Posted by Greg Laden on September 4, 2008 Former Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff has been sentenced to four years in prison for corruption.
A Washington court found Abramoff guilty of trading expensive gifts, meals and sports trips in exchange for political favours.
In a possibly related matter …
A review of campaign finance filings shows that .. Arizona Republican [John McCain] has accepted more than $100,000 in donations from employees of Greenberg Traurig, the very firm where Abramoff once reigned.
source
Weird place for spam, maybe that means your hits are up?
Anyways, colour me surprised that McSame is into the same old crap. He’s a maverick dontcha’know?
Almost as shameless as Abramoff…
LOL.
IMHO you have to look closely and skeptically at anyone who opens a conversation with: “We are legitimate and reputable company” …
Sort of like the used car dealer claiming: ‘Everyone knows me as honest john’.
When they start by defending their integrity it makes me wonder how much of it they have.
On topic.
Yes, for a guy worried about the corrosive influence of big money on our political system McCain certainly seems to have no problems taking their money.
In comparison Obama seems to have gotten the majority of his campaign money from small contributors. Grass roots politics in action.
He looks almost thoughtful there, almost contrite. But you know the only thing he’s thinking is “How many more years will they add if I slug everyone with a camera?” Remember that the next time you see a conservative looking thoughtful.
Oh that sneaky McCain. He knows he’s getting booted around 2010 because of Abramoff, so he chose Palin knowing she’ll become President after his forced resignation. Just as Obama knows that his association with Wright and Ayers would force him to resign, making Biden President.
That’s right, the two men selected the running mate they did knowing full well that the person they chose would become President of the United States of America. Thanks to Presidential candidate prerogatives our right to select the person we want to vote on for President has been circumvented. Once again politicians have stripped us of our natural rights.
It comes down to this; who do you want as your President for the next four years, Sarah Palin or Joe Biden?
Scenario: In the year 2011 Vice President Sarah Palin approaches President John McCain regarding assassination threats being made against him. President McCain reassures her with, “Worse comes to worse I am confident you will do a great job in the Oval Office.”
Scenario: In the year 2011 Vice President Joe Biden approaches President Barack Obama regarding assassination threats being made against him. President Obama reassures him with, “Why would anybody want to shot me to make you President?”
Top Contributors
John McCain
Merrill Lynch $296,913
Citigroup Inc $268,501
Morgan Stanley $234,272
Goldman Sachs $208,395
JPMorgan Chase & Co $179,975
AT&T Inc $174,497
Greenberg Traurig LLP $150,387
Credit Suisse Group $150,025
Blank Rome LLP $149,426
PricewaterhouseCoopers $140,120
UBS AG $139,665
US Government $137,117
Bank of America $129,475
Wachovia Corp $122,846
Lehman Brothers $117,500
Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher $104,250
US Army $102,898
FedEx Corp $99,753
Bear Stearns $99,300
Sidley Austin LLP $96,200
Barack Obama
Goldman Sachs $653,030
University of California $576,839
JPMorgan Chase & Co $414,760
Citigroup Inc $408,299
Harvard University $407,219
Google Inc $404,191
UBS AG $389,294
Lehman Brothers $361,482
National Amusements Inc $360,703
Moveon.org $347,463
Sidley Austin LLP $329,776
Microsoft Corp $326,847
Skadden, Arps et al $320,550
Morgan Stanley $307,221
Time Warner $305,538
WilmerHale $275,132
Jones Day $272,755
Latham & Watkins $270,595
University of Chicago $268,285
Stanford University $258,388
Grass roots in action, indeed.
Joel, you know you’ve got to source these things so we can figure out what we’re looking at.
Sorry Stephanie, here is the source.
Probably opensecrets.org which notes, as Joel does not, that This table lists the top donors to this candidate in the 2008 election cycle. The organizations themselves did not donate , rather the money came from the organization’s PAC, its individual members or employees or owners, and those individuals’ immediate families. Organization totals include subsidiaries and affiliates.
Which makes a lot more sense considering that everything that would be good for Goldman Sachs as a company is pretty much standard Republican line. Deregulation, privatization, w/e.
Also of note, is that apparently 96% of Obama’s donations come individual contributions w/ less than 1% from PACs. In comparison to McCain who is at 81% from individual contributions.
So, how does that make more sense?
How is it that Obama’s total contributions from PACs is far less than any one of the PACs listed?
Like i said, opensecrets.org notes: This table lists the top donors to this candidate in the 2008 election cycle. The organizations themselves did not donate , rather the money came from the organization’s PAC, its individual members or employees or owners, and those individuals’ immediate families. Organization totals include subsidiaries and affiliates.
So in theory, the number of dollars per company should be partly affected by the size of company measured in number of employees.
When I first saw this I knew it was wrong (Thanks Stephanie) because there is no overlap between the lists. At the corporate level, most companies give roughly similar amounts to both candidates.
Joel, grassroots is the fact that Obama has raised more in contributions that don’t need to be reported individually (i.e., under $200 from an individual) than McCain has raised in total. From OpenSecrets:
49% (under $200) times $389,423,102 (total raised by Obama) equals $190,817,320, which is greater than $174,165,949 (total raised by McCain).
McCain has, however, received more from individuals donating over $4,600 ($31M to $26M).
Greg, I think you’re not seeing as much overlap as you usually would because of the way university employees have come out for Obama. Push further down on the Obama list and you should see more.
I think someone, lots of someones, are saying, “Fuck the anti-elite crowd. We need someone smart right now.” Of course, since they’re mostly professors and administrators, they swear with their wallets. They leave the real swearing to the grad students who can’t afford much in the way of donations.
Greg, what do you mean there’s no overlap?
Citigroup Inc McCain $268,501 Obama $408,299
Morgan Stanley McCain $234,272 Obama $307,221
Goldman Sachs McCain $208,395 Obama $653,030
JPMorgan Chase & Co McCain $179,975 Obama $414,760
Lehman Brothers McCain $117,500 Obama $361,482
Sidley Austin LLP McCain $96,200 Obama $329,776
It is, however, interesting to note that each of these has given considerably more to Obama than to McCain.
It is also interesting that there are several of the world’s top universities (California, Harvard, Chicago, Stanford), Microsoft, and Google among the top contributors of Obama but not McCain.
The “we need someone smart right now” sentiment is palpable.
Time Warner, too, has given more to Obama than anyone has given to McCain.
When I first saw this I knew it was wrong (Thanks Stephanie) because there is no overlap between the lists.
Where is it wrong? As someone else pointed out, there are several instances of overlap.
Stephanie, that still leaves 51% greater than $200.00 and it’s hard for me to understand how someone who received over $3 million from the organizations listed above, yet only lists 1200.00 from PACs?
David and Joel, there is usually much greater overlap between the lists, enough that it’s apparent at a very quick glance. The difference threw me, too, which is part of why I asked Joel where they came from. It wasn’t just pure formality. 
Sorry, that’s actually 1,600.00 from PACs.
Individual contributions $374,333,800 96%
PAC contributions $1,635 0%
Candidate self-financing $0 0%
Federal Funds $0 0%
Other $15,087,667 4%
Joel, the employer of an individual making a donation is listed even if the individual does not contribute through their employer’s favorite PAC. This helps expose companies illegally giving money to their employees and having them funnel it to a candidate.
The numbers you see above are not donations by the employers. They are donations by individuals that own or work for those employers. They are mostly not coming through PACs for either Obama or McCain.
Stephanie: “Fuck the anti-elite crowd. We need someone smart right now.”
Maybe. I’ll have to think about that.
David: The “we need someone smart right now” sentiment is palpable.
Right on, man!
But David, seriously, I see that overlap, but if you look (typically) at a list that is corporate, not this list (which is NOT a list of corporate doners!) you will see much more of a match. Stephanie, right, I agree completely about the role of the universities. Note, the universities themselves are not giving a dime to any of these candidates.
Yeah, like public universities have any money to spare these days, even if they were able to make political contributions.
The numbers you see above are not donations by the employers.
Stephanie, As an example, the above list shows Greenberg Traurig LLP giving $150,387 to John McCain. Does that mean, this didn’t come from Greenberg Traurig LLP as a company?
The listed organizations did not themselves donate the indicated amount of money. The total is the sum of money donated by the company/institution’s PAC, the various members, employees, owners, and their families.
Have you given money to a candidate? If you do, they ask you who you work for and you are bound by law to tell them.This money is eventually all added up. So for example, the money I’ve given to the Al Franken campaign would be listed in a table such as this one as comeing from the University of Minnesota.
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