Kirk Smith: Electoral Politics

40 Millionaires in US Senate

Mon, 07 Jul 2003 06:26:15 GMT

by Jeremy Johnson

07 Jul 03

At least 40 of the 100 US senators are millionaires, some many times over, according to financial disclosure filings submitted last month. Republicans on the list outnumbered Democrats by a narrow margin of 22 to 18. However, Democratic senators hold the top five spots on the list and eight of the top ten, according to an analysis of the forms by CNN.

These latest financial disclosures underscore the widening gap between the average American and those who claim to represent them in government. Even those congressmen who report a relatively modest net worth are pulling down a salary of $154,700, with leadership positions paying $171,900 annually.

Heading the list is the Massachusetts Democrat and presidential candidate John Kerry, with an estimated net worth of between $164 million and $211 million. He reports holdings in 75 mutual funds, along with two held jointly with his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, heiress to the Heinz food company fortune. Assets that she owns independently, which other sources estimate at hundreds of millions more, are not required to be included. [World Socialist Web Site]

Billionaires for Bush

Mon, 07 Jul 2003 06:10:07 GMT

Editorial

02 Jul 03

George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Laura Bush have been darting across the country these past few weeks raising money for Bush-Cheney '04 Inc. Bush, who broke all precedent in his 2000 bid by opting out of the presidential public-financing system and the spending limits it imposes, is once again pushing the envelope - and the corporate execs, lobbyists and wealthy individuals he has enriched are sending envelopes back, stuffed with checks. His operatives say he hopes to raise $170 million for next year's primaries - an obscene amount, since he will have no Republican challenger and his Democratic opponents will be held to a $45 million spending ceiling. But they're deliberately lowballing his total. Given the $101 million he raised in 1999-2000 and the unwise doubling (by the reform-hungry McCain-Feingold-Shays-Meehan squad) of the individual donation limit to $2,000, Bush starts with a potential funding base of $200 million or more.

Nothing like this has happened since the robber barons and the trusts united behind William McKinley's 1896 campaign. [The Nation]

Thanks to the Net, Howard Dean Hits the Big Time

Mon, 07 Jul 2003 05:33:04 GMT

by Randolph T. Holhut

06 Jul 03

DUMMERSTON, VERMONT. They aren't laughing anymore.

The people who believed that former Vermont governor Howard Dean was nothing more than a hopeless longshot for the Democratic presidential nomination now know otherwise.

That's because the political pros and the Washington press corps (or as Media Whores Online likes to call them, the 'Beltway Kool Kidz') not only underestimated Dean, they also underestimated the power of the Internet as an organizational and fundraising tool.

Dean pulled off a pair of shockers in recent days. In MoveOn.org PAC's online Democratic presidential primary, Dean crushed the rest of the field. With nearly 320,000 votes cast (or more votes than were cast in the 2000 New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary and Iowa and South Carolina presidential caucuses, combined), Dean won 44 percent of the vote. Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich was second with 24 percent and John Kerry was a distant third with 16 percent.

Considering the voters who cast ballots in the MoveOn primary (myself included) constitute a more liberal electorate than most primary states, it wasn't much of a surprise to see the rest of the field in single digits. John Edwards had only 3 percent of the vote. Dick Gephardt and Bob Graham drew less than 2.5 percent. Carol Moseley Braun (2.21 percent) outpolled Joe Lieberman (1.92 percent) and Al Sharpton finished last at 0.53 percent. [American Reporter]

Rwanda Sets Dates for First Polls Since Genocide

Sat, 05 Jul 2003 01:16:44 GMT

04 Jul 03

KIGALI. The Rwandan government has set dates for presidential and parliamentary elections in a move that marks an end to a nine-year transition to democracy after a 1994 genocide killed 800,000 people.

The central African country's government said late on Thursday the country's first presidential vote since the massacre would be held on August 25, with parliamentary elections following a month later on September 29. [Reuters via Financial Times]