members from both groups appeared to act in concert to storm the building, prosecutors have alleged.

As an aside, the fact that Schaffer is the lead guitarist for the heavy metal band Iced Earth, which adds just the right level of surrealism to the whole affair.

I really hope that the widening scope of the prosecutions ends up including Roger Stone and the Mercers.

Failure is VERY Profitable

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Following her 9 point drubbing by Susan Collins, Democrat Sara Gideon still has $11,000,000.00 left in her campaign accounts.

By way of context, the population of Maine is 1.35 million.

Collins raised about $30 million, and Gideon raised about $75 million.  (And the loser spent only about 85% of that, because there is only so much media in Maine)

This is addition to at least $70,000,000.00 in “independent” PAC spending.

This from a campaign that was literally sending out frantic funding requests emails the day before the election.

The reason that they spent so much money was that for every media buy, the consultants associates with the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) got a percentage.

The same thing happened in Kentucky, where Mitch McConnell destroyed the hapless Amy McGrath by almost 20 points.

In both cases, the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) chose to run a largely content free campaign and a largely content free candidate, and the only winners on the Den side were the consultants.

The same could be said from North Carolina, where 3rd party expenditures, and hence commissions, dwarfed spending be l by both campaigns.

All of these races were seen as winnable, and all of these races were not even close, despite the best efforts of the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment).

By comparison, Democrats won both (still hugely expensive) races in Georgia, largely on the get out the vote efforts of Stacy Abrams, which were a TINY fraction of total spending.  (I still don’t trust her though, because of her choices in literature)

For to many in the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment), the strategies never change, because they make money from these failed strategies.  Lots and lots of money, something like 20% on media buys, and 10% on fundraising.

My advice is the same as always tell the DCCC, DSCC, and the DNC to pound sand, never respond to online or phone solicitations for funds, and chose your candidates yourself.

Act Blue is good, but going through a candidate’s web site is better, and you can get links to their web sites through Act Blue.

Until the plague of consultants, who I liken to a plague of locusts, are ejected from the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment), it’s all you can do.

H/t Atrios

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Posted via mobile. 

This Should Get Interesting

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Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) has specifically asked Merrick Garland to investigate allegations that the FBI refused to conduct a full investigation of Brett Kavanaugh following his 2018 nomination to the Supreme Court. 

Given that something in excess of $90,000.00 of Kavanaugh’s debts mysteriously vanished in the months prior to his nomination, this should have been investigated, and it wasn’t.

In fact, as Whitehouse notes, the FBI refused to even call people back who contacted the agency with concerns regarding the now Supreme Court Justice:

The FBI is facing new scrutiny for its 2018 background check of Brett Kavanaugh, the supreme court justice, after a lawmaker suggested that the investigation may have been “fake”.

Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democratic senator and former prosecutor who serves on the judiciary committee, is calling on the newly-confirmed attorney general, Merrick Garland, to help facilitate “proper oversight” by the Senate into questions about how thoroughly the FBI investigated Kavanaugh during his confirmation hearing.

………

The FBI was called to investigate the allegations during the Senate confirmation process but was later accused by some Democratic senators of conducting an incomplete background check. For example, two key witnesses – Ford and Kavanaugh – were never interviewed as part of the inquiry.

Among the concerns listed in Whitehouse’s letter to Garland are allegations that some witnesses who wanted to share their accounts with the FBI could not find anyone at the bureau who would accept their testimony and that it had not assigned any individual to accept or gather evidence.

………

He added that, once the FBI decided to create a “tip line”, senators were not given any information on how or whether new allegations were processed and evaluated. While senators’ brief review of the allegations gathered by the tip line showed a “stack” of information had come in, there was no further explanation on the steps that had been taken to review the information, Whitehouse said.

“This ‘tip line’ appears to have operated more like a garbage chute, with everything that came down the chute consigned without review to the figurative dumpster,” he said.

………

Whitehouse said he is seeking answers about “how, why, and at whose behest” the FBI conducted a “fake” investigation if standard procedures were violated, including standards for following allegations gathered through FBI “tip lines”.

The allegations of sexual assault are concerning, but the financial irregularities, which are job one of any background investigation, and it appears that the FBI did not do this.

We already knew that Kavanaugh was the Federalist Society’s, “Made Man,” in a political sense, but it now appears that he was a, “Made Man,” in a way that is more akin to its original meaning of a fully initiated Mafiosi.

He’s in, and they pay his debts, bury his bodies, and make everything go away.

Hoo Boy!

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Wikileaks has released thousands of internal Democratic National Committee emails, revealing that the organization was aggressively in the tank for Hillary Clinton. (Big surprise, though it is a violation of its organization charter)
These included discussions of using Sanders religion against him, which kind of surprised me, because it’s “our side” that is doing it:

As Hillary Clinton prepared to announce her 2016 running mate, a trove of nearly 20,000 emails were released by WikiLeaks on Friday, providing an embarrassing inside look at Democratic Party operations on the eve of the Democrats’ national convention.

The emails from the Democratic National Committee include discussions of Clinton’s chief rival for the presidential nomination, Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.); details of perks provided to party donors attending the convention; and email exchanges between party officials, journalists and others.

The emails were released with an announcement by WikiLeaks on Twitter that linked readers to a WikiLeaks page inviting visitors to “Search the DNC email database.” A search box sits underneath a one-paragraph introduction:

………

Friday’s digital document dump follows a report last month by The Washington Post that Russian government hackers penetrated the computer network of the Democratic National Committee, gaining access to an entire database of opposition research. DNC and Clinton campaign did not respond to a request for comment Friday as reporters and campaign staff began to assess the situation.


One email written May 5 to DNC communications director Luis Miranda from another party official suggests looking at Bernie Sanders’ faith.

“It might may [sic] no difference, but for KY and WVA can we get someone to ask his belief,” the email from “marshall@dnc.org” says. “Does he believe in a God. He had skated on saying he has a Jewish heritage. I think I read he is an atheist. This could make several points difference with my peeps. My Southern Baptist peeps would draw a big difference between a Jew and an atheist.”

At the very least the author of the letter, DNC CFO Brad Marshall, the author of this email, should be fired, but I do not expect this to happen, since he is clearly a FoH. (Friend of Hillary)

Of further interest is that the emails contain information that Hillary Clinton’s “Fund Raising” for the state party was actually laundered back into her campaign:

………

Other emails show DNC staff in damage control over allegations from the Sanders campaign, when a report—corroborated by a Politico—revealed the DNC’s joint fundraising committee with the Clinton campaign was laundering money to the Clinton campaign instead of fundraising for down-ticket Democrats.………

Between this and the choice of the pro-TPP, pro-abstinence education, pro-parental notification laws Tim Kaine as her VP pick, I think that a lot of the folks from the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party are, to quote the Dixie Chicks, “Not ready to make nice.”

Report: Prominent NeoCon Robert Kagan To Headline Fundraiser For Clinton

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Robert Kagan, the Neocon who has was a major force for invading Iraq (and has supported pretty much every single misbegotten use of force by the Pentagon since Pershing was on active duty), is fundraising for Hillary Clinton:

A prominent neoconservative intellectual and early promoter of the Iraq War is headlining an official campaign fundraiser for Hillary Clinton next month, Foreign Policy has learned. The move signals a shift in the Clinton campaign’s willingness to associate with prominent Republicans and is the latest sign of how far some GOP defectors are willing to go to block a Donald Trump presidency.

Robert Kagan, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a co-founder of the Project for the New American Century, will speak at a Hillary for America fundraiser in Washington’s Logan Circle neighborhood on July 21. According to an invite obtained by FP, the “event will include an off-the-record conversation on America’s continued investment in NATO, key European allies and partners, and the EU.”

………

On Wednesday, Clinton picked up the endorsement of Republican Brent Scowcroft, who served as a national security adviser to Presidents George H.W. Bush and Gerald Ford, and held formal or advisory positions in the administrations of former Presidents Richard Nixon and George W. Bush.

………

But while Scowcroft hails from the GOP’s realist school of thought, a less-interventionist worldview that some liberals subscribe to, Kagan remains firmly in the neoconservative wing — an ideology centered around the use of military force, the forcible removal of dictators, and the importance of spreading democracy around the world.

The American people are in for a positively hideous next 4 years, with a choice between a life support system for a hair weave, and Attila the Hun.

Lovely.

H/t Talking Points Memo.

Jimmy McMillan for President

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Yet more evidence that the rent is too damn high:

A popular narrative of the U.S. housing market has been that big city prices are locking out young buyers, feeding a cycle in which a growing number of people are forced to rent at ever higher rates as demand overwhelms supply. Throw in the fact that wages haven’t kept pace, and you have a world where a wide swath of Americans can’t save enough to ever buy that first home.

The reality may be a bit more complicated. It’s true that, when combined with a lack of government support for affordable housing, this situation has pushed the number of cash-poor renters to a new high. Some 26 percent of U.S. renters paid at least half their income to landlords in 2014, up from 20 percent in 2001, according to the State of the Nation’s Housing report, published on Wednesday by Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies.

Unfortunately much of our economic policy has conflated price increases in real estate prices with economic prosperity, which has led to shelter become increasingly difficult for ordinary people to obtain.

We need to stop viewing housing and real estate as a way to generate returns that exceed inflation, and we need to discourage unproductive speculation in real estate.  (Full disclosure, I am speaking against my own interest as a homeowner with a 30 year fixed rate mortgage)

This is F%$#ed Up and Sh%$

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The Federal Election Commission is so dysfunctional that it cannot even decide that an employer coercing its employees to make political contributions is wrong:

Last week, the Federal Election Commission deadlocked over whether to investigate allegations that coal baron Robert Murray coerced employees at his company, Murray Energy Corporation, into making campaign contributions. It’s a move that watchdogs warn will give the green light to workplace political coercion, which experts say is on the rise.

The case stems from a complaint filed by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) alleging that Murray Energy coerced its salaried employees to contribute to the company’s PAC. Sources within the company had alleged that their year-end bonuses depended on their levels of political giving.

FEC staff had advised the commission that there was a strong case for enforcement, based on evidence that included internal company documents reportedly showing that the company told managers, “We have been insulted by every salaried employee who does not support our efforts.” Staff members recommended that the commissioners find that Murray and his company’s PAC had violated federal election law by “coercing Murray Energy employees to make contributions to federal candidates and participate in fundraising activities supporting federal candidates.”

When the commission finally voted on whether to take action last week, the FEC split along party lines, with the three Democratic commissioners voting in favor of investigation, and the three Republican commissioners voting against action. FEC rules bar the agency from taking action unless a majority of commissioners agree. It’s just the latest in a long list of FEC disputes that have ended in stalemates and inaction—involving everything from complaints over super PAC coordination with campaigns to nonprofits’ political activity, straw donations to LLCs, and end-runs around contribution limits.

Seriously?  An employer threatening loss of pay and perhaps loss of a job you don’t contribute to their candidates is OK?

Seriously?

We are completely f%$#ed.

Meet the Old Boss, Same as the Old Boss

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Hillary is now actively courting Bush donors:

Hillary Clinton’s supporters in recent days have been making a furious round of calls to top Bush family donors to try to convince them that she represents their values better than Donald Trump, multiple sources in both parties told POLITICO.

The moves come as Clinton and the Democratic Party try to take advantage of deep unease among establishment Republicans on Wall Street and elsewhere with Trump’s emergence as the presumptive Republican nominee.

Top targets for the Clinton team include people like Woody Johnson, Jeb Bush’s former finance chair and the owner of the New York Jets. In recent days, Bush’s brother and father, former presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, have said they plan to skip Trump’s nominating convention.

One person close to Clinton said supporters of the former secretary of state drew up a list of Wall Street donors who supported Jeb Bush and other unsuccessful Republican candidates months ago but wanted to wait until Trump locked down the nomination before beginning to make the calls.

Yeah, now THERE’S a staunch defender of the Democratic Party’s liberal traditions, campaigning as the best Republican in the race.

At the rate that this is going, Jill Stein is going to qualify for federal matching funds.

I’m Calling Bullsh%$

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Al-Masdar news is reporting that the Panama Papers reveal that King Salman of the House of Saud laundered money which was donated to the Netanyahu campaign:

Isaac Herzog, member of the Knesset and Chairman of the Israeli Labor party, revealed that Saudi king Salman bin Abdulaziz financed the election campaign of Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

There are no other sources for this.

The only other reports on the internet all link back to this source, and I have no information at all about tits reliability.

I am not citing this to suggest that it is true. I am citing this because my initial reaction was credulous, for about 45 seconds.

This post is not about the report, but about my initial reaction.

I wondered why my initial response was to believe.

I believe that this is because what the Middle East is, a bag full of cats that you can smell crazy on, to paraphrase a popular movie from a few years back.

Dynastic Politics at Its Finest

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Duncan D. Hunter, the son of Duncan L. Hunter, has been caught spending campaign funds on personal expenses, a federal crime:

Rep. Duncan Hunter — whose spending of campaign funds on video games made national news this week — said on Thursday that he’s cutting short a trip to Israel to return to the United States and rectify that problem and several other mistakes.

“There was no taxpayer money involved, and I take full responsibility,” Hunter, R-Alpine, said by telephone from his trip. “That’s it. I’m going to pay everything back by tomorrow morning, with interest.”

Hunter said he and his wife were the only two holders of his campaign’s credit card, which incurred most of the expenses. As of Thursday morning, he said, he is now the only card-holder.

Hunter’s call came amid a review by The San Diego Union-Tribune of an unusual pattern of expenditures listed on his disclosure forms as personal expenses or mistaken charges “to be paid back.”

Campaign finance reports show $5,339 in such charges during 2015 alone: $1,128 in travel, $1,650 to Hunter’s children’s school in El Cajon, $1,424 for video games and $1,137 paid to an oral and facial surgeon.

The forms list only one personal expense that was actually paid back by Hunter — $169 on Oct. 21, with no indication of which personal expense was being reimbursed. None of the other outstanding charges were listed as repaid, or as an ongoing debt to the campaign for the year-end accounting.

The Union-Tribune was the first to report this week that more than 60 video game transactions totaling $1,302 were being questioned by the Federal Election Commission. News outlets from Esquire to Roll Call picked up the story.

I will note that dynastic politics has a long of enabling corrupt and unqualified, whether we are talking about the Hapsburgs, the any number of the Bush clan, Ron Paul’s idiot son, and **ahem** another prominent Presidential candidate.

Notice a Pattern?

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A site unaffiliated with the Clinton Campaign details her, and her campaign’s speaking engagememts:

Date
Location
Event Type
Speaker(s)
April 1, 2016 Newtown, Pennsylvania Fundraiser John Podesta
April 1, 2016 Syracuse, New York Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 1, 2016 Syracuse, New York Organizing Event Hillary Clinton
April 1, 2016 Appleton, Wisconsin Organizing Event Bill Clinton
April 1, 2016 State College, Pennsylvania Fundraiser Laura Rosenberger
April 1, 2016 Tenafly, New Jersey Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 2, 2016 Madison, Wisconsin Organizing Event Cecile Richards
April 2, 2016 Washington, Connecticut Fundraiser Daniel Kurtz-Phelan
April 2, 2016 Boston, Massachusetts Fundraiser Michelle Kwan
April 3, 2016 Los Angeles, California Fundraiser Bill Clinton
April 3, 2016 Los Angeles, California Organizing Event Bill Clinton
April 6, 2016 Washington, DC Fundraiser Gary Gensler
April 6, 2016 Tulsa, Oklahoma Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 6, 2016 Little Rock, Arkansas Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 7, 2016 Denver, Colorado Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 7, 2016 Bexley, Ohio Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 7, 2016 El Paso, Texas Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 7, 2016 San Antonio, Texas Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 7, 2016 Dallas, Texas Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 7, 2016 New York City, New York Fundraiser De’Ara Balenger
April 8, 2016 Forth Smith, Arkansas Fundraiser Bill Clinton
April 10, 2016 McLean, Virginia Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 10, 2016 Washington, DC Fundraiser John Podesta
April 10, 2016 Villanova, Pennsylvania Fundraiser Valerie Plame
April 11, 2016 Glen Cove, New York Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 11, 2016 Mount Kisco, New York Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 11, 2016 Washington, DC Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 11, 2016 Washington, DC Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 11, 2016 Washington, DC Fundraiser John Podesta
April 12, 2016 Miami, Florida Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 12, 2016 Miami Beach, Florida Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 12, 2016 Manalapan, Florida Fundraiser Hillary Clinton
April 12, 2016 Brooklyn, New York Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 12, 2016 New York City, New York Fundraiser Entrpreneurs for Hillary
April 13, 2016 Princeton, New Jersey Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 13, 2016 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 13, 2016 Erie, Pennsylvania Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 13, 2016 Washington, DC Fundraiser Bill Clinton
April 13, 2016 Washington, DC Fundraiser Bill Clinton
April 14, 2016 Brooklyn, New York Fundraiser John Podesta
April 14, 2016 Newton, Massachusetts Fundraiser Bill Clinton
April 17, 2016 London, England Fundraiser Jake Sullivan
April 17, 2016 London, England Fundraiser Jake Sullivan
April 21, 2016 Westport, Connecticut Fundraiser Bill Clinton
April 25, 2016 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 25, 2016 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Fundraiser Chelsea Clinton
April 28, 2016 Polanco, Mexico City, Mexico Fundraiser Melanne Verveer
April 28, 2016 New York City, New York Fundraiser John Podesta
May 2, 2016 Washington, DC Fundraiser John Podesta

Notwithstanding the campaign’s claims, I don’t think that they have managed to harness the power of the small donors.

H/t Naked Capitalism.

She’s Fundraising with Theranos? Seriously?!?!?

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For a while, I have been talking about the smoke and mirrors show that is the lab test company Theranos.

The short version is that they have a multibillion dollar valuation for a technology that allows one to make blood tests from a drop of blood from a finger tip.

Unfortunately, they have not been able to make the technology work, and so they have been doing conventional tests to generate some revenue.

But they are f%$#ing this up too, having been cited by the FDA.

And now the Clinton campaign is having this den of fraud hold a fund raiser for them.

I guess that Enron was busy:

Theranos is a unicorn that may soon be sent to the glue factory. The biotech start-up was once the toast of Silicon Valley. Its signature technology — a blood-testing machine so sensitive it requires a mere pinprick of blood to make accurate diagnoses — attracted a $9 billion valuation. ……… And then, last October, The Wall Street Journal revealed that the company’s breakthrough technology doesn’t actually work.

In recent days, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services found that the company’s lab in Newark, California, was in violation of five federal regulations, thereby posing “immediate jeopardy to patient health and safety.” Last week, the release of that investigation’s full report revealed that “quality control issues” may have compromised the blood-test results of 81 patients.

……… But for god knows what reason, it hasn’t cost the company the chance to host a fund-raiser for the Democratic front-runner. Next week, Chelsea Clinton will join Holmes at Theranos’s Palo Alto headquarters to help raise money for her mother’s campaign. According to an email obtained by Re/code, the event will be held next Monday night and will cost most attendees $2,700 a head.

One of Clinton’s primary liabilities in her race against Bernie Sanders is the perception that she is overly friendly with corrupt corporate interests. So it’s pretty bizarre that she has decided to have a (reportedly) corrupt corporation host her next big fund-raiser. And it’s only one of several unforced errors the campaign has made since last Friday. 

Someone in the Clinton sure picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue.

On the bright side for the Campaign, at least this time Hillary was not caught on camera doing it, so she can blame some lowly staffer.

This really is a complete cock up.

Nothing to See Here, Move Along

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Is anyone surprise that the guests on Chris Matthews’ show Hardball have given over 75 thousand dollars to his wife’s campaign?

It’s an interesting racket:

One day last June, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews opened his show with some news: His wife, Kathleen Matthews, a former local news anchor and Marriott hotel executive, had announced a run for Congress, seeking to replace Chris Van Hollen in Maryland’s 8th District. Matthews enthusiastically endorsed his wife’s candidacy, and vowed to “offer Kathleen whatever help I can.”

The longtime host of Hardball added: “As a journalist, I also know how important it is to respect certain boundaries on my support for her both in my public role and here on MSNBC. And while most of you know that our show doesn’t typically cover congressional races, I will continue to fully disclose my relationship with her as part of MSNBC’s commitment to being transparent and fair in our coverage.”

In the ensuing months, Kathleen’s name has rarely come up on Hardball. But many of the guests on the show have become generous donors to her campaign. And the transparency Matthews promised has not extended to mentioning that to his audience.

Using Federal Election Commission data and Hardball transcripts, The Intercept has identified 48 frequent guests of Matthews’s program who have made donations to the Kathleen Matthews for Congress campaign. These individuals, their spouses, or their political action committees donated $79,050 as of December 31, 2015 — about 5 percent of the $1.5 million Matthews had raised as of that time.

Some of the guests made the donations after they were on the show — in some cases, long after. But in at least 11 of these cases, the Hardball guests appeared on the program after Kathleen Matthews announced her candidacy, and without any disclosure of the donations. And in at least three of those cases, the donations came within days of the MSNBC appearance.

As Atrios would say, “Time for another blogger ethics panel.”

For Sanders Supporters Who are Silver Lining Types

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First, note that the primaries are structured that all of Clinton’s strong states will be done by mid March.

Basically, the southern states, the ones that won’t vote for a Democrat, are relatively early in the process:

I’m keeping this short to put a very simple idea into your head. Because of the way the Democratic Party voting calendar is structured this year, Clinton’s largest lead will occur on March 15. After that, most of Sanders’ strongest states will vote.

 What this means is simple:

  • Hillary Clinton will grow her lead until the March 15 states have voted.
  • Bernie Sanders will erase that lead — partly or completely — after March 15.
  • How much of Clinton’s lead he will erase depends on your not buying what the media is selling — that the contest is over.
  • In most scenarios where Sanders wins, he doesn’t retake the lead until June 7, when five states including California cast their ballots.

March 15 is the Ides of March; a good way to remember the date. The message — gear up for a battle after the Ides of March, and don’t let the establishment media tell you what to think. They won’t be right until the last state has voted.

 If you want to stop reading here, this is all you need to know.

………

Bottom line — Super Tuesday is upon us, and what’s bad for Sanders supporters on March 1 is going to look worse for a few weeks. Stay heartened. Whatever the result in March, this isn’t over until June, after Sanders’ best states have voted as well.

(Emphasis Original)

This is not surprising. Both of the party establishments have attempted to front load the the south, the Republicans because they double down on racism, and the Democrats because they want to forestall the liberal wing of the party. (Super Tuesday was largely a product of the right wing of the right wing of the Democratic Party.)

This raises an interesting question, “Does Sanders have the resources go to distance?”

The answer is clearly, “Yes.”

In fact, it is very likely that Sanders has more Cash on Hand than Clinton does:  (Note that this does not include Super PAC money, but that money does not go as far, because it cannot be targeted as flexibly)

Hillary Clinton raised $30 million in February and has $31 million on hand, her campaign announced on Wednesday — far less than Bernie Sanders.

 ………

 Her rival, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, raised $43 million in February, with $6 million of that coming on Monday. Sanders’ campaign has not announced its cash on hand, but as of the end of January, he had nearly $15 million in the bank.

Sanders Raised $20 million to Clinton’s $15 million in January.

So, Sanders raised $63 million in the first two months of the year, and Clinton raised $37 million, and she has $31 million cash on hand, and we can be reasonably certain that the Sanders campaign has a lower burn rate than Clinton, because she is employing a lot of high powered consultants, and has a far more extensive fundraising apparatus.

Assuming the same spending rates, and Hillary and Bernie would be neck and neck in cash on hand.

My guess is that Bernie is a few million ahead, and Hillary’s big donors are running into campaign finance limits, so the Sanders campaign can take this to the convention.

Not a Great Night for Sanders

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Right now, he appears to have won Vermont, Colorado, Massachusetts, Minnesota and Oklahoma, and Clinton won Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas, and Vairginia.

She also got about twice as many delegates.

Trump won all but four of the states on the ‘Phant side, with Cruz winning Texas and Oklahoma, and Rubio winning Minnesota, and Vermont being too close to call.

We are no hearing a clamor for Bernie to leave the race from the pundits, despite the fact that the Democratic side of the Race is closer than the Republican side, and no one is suggesting that other Republicans capitulate to Trump.

I just love our punditocracy works.

As an aside, Sanders is crushing it on fundraising, raising $20 million in January and $42 million in February, and appears to be outpacing Clinton, with a far lower burn rate, so he can continue to run until the convention.