Campaign 2010

Countdown to Congressional Elections


The most effective way to restrict democracy is to transfer decision-making from the public arena to unaccountable institutions: kings and princes, priestly castes, military juntas, party dictatorships, or modern corporations.
Noam Chomsky, M.I.T. emeritus Professor of Linguistics

The Rise of Corporate Freedom of Speech

(Surpassed 2008 total on August 18)

See Weekly Spending Totals

$2.9 Billion Spent in 08
on Congressional Race
See Major Contributors

Corporate money in politics is bad enough. Secret corporate money is intolerable.


Primary Election Results
(UPDATED: August 25, 2010)






"The Great 2010 Incumbent (Non-)Revolt"

Senate Primary’s
Incumbent Democrats
1 Loss; 6 Wins of 13
Incumbent Republicans
1 Loss; 9 Wins of 12

House Primary’s
Incumbent Democrats
2 Loss; 182 Wins of 245
Incumbent Republicans
2 Loss; 140 Wins of 158

General Election Candidates

Senate

House of Representatives

Visual Facts

Hover to Pause.
Click Image for Larger Size.

National Debt Clock

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WHEN Did You Become Fiscally Responsible?
BEFORE Obama or AFTER Obama??
January 20, 2009
$10,838,758,414,164.46 - ↑90%
Discretionary Spending at 48.6%

January 20, 2001
$5,719,124,940,098.04 - 36%
January 20, 1993
$4,192,107,025,882.17 - 62%
January 20, 1989
$2,601,104,000,000.00 - 189%
January 20, 1981
$909,041,000.000.00

Click Image for Full Size


Debt by President

Are You A Tea Party Hyprocrite??

(Click for Debt Details)

United States of Corporations

Thanks to the GOP's Supreme Court
(Click Flag for Full Size)
Corporate Bill of Rights

Quotes and Links

Hover to Pause
(Look for the Listings)

The Decade When the U.S. Lost Its Way

Where Have All the Neocons Gone?

From Neocons to Crazy-Cons

America Builds an Aristocracy

Supreme immodesty: Why the justices play politics

The Biggest Medicare Fraud Ever

Enough Right-Wing Propaganda

Tax Rate for Richest 400 Taxpayers Plummeted in Recent Decades, Even as Their Pre-Tax Incomes Skyrocketed

"The financial reform bill will determine whether Wall Street’s banks will serve the American economy or whether the American economy will continue to serve Wall Street's banks."

"While the economy doesn't function for most of us ordinary workers, it yields considerable reward for those at the top."

Republicans Are Locked in a Passionate Embrace with a Corpse and Won't Let Go

"The most important thing Republicans think is that if there are Americans who can't afford the insurance policies that private insurers are willing to offer, then that's their problem."

"It should tell you everything you need to know that, in lobbying to retain its bank supervisory powers, the Fed's allies include the big Wall Street banks."

"[Texas Republican Jeb] Hensarling told a Texas-size whopper — and then tried to claim Republican credit for Bill Clinton’s budget surpluses."

"The Supreme Court's 5-to-4 decision last week giving American corporations the right to unlimited political spending was an astonishing display of judicial arrogance, overreach and unjustified activism."

"It was wrong because nothing in the First Amendment dictates that corporations must be treated identically to people."

"They backed the truck up to Fort Knox in broad daylight. They emptied it out, we rescued them and they get $150 billion in bonuses."

"A huge, unregulated boom in which almost all the upside went directly into private hands, followed by a gigantic bust in which the losses were socialized."

So You Just Squandered Billions . . . Take Another Whack at It

Banks 'Too Big to Fail' Have Grown Even Bigger

Bankers' bonuses Beat Earnings as Industry Imploded

U.S. Rescue May Reach $23.7 Trillion

The Bank Bailouts — Corporate Welfarism

New Evidence Cheney Swayed Reaction to Leak - Valerie Plame

Once Again, The More You Watch Fox The Dumber You Are

"Over the past year, the Federal Reserve and the Treasury have injected trillions of dollars into frozen financial markets, snapping up unwanted bonds, extending guarantees to banks and slashing interest rates."

Building a Better Capitalism

The End of Supply Side Economics

The Great Wealth Transfer

The Richer

Who Rules America? Power, Politics, and Social Change

Proponents of Estate Tax Repeal Are Resurrecting Old Misconceptions

Income Gaps Between Very Rich and Everyone Else More Than Tripled In Last Three Decades

Ending Plutocracy: A 12-Step Program

Our Gilded Age

The Rich and the Rest of Us

GOP's "Small Government" Talk is Hollow


Distortions, Hypocrisy & More

"I'm not upset that you lied to me; I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you"
Friedrich Nietzsche
[Hover to Pause]

Today is

July 10, 2009

SEC — (Paid) Training Facility For Big(er) Paying Jobs

July 10, 2009

Over the past several months we’ve all probably heard many in the news media making excuses for the Securities and Exchange Commission (and other regulatory agencies) for their failures to properly oversee the financial industry. The attitude by these defenders seems to be ‘it’s not their fault’. And the reason given is always the same — those poor agency employees are not properly compensated.

Upon returning yesterday after a week away on personal family business, I turned on my TV to find out how the market had performed during my absence. Naturally, the channel was right where I left it was when I turned it off a week ago — on CNBC.

Call it purely coincidental or some sort of psychic event in my timing of turning on the TV, but Jim Cramer of Mad Money was just beginning his “defense” of those at the SEC for not doing their job. He went on and on about why they had not been regulating the financial industry, and he insisted they probably would continue not doing their job. Cramer’s fix (as well as the many other defenders) is to pay them huge bonus — not said: ‘to do the job they are already being paid to do’.

I have to give Cramer due credit for not beating around the bush on his feelings on the matter. He openly admitted what the regulators will not own up to — ‘I’m not going to do the job I am paid to do unless I get some additional huge reward’. In other words, ‘I’m here only to draw a pay check until you agree to reward me’.

Cramer rightfully pointed out that regulators are not going to pursue any possible criminal activity by the same industry they plan to get a big-money job from when they leave the regulatory agency. He used this fact as his “justification” to levy huge bonuses (yea, sure — that’ll work). But not once did he mention, or even insinuate, that enforces of our laws has a fiduciary responsibility to our country and its citizens to do the job they were hired to do without further monetary consideration. Hell, the next thing you know, our city, county, state, and national law enforcement officials will be demanding huge rewards in addition to their regular pay checks if we expect them to pursue bank robbers, murderer’s, rapist, etc.

Maybe the problem is me. I suppose my morals of yesterday just don’t fit in with the 21st century. That is to say, in my day I made an agreement with my prospective employer — ‘if I accept the job and the pay you are offering, I will perform the job to the best of my abilities’. And there was also a silent, understood incentive — ‘do the job you were hired to do and you get to keep your job’. But with the SEC (and others), it seems to be ‘come on in!!. We’ll pay you to do nothing so you can build a relationship with an industry that will lead to a bigger paying job’.

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