Vol. CCLVI, No. 19 June 15, 2012
The New Hampshire Gazette
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The Fortnightly Rant
To the Purchaser Goeth the Spoils
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker won a great victory on June 5th: the beleaguered Republican incumbent defeated his Democratic challenger Tom Barrett by 53 to 46 percent in a recall election initiated by a public referendum. And he achieved his victory the old-fashioned way — he paid for it fair and square. Barrett, who had already lost to Walker once in the regularly scheduled election of 2010, tried to overturn that result with a measly expenditure of just $3.44 per vote received. Walker, boldly demonstrating his superior faith in The American Way,©™ outspent his rival by a factor of 6.66 — a generous $23 per vote. Walker’s national electoral conglomerate, made up of his own local crew and a national network of deep-pocketed outside agitators, ponied up a generous total of $30.5 million for the election. By comparison, Barrett’s pitiful mom-and-pop outfit barely managed to scrape up $4 million — a veritable insult to the body politic. And these figures understate the amount actually spent on the campaign. No one knows how much though; because some groups, like the Koch brothers’ Americans for Prosperity, are 501(c)(4) non-profits and thus exempt from disclosure. Thanks to this massive fiscal overkill, Walker prevailed over his opponent by an underwhelming margin of less than seven percent. The inescapable conclusion in the wake of Wisconsin is this: the argument is over. Never mind running government like a business — government is a business. And woe betide the piker who is undercapitalized. Whence cometh this blizzard of cash? Why, from the poor and downtrodden, of course!
$$$-Rated Video No, seriously, $500,000 came in a single check from Diane Hendricks, who with a net worth of $2.8 billion is the richest woman in Wisconsin. Some eyebrows were raised in May when a videotape of Walker and Hendricks was released. It was not a Paris Hilton-type tape; it contained a different sort of obscenity. The tape showed Hendricks asking Walker, “Any chance we’ll ever get to be a completely red state? And work on these unions? And become a right-to-work [state]? What can we do to help you?” Walker replied, “We’re going to start in a couple of weeks with our budget adjustment bill, but first step is, we’re going to deal with collective bargaining for all public employee unions, because you use divide and conquer.” One check for $250,000 came from Newt Gingrich’s ex-sugar daddy, the casino tycoon and habitual union-buster Sheldon Adelson. Another $250,000 came from Richard “Dick” DeVos, Jr. whose father helped founded Amway and is worth about $4.2 billion. Young “Dick” is no stranger to expensive campaigns — he spent $41 million in 2006 but lost the Michigan gubernatorial race to Jennifer Granholm. He is also a major funder of campaigns to eviscerate privatize public schools. Bob “Swiftboat Veterans for Truth” Perry, of Houston, TX also threw in $250,000 as did Jere Fabick and David Humphreys, two lesser-known mid-western industrialists. Koch Industries, AT&T, Wal-Mart, John Deere, Miller/ Coors, and SC Johnson & Sons also contributed handsomely to the quest to make America safe for those dainty people, the corporations. Seventy-four percent of Walker’s contributions came
from out-of-state according to The Nation’s John Nichols. With Friends Like These Rightly or wrongly, after Walker’s assault on public sector unions, organized labor and progressives in Wisconsin made a conscious choice to take on Scott Walker and his plutocrat pals. Their presumptive friends in the Democratic party also made a choice — to stand back and watch. Walker, on the other hand, had the full attention and sympathy of the Republican National Committee. Chairman Reince (rhymes with Prince) Priebus was the Wisconsin Party Chair from 2007 through 2010 and has been close to Walker for at least a decade. Four other top GOP staffers hail from the Badger State, as well. Hedging Their Bets Last year Republicans slipped a subtle provision into the state law raising the residency require-
ment from 10 to 28 days. That effectively blocked unknown thousands of students now home on vacation from voting in the recall because they registered at school last fall and have been home less than 28 days. “Conservatives” seem oddly eager these days to throw timetested traditions overboard. In the Wisconsin recall, though, they honored a well-worn political chestnut: the misleading robocall. “If you signed the recall petition,” an anonymous male voice said to Wisconsin voters, “your job is done and you don’t need to vote on Tuesday.” Those Wisconsin voters should be grateful — at least they got a carefully-crafted lie. Ten years ago, during the Sununu/Shaheen Senate race, New Hampshire voters attempting to call Democratic Headquarters for a ride to the polls just got a busy signal, thanks to the Republican Party’s Executive Director.
One Faint Glimmer Speaking of felonious Republicans, there is one faint glimmer of hope on the Wisconsin front. Among the few journalists paying any attention is NationalMemo. com’s Joe Conason. Two excerpts: “On May 5, 2010,” Conason wrote on June 7th, “an assistant district attorney filed a court petition asking to initiate a secret probe into the disappearance of thousands of dollars in donations to ‘Operation Freedom,’ an annual event for local veterans partially underwritten by county officials.” “Indeed, nearly all of Walker’s highest-ranking aides and associates from his years as county executive appear to be either facing prosecution or cutting immunity deals to save themselves.” Scott Walker recently shifted $160,000 of his campaign money into a legal defense fund, and told reporters it would not be used to defend his aides.
We now learn that he did so while illicitly wearing the uniform of a Michigan State Trooper. Apparently it had been given to him by his father, the Governor. On one occasion, memorable for the unwitting participants, he pulled over a car and pretended to arrest two young males who were in on the joke, thus leaving two young women stranded by the side of the road. Hilarity no doubt ensued but, as is so often the case, it was not evenly distributed. Considering that the GOP tends to respect and reward thuggish behavior, it seems in retrospect that Mr. Romney was probably the party’s inevitable candidate all along.
Suck It Up, Slackers Billions of people worldwide are still holding their breath more than four years into the Great Recession, hoping that whoever is running the global economy can somehow figure out a way to keep it from falling apart completely. Well, now we can all relax. Robert Benmosche has figured it out. “Retirement ages will have to move to 70, 80 years old,” he told Bloomberg.com during an interview at his seaside villa in Dubrovnik, Croatia, the amenities of which include a vinyard. Benmosche was hired in 2009 to run American International Group, or AIG. At the time, the company was propped up by $85
billion in credit from the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Treasury. During his first meeting with employees he referred to members of Congress as “crazies,” and said that if asked to testify before them he would tell them, “stick it where the sun don’t shine.” AIG’s line of credit has been bumped up to $182 billion since Benmosche took over. Last year the insurance giant paid Benmosche — who had threatened to quit if the government restricted his compensation — $7 million. In other economic news, Verizon has announced that a) it is laying off 1,700 workers, and b) it is paying its CEO $22.5 million for one year’s work.
Banker Grilled Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JP Morgan Chase, testified before the Senate Banking Committee on Wednesday. It was all quite civil. Dimon refrained from calling any of the committee members crazy, and he made no improbable suggestions about what they might do with their questions. Dimon’s testimony was occasioned by Chase’s unanticipated loss of $2 billion — or $3 or $4 billion, accounts vary — by a trader nicknamed “The London Whale,” whose job it was to reduce the risk of loss.
© 2012 by Dan Woodman
News Briefs
Mr. Inevitable
There are, no doubt, more important things to obsess about these days than the decades-old shenanigans of a teenage rich kid. For example, whether the dysfunctional state of politics today will prevent mankind from taking effective action to forestall anthropogenic climate change, and thus condemn us all to a premature, unnecessary, and horrid fate: starvation on an uninhabitable planet. Nevertheless, we are riveted by the recent revelation of further details regarding young Mitt Romney’s penchant for cruising around Michigan in a white Rambler with a red light on the roof.
News Briefs to page two