I have a problem with calling Steven A. Cohen a “donor”. A “donor” usually picks a side and give a decent amount of support. 

What Steven A. Cohen has done isn’t donating, it’s buying off. When you are splashing money around to all parties and all kinds of Senators, most who don’t even serve the state you live in, you aren’t donating to them, you are giving them hush-money. 

From Politico: 

Steven A. Cohen, the multi-billionaire hedge fund owner implicated in an insider-trading scandal, is a major political donor who has contributed heavily to big players in both parties.

Cohen and his wife Alexandra have donated more than $450,000 to the campaign committees and leadership PACs of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and other key lawmakers during the last several election cycles, Federal Election Commission records show.

Cohen also gave $1 million to the Republican Governors Association during the 2009-10 election cycle, according to a Jan. 2011 report from the Center for Public Integrity, a watchdog group.

Cohen is the founder of SAC Capital Advisors and has been estimated by Forbes to be worth as much as $8 billion.

Cohen was implicated in a $276 million insider-trading case brought by the the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday.

In its criminal complaint, the SEC alleged that Mathew Martoma, a former trader with CR Intrinsic Investors — an SAC Capital Advisors affiliate — obtained inside information in 2008 about the progress of clinical trials for an Alzheimer’s drug being developed by two companies.

According to the SEC’s complaint, Martoma “illegally obtained confidential details about the clinical trial from Dr. Sidney Gilman, who served as chairman of the safety monitoring committee overseeing the trial.”

“This massive repositioning allowed CR Intrinsic and the affiliated advisory firm to reap approximately $82 million in profits and $194 million in avoided losses for a total of more than $276 million in illicit gains,” the SEC alleged.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1112/84109.html#ixzz2CntW9FGz

Fun times! 

thevocalibertarian:

We hit 1% (1.1mm) of the vote on only $2 million dollars. Obama/Romney spent $1 BILLION each for 59.5mm and 56.9mm respective votes.  BO spent $16.78 per vote. MR spent $17.56 per vote. GJ spent $1.75 per vote.

How much did each vote cost the Presidential candidates? Thevocalibertarian breaks it down. 

(via lalibertarienne)

poorrichardsnews:

Not that Eric Holder’s Justice department will do anything about it…

from the Washington Examiner:

It has been reported that the Obama campaign this year, as in 2008, has disabled or chosen not to use AVS in screening contributions made by credit card.

That doesn’t sound very important. But it’s evidence of a modus operandi that strikes me as thuggish.

AVS stands for Address Verification System. It’s the software that checks whether the name of the cardholder matches his or her address.

If a campaign doesn’t use AVS, it can wind up accepting contributions from phony names or accepting contributions from foreigners, both of which are illegal.

The 2008 Obama campaign pocketed money from “John Galt, 1957 Ayn Rand Lane, Galts Gulch CO 99999” and $174,000 from a woman in Missouri who told reporters she had given nothing and had never been billed. Presumably she would have noticed an extra charge of $174,000.

The Obama campaign is evidently happy to pocket the money. After all, this is the president who, according to political scientist Brendan Doherty, has appeared at more fundraisers in three and a half years than his six predecessors did in 35 years.

Obama has been to at least two fundraisers just in my apartment building. I often see police and Secret Service blocking traffic for a block around Washington’s posh Jefferson Hotel at 16th and M streets.

Obama talks a good game on transparency and openness, but he’s ready to flout the law by avoiding AVS and to break his high-minded campaign promises.

read the rest

I keep hearing from my left leaning commenters about how most of President Obama’s campaign donations have come from small donors.  However, with the verification system turned off on Obama’s campaign website, we have no way of verifying who these “small donors” really are. 

Is anyone surprised by this?

Obama’s trying to raise a billion dollars, money which he donate to any charity he wants once he retires. He’s continually fundraising and campaigning when he should be working. Like mentioned, he’s done more fundraising than nearly anyone, ever. 

At $35,000 a plate and $1,000 a handshake, he’s going to get to that billion dollar mark sooner rather then later. And it’s all because Obama has been packaged as the common man’s candidate. From the hole in his show in 2008 to the “swag” and singing on Late Night Variety shows.

If Obama isn’t the Manchurian Candidate, he’s the perfect blueprint for one. 

@Suga_Shane

poorrichardsnews:

I wonder what a fist bump would cost you?

Bomb sniffing dogs could be seen around Greenfield Village in Dearborn as officials prepared for President Barack Obama’s visit on Wednesday.

Supporters lined up bright and early to get in the door at The Henry Ford, including Lonnie Peek, who handed over $1,000 to stand in a rope line and shake the President’s hand.

Peek said paying that price will mean a bit of a sacrifice, but it’s worth it.

“A thousand dollars is a lot of money. But other folks are kickin’ in for their candidates, so what you do is you bite the bullet,” Peek said. “You wanna have your conscience good, to feel that this is what I did.

“You know, you go without a couple of meals. We can miss a couple meals,” he said.

read the rest 

Yikes!  Missing meals to shake Obama’s hand?  Also, Mr. Peek probably couldn’t afford to go to one of Obama’s $35k per plate fundraisers. 

So, what’s Obama saying here? 

“I’ll only shake your hand if you’re a member of the 1%”

But he’s a man of the people! Perhaps this is a genius Robin Hood inspired plan that involves charging the ultra-wealthy ridiculous amounts of money that will go towards providing more “fairness” to others. Yea, yea, that’s it. 

He’s stealing money from people, but not really stealing. More like forcing them to willfully hand it over. Robbery without the knowledge that one is being robbed. It’s brilliant if you think about it. 

Or perhaps this is boost his already ginormous ego. He’s trying to raise the most money any campaign has ever raised and break the billion dollar mark. And therein lies the problem I have with Obama. His message that he ran on and was elected on is the polar opposite of his actions since winning office. He’s all about the people, he says, yet he holds $35,000 dinners and charges $1,000 for a handshake. 

A freaking handshake.  

You’re a politician, your job is to shake hands with the people. Hell, you’re goal is to shake hands with as many people as possible. Meet and greet them. Listen to them. Even pretend to care about what they care about. You’re supposed to be accessable to all walks of American citizens, not just those willing to go out on a  $35,000 dinner date or those with $1,000 of cash burning a hole in their pocket. 

You’re the #1 citizen of the American people. You’re job is to represent us, not alienate us. A $1,000 for a handshake? You’re kidding me, right? How much is it to take a picture with you? Priceless? Come on, Mr. President. Your campaign war chest is has as much money as anyone in the history of US Politics has ever had. You can buy and sell the GOP, yet you’re still charging $1,000 for someone to get in a line like a sheep, wait an ungodly amount of time just so they can breath the same CO2 you expel for 10 seconds? 

Obama’s lost touch with who he was before taking office, or at least the man he told us he was. The man with the hole in his shoes. The man who was willing to roll his sleeves up and help you get some work done. The man who’d lace ‘em up and shoot some hoops at a local park. That man doesn’t exist anymore, yet he and the media still want us to believe he does. The ‘Average Joe’ is gone. He’s been replaced by a man of the establishment. A man who makes nearly a million dollars a year, who’s net worth puts him in the 1%. A man whose family spends $10+ million dollars on vacations. A man that sees himself as a celebrity and who fraternizes with the social elite. 

Now that I think of it in those terms, what’s a $1,000 to meet a rock-star, demi-god? Now only if we could find someone in America that had a $1,000 laying around. 

@Suga_Shane