Campaign cash cows are put out to pasture

By DENNIS CONRAD - Associated Press Writer - Sept. 19, 2008

WASHINGTON - This fall, many members of Congress will see a major source of campaign contributions disappear, possibly never to return.

Political action committees affiliated with mortgage giants Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are now banned from engaging in lobbying activities, including making donations. They were ordered to cease when the Bush administration engineered a government takeover of the quasi-governmental companies and put them under a conservatorship in an effort to help reverse a housing and credit crisis.

Whether the PACS come back in some form is likely to depend on the next Congress, says Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., who, as chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, says he will be open minded about it.

PACS, committees formed by business, labor, or other special-interest groups, raise money from their members or employees and make contributions to the campaigns of political candidates whom they support.

Both men seeking the presidency, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., agree on the need to monitor the federal takeover of the two mortgage concerns, but hold different views on what the PACS' ultimate fate should be.

Obama would make it more difficult for Freddie and Fannie to have PACS, saying he wants to reduce the influence of money over the political process. Obama's presidential campaign has raised more private money than any in history, but he doesn't accept PAC dollars. He opposes allowing Fannie and Freddie to be returned as profit-making enterprises whose possible losses are guaranteed by the government.

McCain favors taking both companies fully private and letting them determine whether they want PACS.

Ultimately, it may not matter what the next president thinks about the PACS. Neither McCain nor Obama is likely to veto a bill over whether it allows for PACS. And Congress will likely be under pressure to keep the campaign contribution spigot from those PACS turned off.

That pressure is likely to come from other parts of the finance industry, says Jonathan Koppell, a professor of political science at Yale University's School of Management. He noted that Fannie and Freddie's competitors have long believed the two had an unfair advantage that stemmed from cozy relations with Capitol Hill.

A spokesman for the American Bankers Association declined comment.

Since 2003, Democrats and Republicans have collected $2.3 million from the two PACs. That could sway some lawmakers to insist that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac be reshaped as purely private businesses, which would allow them to revive their PACs.

The contributions are part of a lobbying arsenal that has invested $80 million over the past five years to win hearts and minds in the capital. Fannie and Freddie have spent big on hiring former White House officials and lawmakers. Some members of Congress have received tens of thousands of dollars from the PACS, especially those on committees with jurisdiction over the companies, including Frank.

"They had huge armies of lobbyists that were tripping over each other, so they developed friends on both sides of the aisle over the years," said Peter Fitzgerald, a Virginia banker and former Republican senator from Illinois. "Republicans got very tight with them over the years and they got very powerful."

Stephen Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a Washington-based watchdog group, said the PACs' campaign cash to Congress has helped insulate Fannie and Freddie from oversight.

"The fundamental lack of rigorous accounting and adult supervision is one of the major reasons that taxpayers have had to take over these companies that are drowning in red ink," Ellis said.

The companies hold or guarantee some $5 trillion in outstanding mortgages, more than half the nation's total. It is unclear, experts say, what the taxpayers' responsibility will become. The future of the PACs may depend on how Fannie and Freddie are changed and whether they continue the affordable housing component that Congress has been required.

"If taxpayers continue to have any degree of involvement with these companies they should not be allowed to lavish campaign cash on their elected representatives," Ellis said. "Fannie and Freddie benefited from their close association with the federal government. They can't have it both ways again."

Fully privatized, the companies could have PACS, because corporations have the right to have them as a matter of free speech. On the other hand, the creation of fully governmental replacements would eliminate the possibility of PACS, as government agencies cannot lobby.

"I hope next year we will have a long and serious set of very inclusive discussions" on the issue," said Frank. "I don't want to prejudge that."

AT&T Paid Lobbyist $240,000 in 2007

By Associated Press - Aug. 24, 2007
WASHINGTON -
AT&T Inc. paid Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP $240,000 in the first half of 2007 to lobby the federal government, according to a disclosure form.

The firm lobbied on policy issues related to the telecommunications industry, according to the form posted online Aug. 13 by the Senate's public records office.

Beside Congress, the firm lobbied the Commerce and Treasury departments.

Under a federal law enacted in 1995, lobbyists are required to disclose activities that could influence members of the executive and legislative branches. They must register with Congress within 45 days of being hired or engaging in lobbying.

AT&T is based in San Antonio.


Copyright 2007 Associated Press.

Bill Moyers Journal - Cleaning House

Today is Bill Moyer's birthday. Bill Higgins posted a tribute to him on epluribusmedia

He included this UTUBE video of Moyers coverage of lobbyist!
Higgins wrote:
Born on this day in 1934

"America's corporate and political elites now form a regime of their own, they're privatizing democracy. All the benefits, the tax cuts, policies and rewards flow in one direction: up."
Bill Moyers

I happened to be reading Moyer's Blog early this morning looking for his interview with Public Citizen's Joan Claybrook which I missed when it aired on PBS last Friday on "Bill Moyers Journal."

The subject of the segment was lobbying and lobbyists and their pervasive influence on our political system.

I have a large measure of respect for both Moyers and Claybrook and an enormous loathing for lobbyists and their destructive influence on MY country and I was disappointed to have missed the program.

I responded:

Bill Moyers continues to serve
He's from my hometown, Marshall, Texas, and although he was in Washington before I was aware enough to care deeply about the issues he champions and the dark corners he brings to the foreground through intellectual examination and discussion, I like having ties to him, however remote.
Lobbying is not evil in itself. We have laws that can monitor it. However, the way that much of it operates today is out of acceptable boundaries.

We have seen Transportation Codes of states and the Federal Government changed through sophificated change management re-engineering strategies funded by international business and US firms who smell dollars they can transfer from public coffers and private citizens pocketbooks into their corporate bottom lines.

Kansas City Southern (de Mexico) RR, Carter Burgess, Zachry Construction, BSNF Railway, Ross Perot, Jr and the Alliance group, Ed Bass and others involved in the Texas Pacific Group (who are negotiating to buy TXU electric), and other international player (all members of NASCO) helped underwrite legal, educational, lobbyist and other logistical initiatives resulting in more changes to the Texas Transportation Code in two legislative sessions than had been enacted in 50 years plus major changes in US Transportation Code.

Identical language migrated into many bills in both houses of the Texas Legislature during the 78th and 79th sessions. They were accepted by the Legislative Counsel office and the parties presenting the language are legally allowed to remain hidden, protected behind the attorney client priviledge of the attorney who carried the language to the Legislative Counsel. Despite lobby disclosure laws and rules which require lobbyists to disclose their clients, amounts of money spent on contacts with legislators, most of the heavy hitting special influence peddleing is done without ANY DISCLSOURE REQUIRED because of such practices.

Now it is apparent where much of the funding came from for these far sweeping iniatives which have literally changed how America funds public infrastructure. This past weekend in Fort Worth NASCO held its annual conference. Confident that they have succeeded in enacting enough changes that there is little chance that America will revert to practices which have sustained our system for generations, they are now listing resumes of their board members on their websites and taking credit for their efforts.

It was apparent that change agents, opinion leaders, stakeholders were identified about a decade ago. Along the corriders they anticipated developing, they identified local elected officials, courted them, and incorporated them into their organizations. Contacts with folks with very deep pockets are very enticing to ambitious city commissioners and county commissioners. They established a number of non-profit educational 501s. (Educational 501s can act similar to PACS but do not have to comply with the same financial disclosure laws).

They invited Universities, local governments, transportation planning groups, and corporations to join their non-profit educational organizations and attend their seminars. Local and county governments began to help finance the "change management" initiatives by paying membership fees and fees to attend the seminars.
Local elected officials in key counties were invited to join the board of directors. No one yelled about City Council people and County Commissioners holding offices in these educational 501 non-profit transportation organizations (even though their mission statement was lobbying) because the county or city was also a member. No one stopped to consider the responsiblity that an elected official accepts when accepting an elected office: To give fair and impartial consideration to issues coming before the body.

There is no way a person can give fair and impartial consideration to an issue before the local city council or county commission if they are an officer or board member in an organization with a stated mission to adopt one of the alternatives placed before that body for consideration!

In the past decade we have seen formulation of transportation policy move out of the elected bodies and into the private non-profit forums funded by for profit corporations.

Now we are seeing our gas tax money and city tax money used to fund transportation projects where private partners will charge citizens tolls for 50 years to ride on what was previously state or Federal highways. Citizens no longer can control what gets funded by refusing to approve a bond initiative at a bond election. (American rarely vote down transportation bond initiatives --- even though the toll proponents try to create that illusion).

Bill Moyers understands how the process works, how it used to work and how it should work. I'm thankful that he continues to stimulate discussion, inform the people, and question the holes in the system which is designed to protect citizens and preserve Constitutional government in Texas and the USA.