Fuck its silent in here.......

[morpheus]

I wasn't aware of the applicability of the Court's decision to the expressly prohibited act of foreign entities making donations in connection with U.S. elections.

You don't need to make a donation to make your own commercial:

"Senator Grassley is costing America farmers millions of dollars in his protectionist farm bill.  Vote against Senator Grassley.  This message paid for by Uniliever."

Hard to see how the SCOTUS ruling wouldn't allow that.

Even in non-baseball, 10.17(c) applies.

http://vlex.com/vid/contributions-donations-foreign-nationals-19137877

(a) Prohibition It shall be unlawful for - (1) a foreign national, directly or indirectly, to make -... (C) an expenditure, independent expenditure, or disbursement for an electioneering communication (within the meaning of section 434(f)(3) of this title)

In other words... no.

That would seem to be unconstitutional now.  Given the scope of the ruling, someone could certainly challenge it.

No.  The Court held that a portion of 2 USC 441a was unconstitutional.  Didn't say a thing about 441e.  The law makes the distinction between foreign entities and domestic ones for a reason, and it's a big leap to say that will be affected in any way.

DPD.  The Court specifically affirmed 441e in their opinion:

http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/09pdf/08-205.pdf

We need not reach the question whether the Govern-ment has a compelling interest in preventing foreign individuals or associations from influencing our Nation'spolitical process. Cf. 2 U. S. C. §441e (contribution and expenditure ban applied to "foreign national").

[Chuck to Chuck]

We need not reach the question whether the Govern-ment has a compelling interest in preventing foreign individuals or associations from influencing our Nation'spolitical process. Cf. 2 U. S. C. §441e (contribution and expenditure ban applied to "foreign national").

That doesn't sound like an affirmation.  That sounds like they simply aren't going there with this case.  The whole paragraph includes more tying 441b to 441e.  I can't figure out what they are saying.

[Saul Goodman]

We need not reach the question whether the Govern-ment has a compelling interest in preventing foreign individuals or associations from influencing our Nation'spolitical process. Cf. 2 U. S. C. §441e (contribution and expenditure ban applied to "foreign national").

That doesn't sound like an affirmation.  That sounds like they simply aren't going there with this case.  The whole paragraph includes more tying 441b to 441e.  I can't figure out what they are saying.

Courtspeak can be confusing?  Get out.

[R-V]

Morph it should be noted that when Obama was complaing about the Supreme Court opening up the flood gates to foriegn corporations or donors it was his campaign that removed many of the donation safe guards to prevent people from overseas from donating to his campaign.

I will have to search the internet for the work some bloggers did, but they compared the donation process of McCain and Obama and McCain had all the normal restrictions that would prevent someone from overseas donating while the Obama campaign stripped those out. Plus the Obama campaign accepted nearly anything as payment like gift cards which would be totally untraceable.

And Obama wants to bitch about the flood of forieng money into campaigns to the Supreme Court of the United States. Obama is flush with millions he recieved from over-seas in nothing more than a slick bypass of election law.

Another one of those bullshit moments from the State of the Union.

I read somewhere that he turned off the AVS checking of credit card donations (checks donor's name, address, etc. against the credit card company's records) or something, which could have led to such behavior... but I never saw anything that established that such behavior was in fact occurring.  It may well have, but that's a serious allegation which requires some backup.

Responding seriously to MikeC is like feeding stray animals. My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals.

[Eli]

You know what Bush inherited alot of crap from Clinton too but he never blamed him for his problems.

What?

http://www.google.com/search?q=%22bush+blames+clinton%22

[Slaky]

You know what Bush inherited alot of crap from Clinton too but he never blamed him for his problems.

What?

http://www.google.com/search?q=%22bush+blames+clinton%22

Psh, you could only find 24,500 hits?

[R-V]

Ta-Nehisi Coates with a good takedown of Chris Matthews' latest dipshittery:

The "I forgot Obama was black" sentiment allows the speaker the comfort of accepting, even lauding, a black person without interrogating their invented truth. It allows the speaker a luxurious ignorance--you get to name people (this is what black is) even when you don't know people. In fact, Chris Matthews didn't forget Barack Obama was black. Chris Matthews forgot that Chris Matthews was white.

I'm put back in the mind of the The Wire, when Slim Charles tells Avon that it really doesn't matter that our wars are based on a lie. Once we're fighting, we fight on that lie until the end. I would submit that a significant number of white people in this country, can not stop fighting on the lie. They can't cop to the fact that they really have no standing to speak on Obama's relationship to blackness, because they know so little about black people. It's always hard to say, "I don't know." But no one else can say it for you.

[R-V]

We need not reach the question whether the Govern-ment has a compelling interest in preventing foreign individuals or associations from influencing our Nation'spolitical process. Cf. 2 U. S. C. §441e (contribution and expenditure ban applied to "foreign national").

That doesn't sound like an affirmation.  That sounds like they simply aren't going there with this case.  The whole paragraph includes more tying 441b to 441e.  I can't figure out what they are saying.

I ain't learn-ed enough to follow this argument, but FWIW

A senior administration official told POLITICO on Thursday morning: "There is a loophole that we need to address and are working with Congress to address. There are U.S. subsidiaries of foreign-controlled corporations that could influence our elections because of this ruling."

The issue was raised by Justice John Paul Stevens in his dissent in the case, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission: "t would appear to afford the same protection to multinational corporations controlled by foreigners as to individual Americans."

Stevens continued: "The Court all but confesses that a categorical approach to speaker identity is untenable when it acknowledges that Congress might be allowed to take measures aimed at "preventing foreign individuals or associations from influencing our Nation's political process. ... Such measures have been a part of U. S. campaign finance law for many years. The notion that Congress might lack the authority to distinguish foreigners from citizens in the regulation of electioneering would certainly have surprised the Framers."

And on page 75, Stevens wrote: "Unlike voters in U. S. elections, corporations may be foreign controlled."

[Chuck to Chuck]

You know what Bush inherited alot of crap from Clinton too but he never blamed him for his problems.

What?

"To understand the State of the Union, we must look not only at where we are and where we're going but where we've been. The situation at this time last year was truly ominous. [...] First, we must understand what's happening at the moment to the economy. Our current problems are not the product of the recovery program that's only just now getting under way, as some would have you believe; they are the inheritance of decades of tax and tax, and spend and spend. [...] The only alternative being offered to this economic program is a return to the policies that gave us a trillion-dollar debt, runaway inflation, runaway interest rates and unemployment," - Ronald Reagan

[Gil Gunderson]

You know what Bush inherited alot of crap from Clinton too but he never blamed him for his problems.

What?

"To understand the State of the Union, we must look not only at where we are and where we're going but where we've been. The situation at this time last year was truly ominous. [...] First, we must understand what's happening at the moment to the economy. Our current problems are not the product of the recovery program that's only just now getting under way, as some would have you believe; they are the inheritance of decades of tax and tax, and spend and spend. [...] The only alternative being offered to this economic program is a return to the policies that gave us a trillion-dollar debt, runaway inflation, runaway interest rates and unemployment," - Ronald Reagan

Yeah, well that was Reagan, and he's dead, so there.

Riposte!!

[morpheus]

You know what Bush inherited alot of crap from Clinton too but he never blamed him for his problems.

What?

"To understand the State of the Union, we must look not only at where we are and where we're going but where we've been. The situation at this time last year was truly ominous. [...] First, we must understand what's happening at the moment to the economy. Our current problems are not the product of the recovery program that's only just now getting under way, as some would have you believe; they are the inheritance of decades of tax and tax, and spend and spend. [...] The only alternative being offered to this economic program is a return to the policies that gave us a trillion-dollar debt, runaway inflation, runaway interest rates and unemployment," - Ronald Reagan

Of course, Reagan was right, so there's that.

[Quality Start Machine]

You know what Bush inherited alot of crap from Clinton too but he never blamed him for his problems.

What?

"To understand the State of the Union, we must look not only at where we are and where we're going but where we've been. The situation at this time last year was truly ominous. [...] First, we must understand what's happening at the moment to the economy. Our current problems are not the product of the recovery program that's only just now getting under way, as some would have you believe; they are the inheritance of decades of tax and tax, and spend and spend. [...] The only alternative being offered to this economic program is a return to the policies that gave us a trillion-dollar debt, runaway inflation, runaway interest rates and unemployment," - Ronald Reagan

Of course, Reagan was right, so there's that.

As was Obama.

[morpheus]

You know what Bush inherited alot of crap from Clinton too but he never blamed him for his problems.

What?

"To understand the State of the Union, we must look not only at where we are and where we're going but where we've been. The situation at this time last year was truly ominous. [...] First, we must understand what's happening at the moment to the economy. Our current problems are not the product of the recovery program that's only just now getting under way, as some would have you believe; they are the inheritance of decades of tax and tax, and spend and spend. [...] The only alternative being offered to this economic program is a return to the policies that gave us a trillion-dollar debt, runaway inflation, runaway interest rates and unemployment," - Ronald Reagan

Of course, Reagan was right, so there's that.

As was Obama.

Sure.

[BH]

You know what Bush inherited alot of crap from Clinton too but he never blamed him for his problems.

What?

"To understand the State of the Union, we must look not only at where we are and where we're going but where we've been. The situation at this time last year was truly ominous. [...] First, we must understand what's happening at the moment to the economy. Our current problems are not the product of the recovery program that's only just now getting under way, as some would have you believe; they are the inheritance of decades of tax and tax, and spend and spend. [...] The only alternative being offered to this economic program is a return to the policies that gave us a trillion-dollar debt, runaway inflation, runaway interest rates and unemployment," - Ronald Reagan

Of course, Reagan was right, so there's that.

As was Obama.

Sure.

Obama reminds Morph of his night with Dennis Rodman.

[MikeC]

I read somewhere that he turned off the AVS checking of credit card donations (checks donor's name, address, etc. against the credit card company's records) or something, which could have led to such behavior... but I never saw anything that established that such behavior was in fact occurring.  It may well have, but that's a serious allegation which requires some backup.

This is opening up an old can of worms and all but why exactly would a campaign turn off restrictions that allow you to track donations?

McCain put his entire donar list on-line for everyone to see. Obama put roughly half and kept hidden the rest. True he wasn't required to for donations less than $200, but Obama was running on Mr. Transparency and change. If your talking about being transparent but hiding who and where people are donating from it means your lieing through your teeth. And his first year in office has been a history lesson on how you lie to people.

What is interesting to note when you compare donations of McCain to Obama is McCains come out looking clean, as in dollar amounts. 5.00, 10.00, 100.00 and so on. When you look at Obamas they are in dollars and cents, like 7.16, 45.62, etc. Why are people who are donating not doing it in clean sums? One explanation is foriegn exchange rates. This alone doesn't explain everything its simply a red flag. Newsmax did a story about the ones they did find....

Major media have jumped on the story, with Newsweek noting that FEC auditors ordered Obama's campaign to return large amounts from sources with fake names. One phony was "Good Will," who listed "Loving" as his employer and "You" as his job. The address given was found to be that of the Austin-based nonprofit Goodwill Industries, which informed the Obama campaign last month that its name was apparently being used fraudulently.

Another made-up name: "Doodad Pro." His listed address is a Nunda, N.Y., liquor store next to the now-closed Doodad Boutique.

More disturbing was $33,000 paid for Obama campaign T-shirts by two Palestinian brothers from Gaza who listed "Ga." as their address, which the campaign took to be the state of Georgia. The purchase is considered a campaign donation.

This week, CBS News discovered two Obama contributors who gave $7,722 using fake identities, "Dahsudhu Hdusahfd of Df, Hawaii," employed by "CZXVC/ZXVZXV" and "Uadhshgu Hduadh of Dhff, Fla.," who works for "DASADA/SAFASE."

The Newsmax report noted a separate FEC database of more than 11,500 overseas contributions to Obama totaling $33.8 million, with more than 520 listing their locations as "IR," a possible abbreviation for Iran. (The Associated Press noted that "In FEC reports, the designation 'IR' typically stands for 'information requested' because the donor did not supply it.")

Sixty-three listings had "UK" as the donor's location. Other locales apparently providing money for Obama included Abu Dhabi, Addis Ababa, Beijing and Fallujah, as well as France and Italy.

With over 220 million dollars in donations that Obama refuses to open to review it puts into question whether he was not heavily subsidized with foriegn money or simply illegal donations. His campaign also allowed donations through untracebale pre-paid credit cards.

In recent weeks, questionable contributions have created headaches for Obama's accounting team as it has tried to explain why campaign finance filings have included itemized donations from individuals using fake names, such as Es Esh or Doodad Pro. Those revelations prompted conservative bloggers to further test Obama's finance vetting by giving money using the kind of prepaid cards that can be bought at a drugstore and cannot be traced to a donor.

The problem with such cards, campaign finance lawyers said, is that they make it impossible to tell whether foreign nationals, donors who have exceeded the limits, government contractors or others who are barred from giving to a federal campaign are making contributions.

"They have opened the floodgates to all this money coming in," said Sean Cairncross, chief counsel to the Republican National Committee. "I think they've made the determination that whatever money they have to refund on the back end doesn't outweigh the benefit of taking all this money upfront."

I think calling out the Supreme Court when his campaign was the prime example he was railing against is laughable. Its two-faced and pathetic. I am not sure the Supreme Court made the right decision and I am inclinded to believe Obama's arguement that it could lead to that, but when you have been engaged in circumventing election law in your own campaign you really have no business lecturing the Supreme Court of the United States.