News bits: Americans' concerns; The political donor class; Secrecy shields megasleaze

Poll data obtained in January lists public policy priorities. 

Defending democracy or protecting elections not a listed priority. However, the 4th priority is reducing the influence of money in politics. 

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A WaPo opinion describes how political donor class money circumvents laws to influence politics:

But [public concern about the influence of money in politics] not stopping America’s megadonors. In fact, wealthy contributors have been increasingly pumping cash into the political system — circumventing campaign finance laws in doing so.

Overall, political spending has ballooned in recent years:

One big reason for this has been an innovation known as “joint fundraising committees.” Both parties use them. And their influence is growing.

Here’s how they work: Election laws try to limit the influence of any one rich person by capping how much the individual can donate to a given candidate. In 2020, individuals could give no more than $5,600 directly to Joe Biden or Donald Trump. That’s a tidy sum, but it’s not enough to curry favor with Biden, who amassed more than a billion dollars in the 2020 election, or Trump, whose haul surpassed $800 million.

Joint fundraising committees render such limits meaningless. They allow presidential candidates to bring their campaign, their national party and state parties into a single fundraising entity. Donors can give a limited amount to each group, but -- thanks to the Supreme Court’s 2014 decision in McCutcheon v. FEC — they can hit the contribution limit for as many groups as they want.

The result: The maximum donation to these mega-committees is not $5,600. It’s the combined maximum for each participating group.

This is how two donors were able to cut $817,800 checks to Trump Victory, a joint fundraising committee run by the former president in 2020. Multiple donors gave $730,600 to the Biden Victory Fund. Both campaigns amassed hundreds of millions of dollars this way.

.... in practice, much of the money flows to the national party. .... state-level Republican parties sent 90 percent of their cut of the Trump Victory Fund to the Republican National Committee. In 2020, they sent 96 percent to the RNC. Meanwhile, Democratic state parties sent three-quarters of their haul from the Hillary Victory Fund to the DNC in 2016. In 2020, state parties gave about a quarter of their take to the DNC.

Given the amount of money involved, it seems unlikely that either party has a serious interest in reducing the influence of money in politics. Public opinion can go pound sand.

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The rule of law crashes and burns again?: Reports are coming out that the defamation lawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems against Faux News could wind up in a settlement. If that happens, the most likely outcome (~97% chance?) is a Faux payment of an undisclosed amount to Dominion, a secrecy agreement and Faux either (i) proudly claiming that it admits no wrongdoing, or (ii) invoking KYMS to avoid FIMS. The Guardian reports:

The trial in the closely watched $1.6bn defamation lawsuit between Dominion Voting Systems and Fox will begin a day later than scheduled, the judge overseeing the case announced on Sunday evening, hours before opening arguments were set to begin on Monday and amid reports of settlement talks.

The Wall Street Journal, citing a person familiar with the matter, reported on Sunday that Fox had made a late push to settle the case out of court. Reuters also reported that the delay was due to settlement talks, according to a source familiar with the situation, as did the Washington Post, citing two sources.

KYMS = keep your mouth shut 

FIMS = foot in mouth syndrome

About a week ago, Faux settled another defamation lawsuit brought by a rich person that Faux slandered. On April 10, CNN reported:

Fox News has settled a defamation lawsuit from a Venezuelan businessman who had accused the network of making false claims about him and the 2020 election, attorneys for the man and Fox News said Saturday in a court filing.

The details of the settlement were not made public.

“This matter has been resolved amicably by both sides,” a Fox News spokesperson said Sunday, declining further comment.

Following the 2020 election, former Fox Business host Lou Dobbs had accused the businessman, Majed Khalil, of playing a key role in supposedly rigging the election against Donald Trump.

In a tweet calling the 2020 election a “cyber Pearl Harbor,” Dobbs named Khalil as one of four people he wanted his audience to “get familiar with” for committing supposed election fraud.

That's probably how the Dominion lawsuit will fizzle out if there is a settlement. As usual, the public will be kept in the dark and fed bullshit about it. Faux will proudly claim it did nothing wrong but settled just to be done with it. In fact, Faux will have settled to make it go away, leave loyal Faux viewer's feng shui calm and comfortable, profits coming in and lies and slanders going out. For liars and anti-democracy authoritarians and fascists, it's a win-win. For democracy supporters and inconvenient truth, it's a lose-lose. 

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From the shocked but clueless commentator files: Juan Williams, a friend of Clarence Thomas is shocked, shocked mind you: An opinion The Hill published comments:

I consider Clarence Thomas a friend, and I’m shocked by recent reports

The smell of financial corruption around Thomas is now stronger than the longstanding fear that his votes on the high court are dictated by his hatred of the liberals who put him through painful nomination hearing dominated by Anita Hill’s charges of sexual harassment.

The smell of financial favors is also now stronger than puzzlement about Thomas’s unyielding loyalty to a hardline Republican agenda that made former President Trump call Thomas his favorite justice.

Thomas’s one-sided rulings on guns, abortion and race have long provoked critics who suggest he is motivated by something other than the facts, legal precedent, and fair application of a 236-year-old Constitution to life in contemporary America.

But even with this partial awakening by Williams, he still frames it favorably for Thomas. Williams spins it by saying that Thomas merely failed to appreciate the “limiting influence on his thinking” that came from cavorting with far-right players, e.g., the Nazi billionaire Harlan Crow. 

Limiting influence? How about corrupting influence? 

What is wrong with radical right people? They are cognitively broken. Even when they occasionally see inconvenient truth, they cannot accept it. To assuage their cognitive dissonance, they frame inconvenient reality to soften the blow to their fragile egos. That's wuss to say the least.