Return of the Secret Donors:Tom Fahey's State House Dome: Out-of-state spending boosts Stephen
by: JonnyBBad
Sun Oct 17, 2010 at 09:00:36 AM EDT
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( - promoted by Dean Barker)
Back during the Watergate era it was illegal. The only difference now is that its "legal"
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10...
"Contributors," he said, "were literally flying into Washington with satchels of cash."
The Committee for the Re-Election of the President (CREEP) was also illegally hauling in many millions of dollars from corporations, many of which felt pressured into making contributions.
The record of donors was so tightly held that it was kept in a locked drawer by Rose Mary Woods, Nixon's secretary. The list - which came to be known as "Rose Mary's Baby" - wasn't released until Mr. Wertheimer forced the issue through a lawsuit. Among those on the list were William Keeler, the chief executive of Phillips Petroleum, who pleaded guilty, during the post-Watergate prosecutions, to making an illegal corporate donation.
Read Tom Fahey's State House dome about Lynch/Stpehen money imbalance after the jump
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Tom Fahey in today's UL online reports on the outside influences of undisclosed hidden donor cash on the Governor's race.
http://www.unionleader.com/art...
Each camp has about $300,000 in cash on hand.
But the dollar signs in their campaign finance reports filed last week only show part of the story. The real story is in the money held by groups from outside the state.
The Republican Governors Association's local political action committee reported that it has more than $1.3 million in cash ready to spend here. That's after it infused $1 million into the local PAC during the past three weeks.
Compare the RGA-NH PAC account to the $6,300 the Democratic Governors Association local PAC reported it had as of Oct. 13. That's what was left after it transferred $250,000 into the state Democratic Party coffers.
State House Dome sponsor
Besides the imbalance between two national governor groups, third party spending is the biggest difference this year. We may never know where that money came from, just the names of the groups that spent it. The anonymity is an outgrowth of the "Citizens United" decision by the U.S. Supreme Court last January that upended the McCain-Feingold controls on campaign spending.
Pamela Walsh, campaign manager for Lynch, estimated the Lynch campaign is being outspent 10-to-1 because of the influx of outside money by groups that don't have to file reports. She pegged spending by groups like RGA, Americans for Prosperity and National Organization for Marriage at $1 million a week.
We must take action. After the elections, a Campaign Reform Caucus must be formed.
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