Lee Fang, Republic Report: ''Chris Frates of National Journal broke the story that health insurance companies secretly funneled over $100 million into the U.S. Chamber of Commerce for advertising. The Chamber, during the period in which the money was accepted, orchestrated one of the largest electioneering outside money efforts in American history to help weaken health reform and elect lawmakers, mostly Republican, running on platform to repeal health reform.''
http://truth-out.org/news/item/9804-health-insurance-companies-plowed-over-$107-million-into-electing-speaker-boehners-anti-health-reform-congress
Campaign Cash: The Gift That Keeps on Giving
Bill Moyers and Michael Winship, Moyers & Co.: ''If you are visiting a candidate this summer and looking for a thoughtful house gift, might we suggest a nice super PAC? Thanks to the Supreme Court and Citizens United, they are all the rage among the mega-wealthy. All it takes is a little paperwork and a wad of cash and presto, you can have, as The Washington Post describes it, a 'highly customized, highly personalized political action committee.'''
http://truth-out.org/news/item/9818-campaign-cash-the-gift-that-keeps-on-giving
The Corruption of Politics by Checkbooks
Gerald E Scorse, Baltimore Chronicle: ''Dollars deliver messages in a new book by 'Dollar Bill' Bradley, and the former Rhodes scholar, NBA star, U.S. Senator and presidential candidate has no doubt where the dollars should and shouldn t be going. They should be pouring FDR-style into job creation, and they shouldn t be donated to politicians, especially dollars from corporations. Bradley s book, We Can All Do Better, has an early chapter, ''Uprooting the Root of All Evil,'' that examines the corruption of politics by checkbooks.''
http://truth-out.org/news/item/9824-the-corruption-of-politics-by-checkbooks
On Money in Politics
Bill Moyers, Moyers & Co.: ''When it comes to the vast, corrupting influence of money in politics, historian Thomas Frank has sounded the alarm loudly and often. In 'It s a Rich Man s World,' one of his recent essays for Harper s Magazine, Frank writes, 'Over the course of the past few decades, the power of concentrated money has subverted professions, destroyed small investors, wrecked the regulatory state, corrupted legislators en masse, and repeatedly put the economy through the wringer. Now it has come for our democracy itself.'''
http://truth-out.org/news/item/9847-thomas-frank-on-money-in-politics
How to Own an Election
Bill Moyers, Moyers & Co.: ''In this Bill Moyers Essay, Bill calls out some of the biggest political and super PAC donors, revealing how easy it is for the wealthy one percent to sway an election.''
http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/9866-how-to-own-an-election
--------
Leaked Document Reveals New Corporate Powers And Broken Campaign Promises
By Zach Carter
The administration intends to bestow radical new political powers upon multinational corporations, contradicting prior promises.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article31610.htm
Senators Grovel, Embarrass Themselves at Dimon Hearing
By Matt Taibbi
The senators not only supplicated before the blowdried banker like love-struck schoolgirls or hotel bellhops, they also almost all revealed themselves to be total ignoramuses with no grasp of the material they were supposed to be investigating.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article31605.htm
Writing Off The Elderly
By Paul Craig Roberts
What we have witnessed in the 21st century is a clear decision by political elites and the private interests that control them that gratuitous wars are more important than the elderly.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article31608.htm
Poverty In The USA: Disposable Families in Ohio
By Greg Kaufmann
Ohio has thrown nearly 70,000 people-including 40,000 children-off of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) cash assistance program. That s nearly 25 percent of the state s TANF caseload. The reason?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article31604.htm
Is the Threat of a ''Mafia State'' Real?
By Michael Busch
The intersection between state power and illicit actors is as old as the modern nation-state itself.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article31692.htm
--------
Super PACs must face accountability
San Francisco Chronicle
by Robert Reich
06/17/12
JPMorgan, BP, Walmart and the multibillionaire Koch brothers have just launched a TV advertisement blasting President Obama for the national debt. Actually, I don t know who s behind the ad because there s no way to know. And that s a big problem. The front group for the ad is Crossroads GPS, the sister organization to the super PAC American Crossroads run by Republican political operative Karl Rove. But because Crossroads GPS is a nonprofit, tax-exempt 'social welfare organization,' it can spend unlimited money and doesn t have to reveal its sources. In reality, it s a political front group, and the ad is blatantly partisan...
http://tinyurl.com/7sn6wjr
JPMorgan probed over possible power market manipulation
Reuters
07/03/12
Energy regulators have subpoenaed JPMorgan Chase & Co twice in the past three months as part of an investigation into whether the bank manipulated power markets in California and the Midwest. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on Monday filed a petition in U.S. federal court to require JPMorgan to produce emails from 2010 and 2011 as part of a formal probe into JPMorgan power market bidding practices in those areas...
http://tinyurl.com/6lgsytp
Informant: Thomas L. Knapp
--------
For Billionaires Only: Uncle Sam s Real Estate Fire Sale
http://lewrockwell.com/spl4/real-estate-fire-sale.html
--------
The US Chamber of Commerce s Multimillion-Dollar Attack Plan
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/09/05-1
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Obama
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=John+Boehner
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Karl+Rove
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Republican
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=political+elite
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=state+power
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=billionaire
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Supreme+Court
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Chamber+of+Commerce
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=real+estate
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Big+Banks
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=JPMorgan
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=corporat
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=British+Petroleum
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Walmart
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Koch+brothers
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=health+insurance
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=poverty
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=wealthy
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=campaign+cash
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=corrupt
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=PACs
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Citizens+United+ruling
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=manipulation
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Lee+Fang
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=moyers
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Michael+Winship
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Gerald+E+Scorse
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Zach+Carter
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Matt+Taibbi
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Paul+Craig+Roberts
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Greg+Kaufmann
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Robert+Reich+Blog
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=moyers
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=William+F.+Jasper
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Michael+Busch
http://www.sharenews-blog.com:8090/helma/twoday/sharenews/search?q=Sasha+Abramsky
-----