Democrat Zombie, here are the Dems puppet masters
>MoveOn Gravy Train Makes and Breaks Political Fortunes
September 18, 2007, By Major Garrett
WASHINGTON — Here's a pop quiz on money in politics: Who gives more money to federal candidates, the National Rifle Association or MoveOn.org?
Answer: MoveOn.
And it isn't even close.
In the last two election cycles, MoveOn.org Political Action Committee spent more than $58 million in pro-Democrat political advocacy, according to Federal Election Commission records.
In just the 2006 election cycle, MoveOn.org spent $27 million in advocacy to elect a Democratic majority in Congress and used its formidable fund-raising clout to propel numerous Democratic challengers to House and Senate victories. By comparison, the NRA PAC donated $11 million in 2006.
"They give away and raise about three times as much as the National Rifle Association," said Massie Ritsch, communications director for the Center for Responsive Politics.
Founded in 1998 by Wes Boyd and Joan Blades, MoveOn.org started as an online petition to stop the impeachment of President Bill Clinton in the aftermath of the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal. Boyd and Blades, software engineers from Berkeley, Calif., posted a petition on the Internet seeking signatures for Congress to censure Clinton and "move on" to other domestic issues.
The online petition attracted like-minded liberals and MoveOn began a near-continuous dialogue with its members about what it should do to influence American politics. It created its PAC in 1999 and began attracting money for the 2000 campaign, raising, according to reports, $250,000 in the first five days and $2 million for the entire cycle. Though impressive for its first cycle, MoveOn did not find its true voice or tap into deep-seated anti-war angst until after the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
"MoveOn has grown into one of the biggest political action committees in the country," Ritsch said. "MoveOn collects money and says to its members 'We're going to pass that money along.' They're a conduit. They are aggregating and assembling all the money and pooling their resources so it adds up to big influence."
MoveOn backs candidates and asks members to send contributions on their behalf. They pass the donations on directly and handle all the paperwork.
"This is a form of bundling," Ritsch said.
A quick tally of MoveOn-directed contributions in the 2006 election cycle, according to records compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, offers a sample of the size of its donations:
— Sen. Robert Byrd, West Virginia = $834,211
— Sen. Claire McCaskill, Missouri = $382,531
— Sen. Jon Tester, Montana = $301,788
— Sen. Sherrod Brown, Ohio = $287,622
— Sen. Bob Casey, Pennsylvania = $160,780
Those contributions helped build a Senate Democratic majority as four of the five entered the Senate for the first time. McCaskill and Tester won razor-thin victories over well-funded GOP incumbents Jim Talent and Conrad Burns.
MoveOn-directed contributions also propelled several Democratic challengers to House victories, among them: Nick Lampson, Texas' 22nd District, $156,883; Tim Mahoney, Florida's 16th District, $145,334; Zack Space, Ohio's 18th District, $141,298; Michael Arcuri, New York's 24th District, $129,685; Joe Donnelly, Indiana's 2nd District, $123,035, and Tim Walz, Minnesota's 1st District, $102,657.
"They can help you a lot if you're a (MoveOn) candidate," said Byron York, White House correspondent for the conservative National Review magazine and author of "The Vast Left Wing Conspiracy," a book on powerful liberal groups and their organizing practices.
They live by the $25, $50 and $100 contributions. The smaller the contributions, the more people it takes to come up with a big amount of money.
MoveOn's clout was visible most recently in the muted and belated response from prominent Democrats in the aftermath of the organization's full-page New York Times advertisement last week questioning whether congressional testimony by Army Gen. David Petraeus, head of Multinational Forces in Iraq, would "Betray Us?"
On Capitol Hill, Democrats avoided the issue for days as did the party's top presidential candidates. Only after days and days of coverage did prominent Democrats declare the advertisement out of bounds.
MoveOn directs no contributions to Republican candidates or incumbents, instead avidly spending money against the GOP. It spent more than $2.5 million in 2006 in independent expenditures against Republicans.
House GOP incumbents who lost in 2006 and saw significant MoveOn independent expenditures against them can testify. Among those hardest hit: Charlie Bass, New Hampshire's 2nd District, $143,266; Chris Chocola, Indiana's 2nd District, $245,603; Melissa Hart, Pennsylvania's 4th District, $297,603; and Nancy Johnson, Connecticut's 5th District, $444,424.
Two House Republicans survived the MoveOn independent expenditure onslaught in '06, Rep. Deborah Pryce, who represents Ohio's 15th District, absorbed $417,623 in MoveOn wrath but won a narrow victory nevertheless. Rep. Thelma Drake of Virginia's 2nd District won a second term with 51 percent of the vote after withstanding $529,535 in MoveOn independent expenditure torment, giving her the distinction among House Repubicans of taking the most expensive independent expenditure punch MoveOn threw in the 2006 campaign and living to tell the tale.
MoveOn also punishes Democrats who stray from their liberal, anti-war world view. MoveOn ran a radio ad against Michigan Democratic Rep. John Dingell when he announced his opposition to higher fuel economy standards for automobiles and light trucks.
"Just because MoveOn only supports Democrats doesn't mean it supports all Democrats," Ritsch said. |
