Feb 25 2007
Who Buys What Politicians Are Selling?
With all the rhetoric about capitalists crooks ruining government with all their campaign contributions, we found it interesting to learn that many of the biggest contributors were not the usual pilloried organizations — e.g. Big Oil, and the likes striving for “unfair profits”, and so forth. Of course, following the money in government is very important. When you’re talking millions of dollars of contributions, you have to question what exactly is that money buying?
We can thank groups like the folks over at OpenSecrets.org for organizing the raw electronic data the government is making available. In this case, OpenSecrets has a nice page laying out who (or what) is making the largest contributions to Congress, and has the data tracked back to 1989! Not terribly surprisingly, many of the largest contributors, overall, are organized labor groups. It was not surprising to see that government workers — a sector where free market competition is forbidden by design and purpose, and the taxpayer is viewed as the bottomless resource for funding — lead the list at number one, followed closely at #4 by the National Education Association, the misleading name for the largest government school teachers’ union in the nation. The American Federation of Teachers is #15, which means, combined, government teachers carry more clout than any other group.
Should we be surprised that those workers quite literally have taxpayers over the barrel, receiving far more generous wages and benefits than are available to their non-government brothers in struggle, and dramatically more than non union workers who don’t use legislation to extract their advantage at the expense of the rest of the economy??
All said, money talks, and unions represent 13 of the top 30 political contributors. As an organized philosophy of collectivist and socialist ideology, unions combined are the single most influential driver of politics. We encourage our readers to click over to Vedran Vuk’s piece on the implications to the United States given so much power is in the hands of those who would see America’s trademark liberty and freedom be replaced with organized socialism.
The main groups behind these activities are labor unions. The trap is set perfectly. Make everyone hate business. Talk about lobbyists and special interest groups. Scream “Corporation! Corporation! Corporation!” while secretly influencing politics more than the blatant poster boys of campaign financing. The American people willingly fall into this snare every time.
Should it be any wonder how far we’ve already come??
Surprisingly, big oil is fairly low on the list, with Chevron at #67, Exxon Mobil at #73, and BP at #100. Halliburton, the super whipping boy of many critics, is not even among the top 100, although that may reflect that Halliburton is so connected, it does not have to bother.
Meanwhile, what should not be ignored are the major banking and financial institutions, and other associations of workers in those fields. Certainly those who profit from an inflating money supply ought to be watched, as should those who benefit by the ever increasing complexity of financial planning. If the organized labor is at the trough grabbing what they can, so too are many of these other groups. The losers are those who are average Americans too busy to play such games.
Feel free to check out the list yourself to make your own conclusions about who is buying what favors.
