Campaign Finance Disclosure Vote in Senate Coming Soon - Make Your Voice Heard [155*5]

IT HAS ANNOYED ME TO NO END not to be able to find out who the big money is from that behind many of the campaign ads; I hope it annoys you to. You can't know right now because the part of the campaign finance law protects them from disclosing their identity if they donate through a non-profit organization.

The DISCLOSE Act (S. 3369), which has been sent to the Senate and the press today, tries to fix this problem. The following excerpt is from the Coffee Party USA, of whom I am a member,

" ...As you [might or might not] know, the Senate will be voting to break the Republican filibuster against the bill Monday at Midnight, and again on Tuesday (assuming the Monday vote will fail). No Republican senator has yet indicated they will support cloture and the bill. ..."

And then a partials quote from the letter contained on their site:

"Dear Senator,

The 156 undersigned national, regional and local organizations support S. 3369, the DISCLOSE Act of 2012, sponsored by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse.

The legislation would provide the public with basic information about campaign expenditures made by outside groups that are influencing federal elections and the donors financing these expenditures. The legislation would also provide timely disclosure by Super PACs and require outside groups which make campaign expenditures to take responsibility for their campaign ads. ...

... The First Amendment protects political speech; and disclosure permits citizens and shareholders to react to the speech of corporate entities in a proper way. This
transparency enables the electorate to make informed decisions and give proper weight to different speakers and messages. ..."

The article at the Coffeparty USA website suggested I crosslink it with this site but, other than what I did above, with the link, I am not sure how to do that. Anyway, they also provided this, if you are interested, and I hope you are because knowing where all of that money is coming from for both the Democrats and Republicans is very important.

Want to see where your Senators sit on transparency in the attempted purchase of election results? Look them up here and email them or then give them a call!

THE FIRST TWO COMMENTS WRONGLY CLAIMED that the DISCLOSURE ACT carved out an exception for Democratic-leaning labor unions without providing any proof of the assertion. Of course, that would be a dastardly political trick by the Democrats to put a poison pill in this House Republican sponsored bill so that it would look bad for the conservatives. Of course, I had to stick my nose in it and go look. Below are the pertainent sections of the Act which the commenters referred to make their assertion, it is at the very bottom. As I expected, they cherry-picked a couple of words and left out one important other word where the exclusion also applies ... corporations.

Judge for yourself: It starts with S. 3369, ‘SEC. 324. DISCLOSURE OF CAMPAIGN-RELATED DISBURSEMENTS BY COVERED ORGANIZATIONS, subsection (d):

‘(d) Campaign-Related Disbursement Defined- In this section, the term ‘campaign-related disbursement’ means a disbursement by a covered organization for any of the following:

‘(1) An independent expenditure consisting of a public communication.

‘(2) An electioneering communication, as defined in section 304(f)(3).

‘(3) A covered transfer.

‘(e) Covered Organization Defined- In this section, the term ‘covered organization’ means any of the following:

‘(1) A corporation (other than an organization described in section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986).

‘(2) An organization described in section 501(c) of such Code and exempt from taxation under section 501(a) of such Code (other than an organization described in section 501(c)(3) of such Code).

‘(3) A labor organization (as defined in section 316(b)).

‘(4) Any political organization under section 527 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, other than a political committee under this Act.

‘(f) Covered Transfer Defined-

‘(1) IN GENERAL- In this section, the term ‘covered transfer’ means any transfer or payment of funds by a covered organization to another person if the covered organization--

‘(A) designates, requests, or suggests that the amounts be used for--

‘(i) campaign-related disbursements (other than covered transfers); or

‘(ii) making a transfer to another person for the purpose of making or paying for such campaign-related disbursements;

‘(2) EXCLUSIONS- The term ‘covered transfer’ does not include any of the following:

‘(A) A disbursement made by a covered organization in a commercial transaction in the ordinary course of any trade or business conducted by the covered organization or in the form of investments made by the covered organization.

‘(3) EXCEPTION FOR CERTAIN TRANSFERS AMONG AFFILIATES-

‘(A) EXCEPTION FOR CERTAIN TRANSFERS AMONG AFFILIATES-

‘(C) DETERMINATION OF AFFILIATE STATUS- For purposes of this paragraph, the following organizations shall be considered to be affiliated with each other:

‘(i) A membership organization, including a trade or professional association, and the related State and local entities of that organization.

‘(ii) A national or international labor organization and its State or local unions, or an organization of national or international unions and its State and local entities.

‘(iii) A corporation and its wholly owned subsidiaries.

THE FOLLOWING SENATORS either voted NO or Did Not Vote in the first vote to invoke Cloture last night to cut-off debate on the filibuster of the DICLSOSE Act. I think SCOTT BROWN (R-MA) and HELLER (R-NV) may become vulnerable because of it.

• Scott Brown (R-MA), Nay | Phone: (202) 224-4543 | Fax: (202) 228-2646
• Susan Collins (R-ME), Nay | Phone: (202) 224-2523 | Fax: (202) 224-2693
• Lindsey Graham (R-NC), Nay | Phone: 202-224-5972 | DC Fax: 202-224-3808.
• Heller (R-NV), Not Voting | Phone: 202-224-624 | Fax: (202) 228-6753
• Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), Nay | Phone: 202-224-5922 | Fax: (202) 224-0776
• Kirk (R-IL), Not Voting | Phone: 202-224-2854 | Fax: (202) 228-4611
• Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Not Voting | Phone: (202) 224-5824 | Fax: (202) 224-9735
• Richard Lugar (R-IN), Nay | Phone: (202) 224-4814 | Fax: (202) 228-0360
• John McCain (R-AZ), Nay | Phone: (202) 224-2235 | Fax: (202) 228-2862
• Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Not Voting | Phone: (202) 224-6665 | Fax: 202-224-5301
• Olympia Snowe (R-ME), Nay | Phone: (202) 224-5344 | Fax: (202) 224-1946
• Wicker (R-MS), Not Voting | Phone: (202) 224-6253 | Fax: (202) 228-0378

IN A STRAIGHT PARTY LINE VOTE the conservatives defeated the motion to end the conservative filibuster against Disclosure Act aimed at making the source of ALL political donations greater than $10,000 known to whoever wanted to know it. It is ironic, because conservatives have been pushing for this exact legislation forever until President Obama came out in support of it, then, in line with their vow to make Obama a one-term President, they opposed their own legislation.

The conservatives on the Hill and comments in this hub have unsuccessfully tried to make the case that this bill carved out an exception for union members because of a $10,000 and $50,000 exemption included in the bill, ones the conservative House put in there, if I am not mistaken (again irony) claiming Union members will be able to continue to anonymously donate to the Democrats and, by implication, individually influence their vote with their $50 donations, lol. Of course, these same conservatives didn't say anything about the fact the same "carve out" applies to corporate executives who could give $9,999 anonymously and actually have some chance at a quid pro quo from a local legislator.

The only silver lining to come from this vote is it problably sealed Scott Brown's fate in the Massachusettes Senate race; I really doubt those voters will appreciate his NEY vote.

All I can say is this is another conservative slap-in-the-face of the 80% of American's who supported this Act and should be a call to action to vote conservatives out of office in big numbers.