Campaign Contributions=Bribes

The thread on Term limits brought this basic problem up & I figured it deserved its own discussion. Here are my feelings (from another thread):

"While campaign contributions is a bit off topic I would be in favor of making illegal ANY bribes (err....campaign contributions ) to any elected official. Make all elections be totally funded by taxes. I think any money given to an elected official to influence his vote is a BRIBE....Plain & simple!"

Good point, I think that no matter how good the intention one would be hard pressed not to remember who gave a large sum of money. But with the cost of present day I don`t think the tax payers should foot the bill unless extremely scaled down & then the public might not be as well informed. It might just go back to being the U.S.A. where any millioniares son or daughter could some day grow up to buy the office. A hard nut to crack, prehaps limits with closed loop-holes.

You mean like this?
"Senator Barack Obama received a $101,332 bonus from American International Group in the form of political contributions according to Opensecrets.org. The two biggest Congressional recipients of bonuses from the A.I.G. are - Senators Chris Dodd and Senator Barack Obama."

http://www.examiner.com/x-268-Right-Sid ... s-from-AIG

Now Dodd is trying to throw BHO under the bus.

"Dodd Blames Obama Administration for Bonus Amendment"

“I did not want to make any changes to my original Senate- passed amendment” to the stimulus bill, “but I did so at the request of administration officials"

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid= ... _tMXRy2vDs

spc wrote:You mean like this?
"Senator Barack Obama received a $101,332 bonus from American International Group in the form of political contributions according to Opensecrets.org. The two biggest Congressional recipients of bonuses from the A.I.G. are - Senators Chris Dodd and Senator Barack Obama."

http://www.examiner.com/x-268-Right-Sid ... s-from-AIG

Now Dodd is trying to throw BHO under the bus.

"Dodd Blames Obama Administration for Bonus Amendment"

“I did not want to make any changes to my original Senate- passed amendment” to the stimulus bill, “but I did so at the request of administration officials"

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid= ... _tMXRy2vDs

Heehehe...I give them 90 days before they're trying to slit each others throats!

spc wrote:You mean like this?

Not taking the bait Stephen. Suffice it to say that your side has Ted Stevens, et al & our side has them too. It's the system that screwed up & fails to take human nature (greed) into account. We can't change human nature so let's change the system.

Devil505 wrote:Not taking the bait Stephen.

I'll take that as a "YES".

But Obama didn't take money from Lobbyists which could potentially assert influence over him after he was elected. He only took money from labor unions that are now trying to influence, o wait forget I just said that.

Objection

billlindley wrote:But Obama didn't take money from Lobbyists which could potentially assert influence over him after he was elected. He only took money from labor unions that are now trying to influence, o wait forget I just said that.

Yeah, our Dear Leader and his cronies would never buy influnence.


Oh, and last I checked TEd Stevens (R. Alasaka) was given the heave-ho.

All I hear is more party line crap. The whole system needs fixed on both sides, it`s gone on for so long that its going to be hard to change. Same as the pork, these reps don`t know how to write or vote on a bill without the third grade mentality of well if you want that I`m going to one up you & add this. Make them all declair & pay taxes on every perk & dinner they attend. I was watching CNN(I believe it was) when Dodd was asked about that wording & then he knew absolutly nothing about it. It wasn`t in there as far as he knew. I know he wasn`t under oath then but I think there should be some type of penalty for publicly lieing to the very people that he is representing. And thats for all parties not just the party of choice, if you name dems. someone else can name reps so whats the point. It`s the system that is dirty.