Democrats Make It Official: They'll Take Undisclosed Donations, Too

[Freddie Stubbs]

Source: National Journal

Prominent Democratic strategists, including two former top aides to President Obama, are formally launching independent committees aimed at countering the onslaught of outside Republican organizations expected to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on the 2012 presidential campaign.

Priorities USA and Priorities USA Action, the two companion committees, hope to raise $100 million to defend Obama, organizers said, an amount that will allow them to run ads competing with American Crossroads, the American Action Network, and other Republican-backing outside organizations.

The organization will not live up to the same campaign finance standards by which Obama has pledged to run its campaign. They will take unregulated donations that do not require disclosure; Obama and Capitol Hill Democrats have railed against Crossroads and other Republican groups that do the same thing. The organizers said the 2010 Supreme Court decision in Citizens United, opening the door to unlimited corporate contributions, left them no choice.

"In the Citizens United ruling, the right-leaning Supreme Court created a new set of rules that allows individuals to give as much as they want and remain anonymous should they choose," the group said in a press release. "Karl Rove and the Koch brothers then chose to exploit this decision to press their right-wing agenda without accountability. While we agree that fundamental campaign finance reforms are needed, Karl Rove and the Koch brothers cannot live by one set of rules as our values and our candidates are overrun with their hundreds of millions of dollars. We will comply with all applicable rules and laws but we won’t be boxed in by a double standard."

Read more: http://nationaljournal.com/politics/democrats-make-it-official-they-ll-take-undisclosed-donations-too-20110429

[Ian David]

1. Can we just walk in and hand them cash? n/t

[alp227]

2. REPEAL THE CITIZENS UNITED DECISION! n/t

[Ship of Fools]

3. ditto ditto ditto ditto ................ ditto!!!

dammit!!!! :)

[Freddie Stubbs]

8. How do you repeal a Supreme Court decision?

[alp227]

9. amend the constitution, see movetoamend.org

or challenge the case when Obama can replace a Republican justice

[bluestateguy]

4. Citizens United sucks

but they are the rules of the game right now.

I'm not really willing to stand silently by and be idealistic and watch Democrats unilaterally disarm while the enemy raises gobs and gobs of cash and cruises to victory in 2012.

[Le Taz Hot]

12. That's how we ended up

with Clinton, triangulation, the Third Way and the Blue Dogs. I'll pass.

[kestrel91316]

5. Fair's fair.

[OnyxCollie]

6. Except for ordinary citizens. nt

[Aerows]

7. They just can't sell our country fast enough

Repeal the Citizen's United ruling

[Teaser]

10. Good

.

[Tarheel_Dem]

11. Excellent move by Democrats. Let the wailing & gnashing of teeth begin...

by the idealists. Talk to the USSC, they invented the rules of this new game. It's on! :bounce:

[Earth_First]

13. I do not recognize this country any longer...

Secret campaign contributions, propietary balloting systems, voter ID laws...

WTF has all this become?!

I'm sure to catch grief for this comment; however, the Democrats serve no good in my book by participating in this...

While I full understand the consequences, I just feel so dirty knowing that we're playing by the same set of rules that we cried foul on.

[Tarheel_Dem]

14. Then your gripe, as it were, should be with the USSC. And until the courts

are changed, or the constitution amended (which isn't going to happen), we have to live with the ruling of the highest court in the land.