Hypocrisy

Democratic Senate Leader Harry Reid has spent the last several years demonizing businessmen Charles and David Koch (pronounced Coke), usually referred to merely as “the Koch brothers.”  Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats in the House and Senate, and their mouthpieces in the media, have parroted these attacks.  Reid has mentioned the much-maligned Koch brothers more than 140 times in speeches this year alone (there are actually people who keep track of these things.)

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Harry Reid has accused them (inaccurately) of wanting to abolish Social Security, public education, Medicare, women, and being in favor of cancer.  He has accused them of attempting to “buy” our democracy.  He has accused Senate Republicans of being “addicted to Koch.”  (Get it?)  He has even called them “un-American” for allegedly giving so much money to Republicans that they’ve “corrupted our political system.”

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So when the list of the top 25 “super PACs” was released last week, you’d expect that the evil Koch brothers would have been at the top of the list, since they were, after all, supposed to be the top corruptors of our political system.  But no, they were only number eight.  The number ONE super PAC on the list, was controlled by none other than – Harry Reid himself!

In fact, it wasn’t even close.  The Koch brothers’ PAC, Freedom Partners Action Fund, raised and spent a little over $8 million, and Harry Reid’s PAC, the Senate Majority PAC, raised and spent four times that amount, over $34 million.  The word hypocrisy comes to mind.

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Another interesting fact is that among the top 25 PACs, those affiliated with Democrats raised $110 million, compared to only $55 million raised by Republican-affiliated PACs.  So overall, Democrats raised twice as much as Republicans from these “corrupt, un-American” organizations.

That’s one of the main reasons that it’s not a foregone conclusion that Republicans will win the Senate by picking up six seats this fall, or that Republicans in the House will do as well as many hope, and expect.  The Democrats’ allies just have more money to throw around.  Most of it is being spent on negative TV ads in key races, trashing Republican candidates.  (It’s happening on the other side as well, but with less money behind it.)

Interestingly, on the House side, the Democrats under Nancy Pelosi have outraised Republicans under Speaker Boehner by $33 million.  The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) has raised $146 million and the National Republican Congressional Campaign Committee (NRCC) has raised only $113 million so far this election cycle.

I’m told that there are two main reasons why House Democrats are kicking butt on fundraising.  One is they’re able to raise significantly more money online than Republicans because they have Barack Obama’s online contributor list from his Presidential campaigns.  And secondly, Obama’s spent a great deal of time at fundraisers in major cities across the country.

The bottom line is, as long as there are elections, candidates and parties and their supporters will raise money to fund campaigns.  But for Harry Reid, the top guy in the United States Senate, to use his bully pulpit to bash a couple of law-abiding American citizens for contributing their own money to the political process, when the fundraising group he controls has raised four times as much money as they have, is the height of hypocrisy, and deserves to be roundly criticized.

But don’t hold your breath.

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