Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Plays Scathing 'Corruption Game': 'It's Already Super Legal for Me t

[Daryl Hunt]

They keep using her early stuff to discredit her. But she's not the starry eyed bambi anymore. She's a force to be reckoned with. In that clip, she was just plain brilliant. When she was leading that pack in the Senate looking for absent Mitch, it's too bad she didn't find him. She could have tied him to the front of her pickup and drove around Washington for a bit. I wonder if they have Game Tags for that?

She's a ******* imbecile and so is anybody still defending her, but as I've said before, even stupid people get representation.

I take it Taz you didn't like her game?

I found it refreshing. She took advantage of the fact that it was on the floor of the House and the answers had to be truthful. She asked Republicans those questions and they had to honestly answer it in a yes or no situation. She was extremely well prepared and her delivery was brilliant. You can dislike her all you want but you can't take that away from her. What she has shown is that our government is corrupt and broken and needs to be fixed. Cortez is scaring the living hell out of a lot more than just Republicans.

 

[Dont Taz Me Bro]

Cortez is scaring the living hell out of a lot more than just Republicans.

I'll tell you the same thing I've told all the other Alexandratards. You continue to confuse mockery and ridicule of the galactically stupid as being fear. People are about as afraid of her as they are the court jester. Continue to make this mistake at your own peril.

 

[Dont Taz Me Bro]

She made a bunch of Congress Critters lookl like a bunch of greedy corrupt criminals that they really are. The Federal Congress is exempt from the various antitrust acts. If the same things were done by the civilian businesses, there would be a whole bunch of fines and a whole lot of managers cooling their heels in Prisons. We need to make Congress and the President as accountable as we do the civilians. But we have the fox guarding the henhouse.

Just because she can see the same problems with Congress that most of us can doesn't mean she has the intelligence or maturity to fix them, which has been made more than clear by her own actions.

 

[Daryl Hunt]

Cortez is scaring the living hell out of a lot more than just Republicans.

I'll tell you the same thing I've told all the other Alexandratards. You continue to confuse mockery and ridicule of the galactically stupid as being fear. People are about as afraid of her as they are the court jester. Continue to make this mistake at your own peril.

WE laughed at Trump as well and look at what that got us.

 

[edward37]

Cortez is scaring the living hell out of a lot more than just Republicans.

I'll tell you the same thing I've told all the other Alexandratards. You continue to confuse mockery and ridicule of the galactically stupid as being fear. People are about as afraid of her as they are the court jester. Continue to make this mistake at your own peril.

WE laughed at Trump as well and look at what that got us.

Trump was and is an accident waiting to happen and republicans ignored his inability to be president And now look at the load of crap he got us into

 

[BlueGin]

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

So you didn’t post the rebuttal?

 

[Daryl Hunt]

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

So you didn’t post the rebuttal?

It's not up to Brainboy to post the rebuttal. It's up to the dissenters to post the rebuttal. Sorry but character assassinations don't count as rebuttals and that is all that's been posted.

 

[Dont Taz Me Bro]

Cortez is scaring the living hell out of a lot more than just Republicans.

I'll tell you the same thing I've told all the other Alexandratards. You continue to confuse mockery and ridicule of the galactically stupid as being fear. People are about as afraid of her as they are the court jester. Continue to make this mistake at your own peril.

WE laughed at Trump as well and look at what that got us.

Trump has his share of problems, but to put him on the same scale of lunacy as AOC is beyond the realm of reason.

 

[Hellokitty]

New members, meet the ‘slush fund’
Many Hill freshmen are already establishing leadership PACs despite association with abuse
Posted Jan 14, 2019 5:55 PM

Stephanie Akin
@stephanieakinHouse Democrats to consider publishing internal caucus rules ‘in short order’Elizabeth Warren planned fanfare, but instead she’s getting pannedNo ‘material impact’ of foreign interference in 2018 elections, Trump administration finds


Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., left, and Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., are among the more than two dozen freshman lawmakers who have established so-called leadership PACs, a type of fundraising committee critics say is too often abused. Ocasio-Cortez and Omar have pledged not to accept corporate PAC money. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)


The newest class of congressional lawmakers — some of whom campaigned against corruption and corporate influence in politics — is rapidly adopting a practice that critics say is among the swampier in Washington.

More than two dozen new members of the House and Senate — including prominent freshmen such as New York Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Utah Republican Sen. Mitt Romney — have established so-called leadership PACs, according to data compiled by government watchdog group Issue One. Leadership PACs are fundraising committees that allow lawmakers to raise money for their colleagues and candidates.

The vast majority of House and Senate members have one, and many say they can be helpful tools to support other politicians and the issues they care about. But the PACs are not subject to the same restrictions on personal spending as individual campaign committees, leading to numerous examples of alleged misuse. Critics say they also allow politicians to evade campaign contribution limits and obscure donations from corporations and other powerful groups.


“The new freshman class of 2018 has said that one of the fundamental issues they ran on, and they heard from their constituents about, was to clean up the corruption in Washington and to diminish the influence of money in politics,” said Tim Roemer, a former Indiana Democratic congressman and U.S. ambassador to India. “Leadership PACs, as currently structured, add to the problem.”

Also watch: First 2020 Senate race ratings are here


An ‘influence game’
Roemer co-chairs Issue One’s ReFormers caucus, a group of former members of Congress, governors and Cabinet members that has urged the Federal Election Commission to close “loopholes” in its regulation of leadership PACs.

Leadership PACs allow lawmakers to accept additional money from donors who have already maxed out donations to their individual campaign committees, effectively raising the cap on campaign donations from deep-pocketed benefactors. Because leadership PACs are little known outside of the Beltway, with obscure names like the Penguin PAC or the Blue Hen PAC, voters are less likely to be watching.

As of this week, all nine of the new senators have formed leadership PACs, as have 23 of the 92 House freshmen, said Michael Beckel, the manager of research, investigations and policy analysis at Issue One. That brings the total number of Hill lawmakers with leadership PACs to 437 out of 534, or 82 percent.“For many incoming members, leadership PACs are part of the Washington influence game,” Beckel said. “Some of them have more quickly embraced them than others.”

Issue One and the Campaign Legal Center produced a report last year that showed that roughly 60 percent of the $150 million raised by leadership PACs between Jan. 1, 2017, and Sept. 30, 2018, came from political action committees connected to companies, trade associations, labor unions and other groups that frequently have business before lawmakers.

Want insight more often? Get Roll Call in your inbox

Only 45 percent of the money raised through leadership PACs during that same time period went to contributions to federal candidates or other political committees. Instead, some members of Congress used their leadership PACs for personal expenses that would not be allowed from authorized campaign accounts, including spending at resorts, golf clubs and fine dining establishments, the report found.

New York Democrat Kathleen Rice plans to reintroduce in the House this week a bill that would reign in abuse of leadership PACs, among other revisions, an aide said. The so-called The Accountability and Transparency Act that Rice introduced with Wisconsin Republican Mike Gallagher and Washington Democrat Derek Kilmer was one of two bipartisan measures unveiled last Congress that aimed to prohibit the “personal” use of money raised through leadership PACs, a restriction already in place for individual campaign committees.

The lack of such basic regulations makes even legitimate use of a leadership PAC appear tainted, said Rep. Scott Peters, co-sponsor of the so-called Leadership PAC Limitation ACT, the other bipartisan measure introduced last Congress.“Even things that are legal just make the whole system look terrible,” the California Democrat said. “The notion that you would be spending money on yacht clubs, and Broadway tickets, golf retreats and trips in limousines — it is just not appropriate for elected officials to be doing that, and it does not engender trust.”

‘Useful tool’
But even the some of the staunchest critics of the rules regulating leadership PACs have established their own, including Peters and Rice. Peters’ committee — Supporting House Problem Solvers — spent $153,000 in the 2018 midterm cycle, $151,000 of which went to federal candidates and state party committees. The remainder was spent on compliance.

Peters said the PAC can be a “useful tool” to help colleagues get elected in the absence of a public system to finance campaigns, but lawmakers have to be “rigorous” about ensuring the money is spent properly.

The new members who have already established leadership PACs include high-profile figures like Ocasio-Cortez, who rose to prominence with vows against accepting donations from corporate PACs.

The pledge was understood as a shorthand declaration of liberation from corporate interests.

Ocasio-Cortez’s leadership PAC, Courage to Change, was formed in late November, too recently to have filed any public financial disclosures. Frank Llewelyn, the committee’s treasurer, said the PAC had not started fundraising. The end-of-year balance in its accounts was $4,700, one contribution and one expenditure, he said.

“We are committed to the highest ethical standards, which is best represented by our ‘no corporate money’ position,” Llewelyn said. “We realize that the regulation of leadership PACs need to be improved.”

Another House freshman, Minnesota Democrat Ilhan Omar, established her Inspiring Leadership Has A Name PAC in October. It had not spent the $5,000 it had raised by the most recent filing deadline at the end of November. Omar’s campaign did not return a request for comment but told the Center for Responsive Politics the PAC does not accept corporate PAC contributions.

Sharing the wealth
Texas Republican freshman Lance Gooden said he hadn’t even heard of leadership PACs before he was advised to start one to help other candidates during his House campaign. Running for a safe GOP seat, he said he raised more money than he needed for the general election.

“My intention was to use my leadership PAC going forward to help other candidates who need resources,” he said, adding that he was aware of alleged abuse of such committees.

“My internal rule of thumb is that we have to make sure that a solid majority of this money is spent on other races and not on frivolous expenses.” he said. FEC filings show that almost all of the $17,000 Gooden’s committee disbursed went to other federal and local candidates.

But not all members are so self-disciplined, said Adav Noti, a former FEC lawyer who now works at the Campaign Legal Center.

“It’s not inherently bad to have one if you are one of the few members of Congress who actually uses it for its intended purpose, but that’s fairly rare at this point,” Noti said.

He added that as long as party leaders use fundraising prowess to determine who will rise in the ranks and get coveted committee chairman positions, the incentive for members to establish leadership PACs will remain strong. Zach Wamp, a co-chairman of Issue One’s ReFormers Caucus and a former Tennessee GOP congressman, said he encourages new members to avoid that pressure, though he recognized they were unlikely to follow his advice.“It sure looks like now you have to do it in order to advance, but it doesn’t make it right,” he said. “It is a proliferation that is unhealthy. It pollutes the Congress, and it leads to, I would call it, unintentional corruption.”

 

[Daryl Hunt]

Cortez is scaring the living hell out of a lot more than just Republicans.

I'll tell you the same thing I've told all the other Alexandratards. You continue to confuse mockery and ridicule of the galactically stupid as being fear. People are about as afraid of her as they are the court jester. Continue to make this mistake at your own peril.

WE laughed at Trump as well and look at what that got us.

Trump has his share of problems, but to put him on the same scale of lunacy as AOC is beyond the realm of reason.

There is one HUGE difference. You can be a bit of a loon and be in Congress where there are over 500 others to smooth out your lunacy. But there is one President. If that President is a loon then it's not going to be good for America. When you say he has his share of problems, his share of problems have long since become OUR share of problems with the first two years of no one there to iron those problems out. In the last month he has been told in public once "NO" and he almost lost his mind. Any President should be told forcefully no once in awhile and deal with it. Now that he's finally figured out that he's been demoted from King down to the lowly position of President (Oh, the Horrors) he might turn out okay.

 

[BlueGin]

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

So you didn’t post the rebuttal?

It's not up to Brainboy to post the rebuttal. It's up to the dissenters to post the rebuttal. Sorry but character assassinations don't count as rebuttals and that is all that's been posted.

So,you just post partial information and leave out the response during the same meeting? And then want everyone one to jump on your bandwagon?

 

[Daryl Hunt]

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

So you didn’t post the rebuttal?

It's not up to Brainboy to post the rebuttal. It's up to the dissenters to post the rebuttal. Sorry but character assassinations don't count as rebuttals and that is all that's been posted.

So,you just post partial information and leave out the response during the same meeting? And then want everyone one to jump on your bandwagon?

Nope but I expect you to bring your own bandwagon. No sniping from the rooftops allowed.

 

[BlueGin]

Cortez is scaring the living hell out of a lot more than just Republicans.

I'll tell you the same thing I've told all the other Alexandratards. You continue to confuse mockery and ridicule of the galactically stupid as being fear. People are about as afraid of her as they are the court jester. Continue to make this mistake at your own peril.

WE laughed at Trump as well and look at what that got us.

Trump has his share of problems, but to put him on the same scale of lunacy as AOC is beyond the realm of reason.

There is one HUGE difference. You can be a bit of a loon and be in Congress where there are over 500 others to smooth out your lunacy. But there is one President. If that President is a loon then it's not going to be good for America. When you say he has his share of problems, his share of problems have long since become OUR share of problems with the first two years of no one there to iron those problems out. In the last month he has been told in public once "NO" and he almost lost his mind. Any President should be told forcefully no once in awhile and deal with it. Now that he's finally figured out that he's been demoted from King down to the lowly position of President (Oh, the Horrors) he might turn out okay.

Trump has been told no way more than that clown Obama ever was. And Obama did his fare share of damage that democrats couldn’t care less about. Why are you pretending you all of a sudden care about political corruption?

 

[BlueGin]

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

So you didn’t post the rebuttal?

It's not up to Brainboy to post the rebuttal. It's up to the dissenters to post the rebuttal. Sorry but character assassinations don't count as rebuttals and that is all that's been posted.

So,you just post partial information and leave out the response during the same meeting? And then want everyone one to jump on your bandwagon?

Nope but I expect you to bring your own bandwagon. No sniping from the rooftops allowed.

I usually try to give the other side the chance to be honest. You never are though...why is that?

 

[Daryl Hunt]

Cortez is scaring the living hell out of a lot more than just Republicans.

I'll tell you the same thing I've told all the other Alexandratards. You continue to confuse mockery and ridicule of the galactically stupid as being fear. People are about as afraid of her as they are the court jester. Continue to make this mistake at your own peril.

WE laughed at Trump as well and look at what that got us.

Trump has his share of problems, but to put him on the same scale of lunacy as AOC is beyond the realm of reason.

There is one HUGE difference. You can be a bit of a loon and be in Congress where there are over 500 others to smooth out your lunacy. But there is one President. If that President is a loon then it's not going to be good for America. When you say he has his share of problems, his share of problems have long since become OUR share of problems with the first two years of no one there to iron those problems out. In the last month he has been told in public once "NO" and he almost lost his mind. Any President should be told forcefully no once in awhile and deal with it. Now that he's finally figured out that he's been demoted from King down to the lowly position of President (Oh, the Horrors) he might turn out okay.

Trump has been told no way more than that clown Obama ever was. And Obama did his fare share of damage that democrats couldn’t care less about. Why are you pretending you all of a sudden care about political corruption?

Let's check how is currently President. BRB........ Nope, it's not Obama. It's Trump. You really need to get a new calendar. That one from 2015 is way out of date. Get new one for 2019.

 

[Daryl Hunt]

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

So you didn’t post the rebuttal?

It's not up to Brainboy to post the rebuttal. It's up to the dissenters to post the rebuttal. Sorry but character assassinations don't count as rebuttals and that is all that's been posted.

So,you just post partial information and leave out the response during the same meeting? And then want everyone one to jump on your bandwagon?

Nope but I expect you to bring your own bandwagon. No sniping from the rooftops allowed.

I usually try to give the other side the chance to be honest. You never are though...why is that?

Ah, just sniping from the Rooftop. Sorry, doesn't hold water. No bandwagon no official opinion from you accepted.

 

[BlueGin]

I'll tell you the same thing I've told all the other Alexandratards. You continue to confuse mockery and ridicule of the galactically stupid as being fear. People are about as afraid of her as they are the court jester. Continue to make this mistake at your own peril.

WE laughed at Trump as well and look at what that got us.

Trump has his share of problems, but to put him on the same scale of lunacy as AOC is beyond the realm of reason.

There is one HUGE difference. You can be a bit of a loon and be in Congress where there are over 500 others to smooth out your lunacy. But there is one President. If that President is a loon then it's not going to be good for America. When you say he has his share of problems, his share of problems have long since become OUR share of problems with the first two years of no one there to iron those problems out. In the last month he has been told in public once "NO" and he almost lost his mind. Any President should be told forcefully no once in awhile and deal with it. Now that he's finally figured out that he's been demoted from King down to the lowly position of President (Oh, the Horrors) he might turn out okay.

Trump has been told no way more than that clown Obama ever was. And Obama did his fare share of damage that democrats couldn’t care less about. Why are you pretending you all of a sudden care about political corruption?

Let's check how is currently President. BRB........ Nope, it's not Obama. It's Trump. You really need to get a new calendar. That one from 2015 is way out of date. Get new one for 2019.

Why are you all of a sudden pretending you care about political corruption? Look at all the crooks your side elects,supports and covers up for.

All the shady money democrats get during elections, then you turn around and let Democratic congress critters being investigated for corruption be in charge of finances?

This is all just a bunch of grandstanding BS.

 

[BrokeLoser]

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

Lol, she is dangerous because she is a true believer.

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

Lol, she is dangerous because she is a true believer.

True believer that we should get rid of the corruption? That's what we really need.

They keep using her early stuff to discredit her. But she's not the starry eyed bambi anymore. She's a force to be reckoned with. In that clip, she was just plain brilliant. When she was leading that pack in the Senate looking for absent Mitch, it's too bad she didn't find him. She could have tied him to the front of her pickup and drove around Washington for a bit. I wonder if they have Game Tags for that?

I’m thinking Miss Marx thinks Congress is made up of one representative and that “writing laws” and ratifying laws are synonymous....what a ******* dumbass....and you fools eat the shit up, all because you think she’ll put up one hell of a fight for your free shit.
Hahaha...this is super fascinating...kind of serves as testament to just how desperate you Mexicrats really are...watching you grown ass adults get all giddy over some twenty-something year old child whom speaks like a high school kid....is awesome. Thanks for the free entertainment.

 

[Maxdeath]

It will be interesting to see if she calls out all the democrats running in

I haven't really followed her much yet, but she sure is right about our problems here. Now this is what we really need to fix. We need to vote out every politician who won't agree to fix this. Only way we will fix out corruption.

Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plays scathing campaign finance "corruption game"

“Let’s play a lightning round game," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I’m gonna be the bad guy and I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests, even if that means putting my interests ahead of the American people."

"So," the 29-year-old asked the panel, "if I want to run a campaign that is entirely funded by corporate political action committees [PACs], is there anything that legally prevents me from doing that?"

"No," one expert, Karen Hobert Flynn, the president of the government accountability watchdog group Common Cause, said decisively.

Wow she may have inadvertently stumbled on something that is not completely crazy. Unfortunately if she has her way there would be nothing left of the U.S. in two or three election cycles there would be no reason to worry about PACs or any other form of corruption in our political system.

AOC Doesn’t Let the Facts Get in the Way of a Good Story
February 7, 2019 • By Scott Blackburn • Blog • Disclosure, First Amendment and Campaigns
Share This Article: hearing on H.R. 1. Common Cause tweeted that “@AOC exposes just how much ‘bad guys’ can get away with under the shameful state of our campaign finance laws.” Roll Call credited Ocasio-Cortez for turning the hearing on its head by saying that “dark money was ‘shaping’ questions about [the] reform bill.”

Ocasio-Cortez’s storytelling may have been persuasive to the uninformed. But it was also wrong.

Presenting herself as the hypothetical “bad guy” trying to destroy democracy, Ocasio-Cortez spun a tale about how she could (among other things) “use my special interest, dark money-funded campaign to pay off folks that I need to pay off to get elected.”

This dystopic vision of how campaigns work in America bears little semblance to reality. Let’s work backward:

1) You cannot use campaign funds for non-campaign related expenses. That includes “paying off folks.” Here, Ocasio-Cortez appears to be referencing the Stormy Daniels scandal and the “greenlight for hush money” she claims it represents. But she has the argument exactly backwards. Those who believe Trump committed a campaign violation think that the hush money needed to be paid with campaign expenses, and that Trump’s failure to do so was the problem. As IFS Chairman Bradley A. Smith previously argued, IFS believes the opposite is true. The crime would be if you did “pay off folks” with campaign money. The real “folks you need to pay off to get elected” are voters, and it turns out they cannot be bought. As we have written about over and over again, money doesn’t buy elections. Ocasio-Cortez should know this better than most!

2) “Dark-money funded campaigns” are not a thing. The source of all donations to candidates over $200 are fully disclosed to the FEC, which then publishes that information online for the world to see. “Dark money” refers to spending from nonprofit groups making expenditures independently of any candidate to voice their support or opposition to candidates and their policies. These groups cannot give money to candidates, so it’s impossible for any candidate to run a “dark-money funded campaign.” These groups are limited in how much they can spend on such campaign speech. Additionally, many groups that Representative Ocasio-Cortez slanders with the “dark money” label are not nefarious or secretive organizations, but respected civic groups with a long history of involvement in public affairs. These groups include nonprofits like the ACLU, NAACP, and Planned Parenthood – hardly voices that should be silenced in debates surrounding elections.

3) “Special interest” money does not dominate campaign coffers, even of the candidates you don’t like. This ties in to Ocasio-Cortez’s earlier assertion that a campaign could be entirely funded by corporate PAC donations. That’s true in the abstract – there’s nothing in the law to stop a candidate from trying – but completely divorced from the reality of how campaigns are funded. Notably, Ocasio-Cortez did not name any examples of this sort of campaign, because there aren’t any. In reality, all congressional campaigns are predominantly funded by individual donors, not corporate PACs. This is one reason why anti-corporate PAC pledges are widely seen by those who are familiar with the system as grandstanding. Even ignoring this reality, corporate PACs have a contribution limit of $5,000 to any campaign, so a candidate looking to fund their effort solely with PAC funds would have to find a remarkably broad coalition of so-called special interests to fund their campaign. Finally, corporate PACs are funded exclusively with donations from employees, executives, and board members of the company, whose contributions to the PAC are limited and publicly disclosed.

Ocasio-Cortez, like most politicians, is a Manichaean. There are the good guys and the bad guys; the goal is to stop the bad guys and help the good guys. If someone disagrees with you about a bill or policy, the only reason must be that they are the bad guy, or at least paid for by the bad guys. It also must mean that your bill will hurt those bad guys! That’s why they’re opposing it, and that confirms that the bill is good!

The world doesn’t work that way. Opponents of H.R. 1 are not bought by the fossil fuel industry, or big pharma, or some other nonsense. There are manylegitimate gripes with how this 570-page monstrosity of a bill hurts the fundamental First Amendment rights of all Americans. Ocasio-Cortez and supporters of the bill may think that those costs are outweighed by the benefits, or that it is more important to cast the symbolic anti-corruption vote than to deal with the policy ramifications of their proposal.

But they should at least learn how the system actually works now before they become so certain of how to fix it.

And yet every politician is owned by lobbyists and enter service with little and leave filthy rich. Sorry, but it's obvious they are all corrupt.

There are a few that have entered public life rich to start with.
JFK, LBJ, Trump all come to mind immediately.

Doesn't trump bill himself as The King of Debt?

Not sure about that but I bet his bank account is bigger then yours. What you consider your debt is probably pocket change.

 

[edward37]

It will be interesting to see if she calls out all the democrats running in

Wow she may have inadvertently stumbled on something that is not completely crazy. Unfortunately if she has her way there would be nothing left of the U.S. in two or three election cycles there would be no reason to worry about PACs or any other form of corruption in our political system.

AOC Doesn’t Let the Facts Get in the Way of a Good Story
February 7, 2019 • By Scott Blackburn • Blog • Disclosure, First Amendment and Campaigns
Share This Article: hearing on H.R. 1. Common Cause tweeted that “@AOC exposes just how much ‘bad guys’ can get away with under the shameful state of our campaign finance laws.” Roll Call credited Ocasio-Cortez for turning the hearing on its head by saying that “dark money was ‘shaping’ questions about [the] reform bill.”

Ocasio-Cortez’s storytelling may have been persuasive to the uninformed. But it was also wrong.

Presenting herself as the hypothetical “bad guy” trying to destroy democracy, Ocasio-Cortez spun a tale about how she could (among other things) “use my special interest, dark money-funded campaign to pay off folks that I need to pay off to get elected.”

This dystopic vision of how campaigns work in America bears little semblance to reality. Let’s work backward:

1) You cannot use campaign funds for non-campaign related expenses. That includes “paying off folks.” Here, Ocasio-Cortez appears to be referencing the Stormy Daniels scandal and the “greenlight for hush money” she claims it represents. But she has the argument exactly backwards. Those who believe Trump committed a campaign violation think that the hush money needed to be paid with campaign expenses, and that Trump’s failure to do so was the problem. As IFS Chairman Bradley A. Smith previously argued, IFS believes the opposite is true. The crime would be if you did “pay off folks” with campaign money. The real “folks you need to pay off to get elected” are voters, and it turns out they cannot be bought. As we have written about over and over again, money doesn’t buy elections. Ocasio-Cortez should know this better than most!

2) “Dark-money funded campaigns” are not a thing. The source of all donations to candidates over $200 are fully disclosed to the FEC, which then publishes that information online for the world to see. “Dark money” refers to spending from nonprofit groups making expenditures independently of any candidate to voice their support or opposition to candidates and their policies. These groups cannot give money to candidates, so it’s impossible for any candidate to run a “dark-money funded campaign.” These groups are limited in how much they can spend on such campaign speech. Additionally, many groups that Representative Ocasio-Cortez slanders with the “dark money” label are not nefarious or secretive organizations, but respected civic groups with a long history of involvement in public affairs. These groups include nonprofits like the ACLU, NAACP, and Planned Parenthood – hardly voices that should be silenced in debates surrounding elections.

3) “Special interest” money does not dominate campaign coffers, even of the candidates you don’t like. This ties in to Ocasio-Cortez’s earlier assertion that a campaign could be entirely funded by corporate PAC donations. That’s true in the abstract – there’s nothing in the law to stop a candidate from trying – but completely divorced from the reality of how campaigns are funded. Notably, Ocasio-Cortez did not name any examples of this sort of campaign, because there aren’t any. In reality, all congressional campaigns are predominantly funded by individual donors, not corporate PACs. This is one reason why anti-corporate PAC pledges are widely seen by those who are familiar with the system as grandstanding. Even ignoring this reality, corporate PACs have a contribution limit of $5,000 to any campaign, so a candidate looking to fund their effort solely with PAC funds would have to find a remarkably broad coalition of so-called special interests to fund their campaign. Finally, corporate PACs are funded exclusively with donations from employees, executives, and board members of the company, whose contributions to the PAC are limited and publicly disclosed.

Ocasio-Cortez, like most politicians, is a Manichaean. There are the good guys and the bad guys; the goal is to stop the bad guys and help the good guys. If someone disagrees with you about a bill or policy, the only reason must be that they are the bad guy, or at least paid for by the bad guys. It also must mean that your bill will hurt those bad guys! That’s why they’re opposing it, and that confirms that the bill is good!

The world doesn’t work that way. Opponents of H.R. 1 are not bought by the fossil fuel industry, or big pharma, or some other nonsense. There are manylegitimate gripes with how this 570-page monstrosity of a bill hurts the fundamental First Amendment rights of all Americans. Ocasio-Cortez and supporters of the bill may think that those costs are outweighed by the benefits, or that it is more important to cast the symbolic anti-corruption vote than to deal with the policy ramifications of their proposal.

But they should at least learn how the system actually works now before they become so certain of how to fix it.

And yet every politician is owned by lobbyists and enter service with little and leave filthy rich. Sorry, but it's obvious they are all corrupt.

There are a few that have entered public life rich to start with.
JFK, LBJ, Trump all come to mind immediately.

Doesn't trump bill himself as The King of Debt?

Not sure about that but I bet his bank account is bigger then yours. What you consider your debt is probably pocket change.

But I can't sell my name to put on buildings and I can borrow from American banks and not even ONE bankruptcy.