Quote:
Originally Posted by MUTGR
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Hardly laughable. Citizens United is a decision that is despised by many people in both parties. The corrupting influence of $ billions from groups that are allowed to remain in the shadows, spending big money to advance agendas that specifically favor them alone, has reached it's black talons into every state, all the way down to local elections.
This is a major reason why Trump is now the Republican nominee. There are many differences between the traditional PAC groups, like the RNC and the DNC, and the Super-PACs.
The first has many regulations on accountability and clarity as to where the money comes from, where it goes, and how its spent. There are many restrictions as to who is allowed to contribute to a PAC as well. And the voters can always learn who is a member of a tradtional PAC, as all membership is required to be open knowledge.
The second- the Super PAC- has almost none at all. If the traditional PAC is an attack dog, a Super-PAC is an attack lion in comparison.
As long as it is a legal corporation, donors can be anonymous, the number of donors, and the location of the donors, can be kept completely secret. The closest the individual contributors come to being exposed is only the location of the Super-PAC headquarters, and the headquarters can be nothing more than an empty office with one person in it. In back of some small town strip mall far away from where the meetings are actually held, and even farther away from where the money actually goes.
A corporation can easily have sub-corporations within it that further cloak huge amounts of money, so as voters, we will never know if major contributors are even American citizens. A Super-Pac doesn't even have to be in the United States, as long as it is legally incorporated here.
For all we know about them, they could be from anywhere, holding any belief, not matter how damaging to us it is, and the members could all be patriotic Americans or ISIS for all we know, or will ever know, wrapping themselves in one sub-corporation after another like an onion for protection, all wrapped in an American flag so it looks good.
The SCOTUS decision was a very dangerous decision for our republic.
The more a person looks into the Super Pacs, the more the alarm grows.
Even when a thoughtful voter knows nothing about them or how they work, they all smell slightly rotten, don't they?
That's part of the reason why both Trump, Bernie and Clinton all decry them.
All have and use traditional political PACs, as did the other candidates. That's because, in the end, the total amounts of money every candidate gets shows up every time.
This is the only safeguard we voters have, but its a very weak one once anyone tries to track down a Super Pac.
Trying to learn who's at the bottom of any Super PAC is like going down a spider hole. The deeper one goes, the more likely it is to encounter some very nasty human spiders. Finding any of them will take a lot of time, bravery, and financial commitment.
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