Net Neutrality and the best Congress money can buy

Open Secrets had a link to a list of Senators and Representatives who took money since 1989 from AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon and whether they voted for or against net neutrality.  Every Senator took some money and only a handful of Representatives took no money from these three.

“We have the best Congress money can buy” is attributed to Will Rogers.

Maybe we need a Constitutional amendment that politicians can only accept money from individuals who can vote for them.

U.S. Tax Preparation, special interests making our life miserable

I posted the following comment to “Filling taxes in japan is a breeze, why not here?”, T.R. Reid, New York Times, 2017-04-17.

When we lived in Italy and Sweden (1968-1974) we filled out four-page forms for those countries' taxes. And then we had to at least fill out a two-page form for the U.S. But we didn't have much investment income then.

I have tried tax software, but their question format takes longer than doing my own spreadsheet. I tried the Free-Filer that the IRS site links to, but it doesn't provide instant recalculations like my spreadsheet does.

Maybe I shouldn't say this because some lobbyist will get Congress to take this benefit away: the IRS does provide fillable PDF forms that you can fill out offline instead of handwriting the data.

I should have added to my comment the old adage: We have the best Congress that money can buy!

I am a Democratic Party leader?

Way back in 2008 I donated ten or twenty bucks to the Obama campaign.  Ever since then I receive pleas for money and for filling out a “survey” from the Democratic National Party.

“OFFICIAL PARTY BUSINESS - OPEN IMMEDIATELY”

The letter, this time “from” Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, includes:

Melvyn, you are one of a select group of party leaders…

I am a Democratic Party leader?  The last time I was an official party leader was in the 70s when I was a Republican precinct financial chair.  Then came Reagan.  I’ve been wandering in the political desert ever since with a couple of forays to support one or another independent candidate.

Now Reagan looks like a liberal and my only choice is pretty much to vote Democratic.  The Democrats are several steps closer to reality and practical governance than the Republicans.  Where are the likes of John Anderson, Arne Carlson, and Bill Frenzel?

I scribbled on a plea for the 2012 Presidential campaign that Obama should depend on his big donors rather than small donors he courted so well in 2008.  I haven’t sent any money since.

Still the pleas come.

The return envelope is labeled:

SURVEY RESPONSE ENCLOSED – PLEASE RUSH

As with all political surveys, the questions and answer selections are biased toward the bias of the party printing the survey.  They are meant to affirm the party’s beliefs rather than shape them.

Well, I will vote in November.  That is a lot more than I can say about many who call themselves Democrats.

Conservatives, prudence, and the rest of us

George Will has written about "the central conservative virtue, prudence"; see
"What to make of George Will on Newt Gingrich".

I thought again about this prudence in reading "Why I'm Giving Up Cynicism for New Year's" by Bill McKibben, Yes! Magazine, 2012-01-06. McKibben wrote about the 234-194 Congressional vote "to force a quicker review of the [Keystone XL] pipeline":

"As important as the vote total in the House, however, was another number: within minutes of the vote, Oil Change International had calculated that the 234 Congressional representatives who voted aye had received $42 million in campaign contributions from the fossil-fuel industry; the 193 nays, $8 million."

This paragraph made me think about Will's "prudence" remark. Darn tootin' conservatives have "prudence"; they know better than to upset their paymasters.

Some of these same "prudent" conservatives are imprudent with facts and language. Maybe we should do our own fact and language change; let's call "campaign contributions" for what they are – bribes.

Now, dear reader, let me check your prudence. In the quote above "As important as the vote total…" what happened within minutes of the vote? Did those who voted "aye" receive within minutes "$42 million in campaign contributions from the fossil-fuel industry"?

If you thought the contributions were instantaneous, please read the quote again. "[W]ithin minutes of the vote, Oil Change International had calculated that…"

How easy it is to slant things to our own thinking!

Follow the money follow-up

Rather than just blather here about issues, I did act on campaign contributions. Sen. Amy Klobuchar is up for re-election next year, and so I sent following to her campaign.

"I am seriously considering not voting for any candidate who accepts money from organizations and people who accept campaign contributions from those who have no right to vote for that candidate. The situation for Cravaack is pretty bad, see Coffee Party's call-in "Who's your Daddy?" The FEC does not provide as much details for Senators, but I'm disappointed with both of our Senators from Minnesota. See Follow the money - Minnesota's Democratic U. S. Senators."

Follow the money - Minnesota's Democratic U. S. Senators

On 9 November I wrote an analysis of Rep. Chip Cravaacks' contributions, "Coffee Party's call-in 'Who's your Daddy?'". I wrote that I didn't check on Minnesota's Democratic Senators, Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken. As I'm not too pleased with the contributions to any candidates, I finally found a round tuit to look at Klobuchar's and Franken's contributions.

It's not as easy as looking at Cravaack's. The Senate does not provide the nice summary that the House of Representatives does. Essentially, the only detail is in the scanned copies of the reports that the Senators have to provide. And Open Secrets http://www.opensecrets.org doesn't provide as much detail for the Senate as the FEC does for the House of Representatives. I limited my review to the top 20 contributions from industries.

For Klobuchar this is at http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/industries.php?cycle=2012&cid=N00027500&type=I.

The top industry was lawyers and law firms. Both PACs and individuals gave $754,054 of her $4,056542 contributions from the top 20 industries, or 18.59%. Labor unions are broken down into five types; the total of all five types was $399,549 or 9.85%. Next was "retired" with only individual contributions of $317,000 or 7.82%. Lobbyists were fourth with $229,455 or 5.65%. The remaining groups were five percent or less. My thought is to let her have the votes of these contributors in 2012, if they can vote, and to carefully consider the alternatives to the major parties, including voting for Wright In.

For Franken this data is at http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/industries.php?cycle=2012&cid=N00029016&type=I.

The top industry is again lawyers and law firms, and it is probably followed by unions and retired. I've been searching and writing on this long enough for today. I will jump back to Franken's top contributors. The top four are Time Warner, General Electric, University of Minnesota and Moveon.org. It is kind of hard to know what this means as these are mostly individual contributions; the contribution of a web designer at Time Warner would be considered in this total. Is that web designer in New York or Minneapolis. From the data available on OpenSecrets, I wouldn't know.

What I was looking for is how much Franken may be getting from the medical device industry, given that he has proposed legislation to speed up approval of devices. The first directly health-related company was United Health ranked 37 with $18,150 from individual contributors. However, my thought is the same as for Klobuchar, let him have the votes of these contributors in 2014, if they can vote.

Coffee Party's call-in "Who's your Daddy?"

The Coffee Party suggested today, Nov. 9, as a day to call our senators and representatives asking them "Who's financing your campaign?" They were hoping to flood the switchboard. I don't know if they did, because when I called at 1:00 CST, I had an answer on the first ring from the switchboard, and was politely and cheerfully forwarded to the office of my Representative Chip Cravaack, Rep. MN-8.

The young man who answered on the first or second ring listened to my question, "What percentage of his contributors can vote for him, and what percentage of his campaign dollars came from voters in his district?" Before he answered, he asked my name and ZIP code. Fair enough. He asked me to hold while he conferred with somebody else. When he came back he referred me to the Federal Election Commission site and to the campaign headquarters.

I chose the first. Now two hours later I have some results on a spreadsheet. For 2011 through September, Rep. Cravaack has raised $539,748 with $270,517 from 352 named individuals and $146,567 from 106 other than party committees. There was also $122,664 unitemized individual contributions, probably less than $100.

Of named individual contributors, 11.65% were from out of state, but 82.08% of PACs were from out of state. Of dollars raised from individuals, 17.32% were from out of state, but 81.73% of PAC dollars were from out of state.

Of the total itemized dollars, 39.95% were from out of state, and 35.14% were from PACs, both in and out of state.

I didn't check on Senators Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken. It wouldn't surprise me that they had similar PAC and out-of-state contributions.

You can find the finances of all currently declared Congressional candidates at www.fec.gov. It can make for some interesting and time-consuming reading and calculations.

How can we fight too much money in campaigns?

One, don't watch TV. That is probably where most of the declared and undeclared money goes.

Two, let candidates who you think are too dependent on outside donors that you don't like such dependence and might not vote for them.

Three, be sure to vote, even if it has to be for Wright In. Staying away like nearly half the eligible voters do only helps the big bucks people get into office.

The 1% earned their money?

Anybody who reads the news regularly knows that there is plenty of back-scratching in the executive suites and board rooms of large companies. Not only do they provide bribes, er, campaign contributions to OUR supposed representatives, but they reward each other handsomely with no justification other than some mumbo-jumbo about performance in the proxy statements.

There is little mention of all the people who are paid far, far, far less but made all this "performance" possible. It's a bit like d'Artagnan of Three Musketeers fame who kicked his servant Planchet for "poor performance" but the servant did almost all the work except the sword fighting.

For some examples of this over-compensations see "The Most Outrageous Acts of Corporate America", The Daily Ticker with Daniel Gross, 2011-10-20.

Some simple steps to end corruption

1. Show up and vote
2. Choose candidates you believe in, ignore what the polls say about the "front runners".
3. If you don't strongly believe in any, rank them according to campaign contributions. The order is up to you among corporate contributions, total contributions, individual contributions, and location of contributors.
4. Show up and vote
5. Choose the candidates who rank most favorably according to step 3.
6. If you find all the choices for an office equally "corrupt", then consider somebody who you think is not corrupt and write that person's name in.
7. Show up and vote
8. If you can't think of anybody in step 6, then consider "Wright In".
9. Show up and vote
10. The only "spoiler" vote is the vote not cast.
11. Show up and vote
12. If you don't like the outcome of the election and you didn't follow steps 1, 4, 7, 9, and 11, don't blame me. I will have showed up and voted.

Quote of the day - campaign contributions

"What's the difference between a bribe and a campaign contribution?"
- Richard Coates, mostly jobless construction worker who demonstrated outside Bank of America in Boston, quoted in "Can 'Occupy Wall Street' really get money out of politics?", Mark Trumbell, Christian Science Monitor, 2011-10-14.

If you believe in unfettered free markets…

I have some tulip bulbs for you.

If you believe in unfettered free markets, I have some mortgages to sell you. Trust me, they are all low risk.

If you believe in unfettered free markets, I plan to buy the lot next to your house and start a junk yard.

If you believe in unfettered free markets, I plan to buy the lot on the other side of your house and start raising pigs.

You say I can't do these. I can if I pay your neighbors enough for their houses and don't tell them my intent.

You say there are laws against my doing these things in residential neighborhoods. I thought you were for unfettered free markets. These laws are fetters on the free markets. Besides, if I make enough contributions to candidates that see things my way, then they'll change the laws in my favor.

Preposterous, you say. Not at all. It's happening with big corporations selling risky investments without giving you complete information (complete information being a requirement for a free market), putting up unsightly commercial buildings in residential neighborhoods, polluting our air and water, and making exorbitant contributions to candidates, parties, and "right"-minded think tanks.

Spending can be saving

Many want to cut government spending, sometimes even if would save money. The AARP Bulletin has a couple of good articles that highlight this problem.

See "Criminals Bilk Medicare of billions each year" online, "Busting Medicare Fraud" in print, November 2009.

Four years ago Congress turned down a request for $300 million to track down Medicare fraud. An inspector general said every dollar spent doing so would return $17. Hmm, so not spending $300 million cost $4.8 billion (300 x (17-1)). Million wise, billion foolish?

If crooks bilk Medicare, it's bad, but we don't want to spend the money to catch them. If businesses bilk Medicare, it's OK because these businesses contribute to our campaigns.

Medicare is being invoiced for wheel chairs on average four times the cost paid by suppliers. "Congress blocked attempts to impose competitive bidding." Hmm, competition is good for schools but not medical suppliers. See "The Case of the Expensive Wheelchair". Gosh, I thought it was bad that my daughter was charged twice the amount for contact lenses that the ophthalmologist paid. I wasn't supposed to know this, but I saw the invoice as the receptionist took the lenses out of the shipping container and put them in a package for my daughter.