Good Layman's guide to the financial crisis

[tequila]

It's been illegal, but that hasn't stopped them at all - they use use all sorts of loopholes, such as US branches, employees, 'bundlers' of contributions, etc., etc. There's an entire cottage industry of people who spend their entire life figuring out ways around the campaign contribution 'caps'.

Except now it's not even illegal. You can't stop them at all, no? Not even with bureaucratic legal cutouts? They can fund all the ads they want.

This is not about contributions to candidates. This is about running ads. For instance, Goldman Sachs can now run all the ads it wants against whatever candidate it wants. Before they had to form PACs or whatever, which were limited themselves, but now that doesn't matter, and they can spend whatever they wish.

Sounds more like an excellent tool of intimidation, rather than outright bribery.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/22/us...gewanted=print

The Supreme Court has handed lobbyists a new weapon. A lobbyist can now tell any elected official: if you vote wrong, my company, labor union or interest group will spend unlimited sums explicitly advertising against your re-election.

“We have got a million we can spend advertising for you or against you — whichever one you want,’ ” a lobbyist can tell lawmakers, said Lawrence M. Noble, a lawyer at Skadden Arps in Washington and former general counsel of the Federal Election Commission.

...

Thursday’s decision, in Citizens United vs. the Federal Election Commission, “is going to flip the existing campaign order on its head,” said Benjamin L. Ginsberg, a Republican campaign lawyer at the law-and-lobbying firm Patton Boggs who has represented both candidates and outside groups, including Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group formed to oppose Senator John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign.

“It will put on steroids the trend that outside groups are increasingly dominating campaigns,” Mr. Ginsberg said. “Candidates lose control of their message. Some of these guys lose control of their whole personalities.”

“Parties will sort of shrink in the relative importance of things,” he added, “and outside groups will take over more of the functions — advertising support, get out the vote — that parties do now.”
In practice, major publicly held corporations like Microsoft or General Electric are unlikely to spend large sums money on campaign commercials, for fear of alienating investors, customers and other public officials.

Instead, wealthy individuals and companies might contribute to trade associations, groups like the Chamber of Commerce or the National Rifle Association, or other third parties that could run commercials.

Previously, Mr. Noble of Skadden Arps said, his firm had advised companies to be wary about giving money to groups that might run so-called advocacy commercials, because such activity could trigger disclosure requirements that would identify the corporate financers.

“It could be traced back to you,” he said. “That is no longer a concern.”