Barack Obama's Well-Tended Money Machine
The great American poet and prose-mangler William Burroughs once offered some words of advice for young people, words that work just as well for inhabitants of Washington D.C.: “An old junk pusher told me,” he wrote, “ 'Watch whose money you pick up.' ”
This is especially true in politics. Whatever Howard Dean's other noble characteristics, for example, only a precious few will ever again see him as an independent voice in the debate over pharmaceuticals since he has taken untold amounts of money, through a law firm, from drug companies. (Dean even dons a hard hat these days, and looks real interested as he tours a biologic manufacturing facilities with BIO's top lobbyist Jim Greenwood. See the picture here.) He can swear to his grave that his views are not for sale, but it won't matter. He picked up dirty money, money that was specifically set aside by a multi-billion dollar industry to influence lawmaking. He made himself suspect.
This is the same problem that Barack Obama faces today, after a terrific bit of reporting in the Washington Times by Matthew Mosk. The story examines the many ways in which Obama has rewarded his top fundraisers since arriving at the White House—through ambassadorships, a golf game on Martha's Vineyard, events at the White House, bowling at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, private briefings with senior officials like Jim Messina and Austan Goolsbee, etc.
Since Obama has taken money from all of these people he is rewarding--often money of the six-figure variety--his motivations are suspect. It looks like payback. It looks bad.
Obama's aides offer a simple defense: At least we are not as bad as the other guys, which is itself an admission of sorts. “I would say from our reckoning, our research, there are fewer donors getting fewer things, whatever you may call them, from this White House than from any White House in memory,” explains Brad Woodhouse, a spokesman at the Democratic National Committee.
Mosk's article does not clearly show otherwise. There are no overnight sleepovers in the Lincoln bedroom, which Clinton made so famous. And the mixers with donors and the president appear to be more limited than the systematic schmoozing of George W. Bush's presidency. (They also involve a number of long-time personal Obama friends, who have ties with the president far deeper than fat checks.) But none of these qualifications remove the stain completely. As Mosk points out, Obama himself has acknowledged as much during the campaign, when he said that he “suffered from the same original sin of all politicians, which is we've got to raise money.”
The problem is that the White House now finds itself in a position where spokesman Robert Gibbs seems to be denying the obvious. Here is an example of how the briefing went today:
QUESTION: Was there a quid pro quo here?
GIBBS: No, of course not.
QUESTION: Well, the DNC documents actually say, those who raise $300,000 before the 2010 midterm election get quarterly meetings with senior members of the Obama administration.
GIBBS: I'd point you to the DNC on that.
QUESTION: But they're with White House officials.
GIBBS: I'd point you to the DNC.
Not exactly Gibbs' finest hour from the podium. Were the administration to do the honest thing, they would admit what Obama admitted during the campaign--Barack Obama is a politician who is willing to do certain things for those who give him lots of money. This is really not a secret. Almost every week this fall, the White House has followed Obama to fundraisers all around the country, where he spends time with people in exchange for money.
It is the same on the streets as it is in marble halls, the same in the bordellos of Tangier as in the ballrooms at the Mandarin Oriental. The money you pick up matters. To pretend otherwise is to play us for fools. There were a lot of people Obama could have golfed with on Martha's Vineyard, and he chose his top New York bundler, UBS Americas CEO Robert Wolf. As Burroughs, may he rest in peace, put it, "Don't take me for dumber than I look."
POSTSCRIPT: Here is Burroughs in all his profane glory. (Beware, some harsh language, and harsher imagery, included.)
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1
This is precisely why very little gets done in Washington that favors the average citizen's day-to-day life.
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As much as I despise Ralph Nader, following the Clinton era, one has to conclude that money drives policy in both parties. And the big money is from corporate interests that always overwhelm the interests of the general population.
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After all, we're just customers whose pockets need to be picked.-
1.1
"This is precisely why very little gets done in Washington that favors the average citizen's day-to-day life".
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And precisely why hypocrisy from both the right and left will continue until the voters of this nation realize what DUPES we all are in the entire scheme of things called "politics".
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When people are elected for life into their positions of "public servants", the real motive for their desires for the most part is to gain power and/or money.
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Reading down through all the various comments, Michael Sherer is beat up for simply telling it like it is. The vast majority are so focused on the fact that Obama is no different than anyone that has come before him in the past. The sad thing, and what one concludes is that Obama promised "change we can believe in", and to put a Nancy Pelosi spin on it, he would "drain the swamp".
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Unfortunately that will never happen in my life-time or a multitude of lifetimes until the American voter realizes and demands that term limits need to be imposed. Coupled with campaign donations that cannot exceed $1,000 per person. Once these two politcal reforms are put into place, hopefully the raping of the tax payer will at least be minimal.
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Thank you Michael for bringing this problem back into the light for everyone to at least think about, and hopefully those who are upset with these practices will write to the elected Congress person demanding change or vote for someone in future elections who will attempt to pass legislation that will bring about change we so desparately need.
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2
What bull$hit.
http://mediamatters.org/research/200910280025
I'm all for purely publicly-funded campaigns and a ban on political donations, but there's a little matter of a Supreme Court ruling that would require a Constitutional amendment to overcome.
Until then, politicians will have to fundraise. Period.
And for the corporatist media to call out Obama for this trivial $hit when it took independent bloggers to bring to anyone's attention the criminal corruption of the Bush adminstration is hypocritical in the extreme.
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3
Yes, Obama is not pure. But this reminds me a bit of the media story a few weeks ago that expressed shock that people on the Obama white house used profanity. The vapors expelled were highly amusing after Dick 'Go F yourself" Cheney just left D.C.
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Gimme a freaking break. If Obama was squeaky clean, it would be a story. If he was much more corrupted by donors than Clinton or Bush, it would be a story. This is a page 15 story at best. If there is a quid quo pro, report it. Go after it. I am getting a bit annoyed at the "shocked shocked" there is gambling reporting on Obama though, followed by a tiny paragraph that notes there was more gambling before he came into town.
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3.1
I am getting a bit annoyed at the "shocked shocked" there is gambling reporting on Obama though, followed by a tiny paragraph that notes there was more gambling before he came into town.
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Funny how some people have internalized the "Obama-as-Messiah" meme pushed by the right-whingers. I realize that expectations are high, but in no way should they be that high. -
3.2
@grape
Unless they legalize marijuana. -
3.3
Oh, I'm thinking the expectations are high more along the lines of Fear-and-Loathing-in-Las-Vegas-Naked Lunch-Electric-Kool-Aid-Acid-Test-high, hotbbq...
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3.4
^ I approve of your reading list. May I include The Doors of Perception?
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4
So all these words boil down to :"It looks bad"?
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Sheesh MS if you are going to try to be a crusading reporter (which I assume is the real point of this post) could you at least do your own reporting rather than leaning on the Moonie Times?-
4.1
Sheesh MS if you are going to try to be a crusading reporter (which I assume is the real point of this post) could you at least do your own reporting rather than leaning on the Moonie Times?
Real reporting is hard. It's way easier to simply parrot whatever smear du jour is being pushed by the right-wing tabloids.
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5
"It is the same on the streets as it is in marble halls, the same in the bordellos of Tangier as it is ballrooms at the Mandarin Oriental."
What drivel. Comparing the long-standing American political system to prostitution is absurd. Both systems are, of course, wrong, but they're nowhere near on the same plane (for one thing, Obama's actions are perfectly legal). I'm sure you thought this sentence represented your writing at your lyrical best--sadly, it probably does. Too bad it also depends on false equivalency.
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5.1
Both systems are, of course, wrong, but they're nowhere near on the same plane (for one thing, Obama's actions are perfectly legal).
I'd prefer legal sexual prostitution over legal political prostitution. In the former, only two people are getting screwed.
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6
To be a "crusading reporter, he'd have to actually be reporting something--he's just riding Matthew Mosk's coattails here.
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7
Are you serious? You are surprised that a politician is giving some perks to people who raised funds for him?
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8
In a parallel universe, Scherer's linking to the newspaper article about how Obama's not raising enough money, and waxing lyrical about how naïve and unprepared Obama is.
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Zero substance, zero value added. Curse you, internets, for ruining print journalism! -
9
Michael Scherer:
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You correctly note:...a precious few will ever again see [POLITICIAN X] as an independent voice in the debate over pharmaceuticals since he has taken untold amounts of money, through a law firm, from drug companies...
Does the same hold true for newsmedia outlets such as Time, who have also taken untold amounts of money, through advertisers, from drug companies?
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While I don't necessarily dispute your assessment of Dean, I believe that it it incumbent upon you to define who you mean by the "few" who "will ever again see" things any particular way.
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To whom exactly are the judges of independence in voice that you refer, Michael Scherer?-
9.1
Does the same hold true for newsmedia outlets such as Time, who have also taken untold amounts of money, through advertisers, from drug companies?
Oh, snap.
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9.2
You lie!
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NBC is not corrupted by GE's defense contracts. Disney and Time-Warner are not corrupted by their media businesses. Any reporter at Time magazine would be proud and eager to report on payola or some other such scandal from their corporate masters. They would be handsomely rewarded for the effort too.
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That special Brian Williams did on GE's environmental problems was great I heard. I missed it, because I was watching Fox news report on Rupert Murdoch's dealings with the Chinese government.
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10
As long as MS is using the Washington Times as an assignment editor I expect within a day or so Michelle Malkin's in depth expose on AARP will be hitting the Swamp.
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11
SZ's post makes me think, what was the purpose at all of the Dean stuff?
Wasn't this a post about how tainted BHO is? Could MS have made that point using someone else?
Could he have used someone actually that holds office?I know Bacaus and Lieberman can't be considered as the Insurance Industry doesn't have much sway.
MS and KT have both said so.But maybe there is someone else in Congress.
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11.1
Yeah Paul you would have thought he would have used a more direct example like his boy John McCain taking all that money from the telecoms so that he would oppose net neutrality, so the guys that charges us up the ying yang for the text messages that cost them practically nothing, force us into multi-year contracts just to keep our favorite phone and can find a way to nickel and dime some more money out of the Internet by holding our traffic hostage. It's funny how easy it is to connect McCain's list of quids with the positions he champions. While a lot of people don't even bother to look because of McCain/Feingold, the truth is he does this a lot. The NY Times nailed him last year, too bad they went for the sex scandal that they couldn't prove and everyone used that to dismiss the rest of it even though the rest of it was dead on. But funny I don't hear Scherer tackling that.
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11.2
Obviously Mikey has been away at one of those intensive, total-immersion, how-to-be-a-jack0ff-idiot seminars.
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12
"All this has happened before, and all this will happen again."
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13
Oh Mickey this is beneath even you. I know the media is not trying to say that Obama is doing something untoward when it is obvious that in our system he has to raise money for political races. the fact that you want to hold Obama to a standard that no mere mortal can live up to is your choice. As a black man he was raised on the dictum that he has to be ten times better than anyone else just to be considered equal. Now he has to be ten times as magical just to be considered honest, effective or dare I say it normal.
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This is so patently unfair, in a system that demands that politicians raise funds as the price of admission, you and your brethren are trying to go out of their way to paint this president as beyond the pale. Here we go again -- it's clin ton vu all over again. You take a president who has been more forthright, more candid than any other politician we've seen in a very long time, one whose done more than any previous administration to limit the impact of lobbyist inside his administration, and from those who at the end of their tour could do upon leaving it, and suggest he's one step beyond selling sleepovers in the Lincoln bedroom? How far are you people going to move the goal posts before you find yourself no longer on the same field of play?
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Just keep in mind that it seems a bit much for anyone in the media to getting up on their soap box when they have failed to connect any of the dots between the right and their own parent corporate relations and have not spent a lot of ink on financial scandals involving the media such as the Washington Post trying to sell admission to access-filled soirees, cbs producers black-mailing celebrities, and the number of so-called, off the record mistakes because you wanted to publish the juicy stuff, I wouldn't squawk too loudly otherwise someone might take another look at the standards you live by. -
14
What does Howard Dean have to do with Barrack Obama's White House? What dirty money has Howard Dean taken, how is it dirty and when did he become a lawmaker? Are you suggesting without putting forth any evidence that the pharma lobbisit are using stolen or launder money or even illegal drug money? Who are the only precious few that will see him as a independant voice in the debate over pharmaceuticals? Did you take a poll that you didn't link to?
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When you say Obama has taken money - over six figures. What do you mean by that? Did Obama pocket the money for himself? -
15
I just finished reading the comments on Amy's post below, looked at the title of the new one at the top and knew it was by Michael before I even clicked on it.
MS are you trying to get a position on Faux News along with the other pseudo journalists, Juan Williams and Mara Liaason? Your finding these shocking (I tell you shocking) stories would seem to qualify you for the group.
And, the Washington Times?? Via @ OWillis RT @DCRTV: The Washington Times' circ plunges 8 percent to just 67K. That's just 12 percent of the Post's circ! More at http://dcrtv.com
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15.1
...did MS once really work at Mother Jones? Or does he have a twin out there somewhere?
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16
Poilitics is so gosh darn confusing.
I've been told over and over that Baucus' opposition to a public option had nothing to do with the insurance lobby. Lobbyists just aren't that powerful, you know.
Now you're telling me that money buys influence??
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17
You might also want to do an in-depth story on Jim Greenwood, who before he became a top lobbyist for BIO, was a Repub congressman from Bucks County PA that we thought was a really good one. Then, poof, off to the corridors of power before he finished his last term. Has to raise money for the family dontcha know.
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18
Isn't it the hypocrisy, stupid. Aren't we always told that the reason GOP peccadilloes are so bad is that the GOP acts like the nation's scold on moral issues? Well, here, Barack Obama campaigned on grass roots, yadda yadda yadda. And now we find that he's just like all the others?
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Yeah, I get it when some right-wing Bible thumper slips it's somewhat newsworthy. Usually someone like that makes a mistake or two or three, but this is standard operating procedure. The cynicism here is just very hard to take. -
19
Re: Dean
he has taken untold amounts of money, through a law firm, from drug companies.
(a) Sorry, but if you want me to take you seriously as a journalist (i.e. change my opinion about you) you actually have to TELL US how much Dean took. "Untold" = none until proven otherwise.
(b) I have no idea what it means to take money "through a law firm". I do know that Dean isn't a lawyer, so cannot be accepting legal fees. Other than that, I find this phrase rather curious, unenlightening, and suggestive of unsupportable guilt by association.
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20
Wow, Mike, this might be the hottest story EVER!!
Among the scoops in this "terrific bit of reporting" from the Moonie-owned rightwing WashTimes:
"Bundlers closest to the president were invited to watch a movie in the red-walled theater in the basement of the presidential mansion."
Oh, no!
"Mark Gilbert, a Florida businessman who raised more than $500,000 for Mr. Obama, said he gets regular e-mails from the White House on topics that interest him."
NO!
"Two top bundlers, for instance, described invitations to bring their families to the private bowling alley at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, adjacent to the White House."
and
"Marty Nesbitt, who bundled between $50,000 and $100,000, and John Rogers, who bundled more than $500,000, have both spent time with Mr. Obama in the White House, including joining the president in the White House movie theater.
NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!
Mike, thanks for bringing this story to the attention of all of us who have the good sense to avoid the ridiculous Washington Times. I guess the "terrific" part of this reporting is that the WashTimes didn't question Obama's birth certificate or take about death panels.
I've got one quick quibble w/ you, though.
You write: "...overnight sleepovers in the Lincoln bedroom, which Clinton made so famous." In point of fact, Clinton didn't make these famous. This was done by rightwing organs like Fox and WashTimes who endlessly screamed and screamed unfounded allegations of nefarious dealings until their screaming was finally picked up by nitwit MSM journalists in places like Time.
Congratulations.
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21
" .. Since Obama has taken money from all of these people he is rewarding .."
Billions of (stimulus and non-stimulus) dollars have gone out from the Obama administration to various people, oranizations and companies. It is not clear that the auto companies, fopr instance, are being rewarded by Obama for something.
Or would you say that MOST of the funds out of the Obama Administration have gone out into "rewards" for favors bestowed?" .. It looks like payback. It looks bad. .."
I doubt that the $3.4 billion in support for “smart grid” projects announced by the administration on Tuesday was a reward to those who will be the recipients ....
" .. Beware, some harsh language, and harsher imagery, included. .."
I can usually get my point across quite effectively to the right wing nuts without resorting to the foul language the Pope wouldn't use. And I try not to pay heed to people who do. -
22
Re: Obama
I will be the first to criticize Obama for both his ideological sympathy with and financial ties to Wall Street and other large corporate donors. Having said that...can someone please show me the link to where Scherer criticized the K Street project? Or where Scherer criticized Bush and Cheney's ties to big oil? Or when he has ever written that a Republican's having been photographed next to a lobbyist meant that said Republican "picked up dirty money" and had "made himself suspect"? Links, please?
The Republicans literally institutionalized the revolving-door of influence that Scherer is now criticizing. This doesn't make Obama right. But it does make Scherer a complete douche-bag.
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23
As usual, Michael Scherer simply can't make me care.
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If Scherer could demonstrate that listening to donors from time to time has had any effects on anyone (and maybe it has!) I might care. But that would require some (what's the word I'm looking for) effort, so Scherer just dresses up a Moonie Times piece in William Burroughs.
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Burroughs, like your beloved Thomas Pynchon, would think you're a tool. -
24
I agree a) that TWT is a Moonie rag, b) MSM pub's and GOP legislators are equally whorish, and c) anything less than this tainted quid pro quo would = electoral defeat.
That said, Obama is the most powerful man in the US and his fellow dems are holding all the gavels in Congress, so quite logically, if a watered down "public option," "climate bill," "banking reform agenda" results, naturally, I'm going to be most f'ing miffed about their corruption. Pointing at republicans or the media is, umm, what guys like Baucus and apparently our sit-on-his-hands president want us to do.
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25
It is day Number 284.
What has this administration accomplished?
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25.1
He's protected us longer from a terrorist attack on our soil than Bush did during his first 284 days in office?
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25.2
sacredh
The First Tourist had the good fortune of having Bush come before him and not Clinton. The poor guy following Obama will probably not be as fortunate.
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25.3
Clinton was also tested by a terrorist attack on the World Trade Center during his first time and had the misfortune of following Bush senior.
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25.4
Do not forget Oklahoma City.
Strange how the philosophies of Timothy McVeigh echo in the words of Beck and Limbaugh today.
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25.5
Yeah but I don't remember Bush Sr being handed the leader of the attack before the attack.
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25.6
abdullah69
"Strange how the philosophies of Timothy McVeigh echo in the words of Beck and Limbaugh today."
Strange how the philosophies of the terrorists echo in the words of the WH and liberal left
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- michaelscherer My favorite newish piece of political rhetoric in Obama's speech today: "waxing political." Sort of like waxing lyrical, except not. - 2 hours ago
- michaelscherer RT @ron_fournier: Did he say 15 years? President Obama's exit strategy gets a Karzai twist: http://bit.ly/6Lm9Q5 - 2 hours ago
- michaelscherer Sketchy santas RT @aterkel: ha - http://bit.ly/5SFqaG - 5 hours ago
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