whatever else it is, the Edwards trial is a damning indictment of how we fund campaigns

[cali]

I don't know if Edwards is guilty of breaking any laws. The laws around campaign finance were a tangle in 2008 and they're even more so now, but that someone could funnel hundreds of thousands to a candidate for whatever purpose is just shameful.

As for Edwards, one of the neglected themes of all of this shit, is that he took shameless advantage of a very old person. Yes, she's a very rich old person but what a pig to lie to an old lady to get hundreds of thousands out of her for any reason, let alone to for setting up his pregnant mistress.

[frazzled]

1. Well, no individual is allowed to give more than $2,500 per election to a candidate

You can give $30,800 to a political party in a calendar year; but this clearly wasn't a donation to the party.

If it WASN'T a campaign contribution (and therefore breaking a law on several levels), and was a private "gift"--my question is, were gift taxes paid on it? Usually the donor pays those taxes, but the donee can pay it too. Mrs. Mellon was writing checks to this dandy named Huffman, making them out ($750,000 of them in all) for "furniture." He in turn was sending the money on to the Youngs. Does that sound like the way one gives a gift? Were taxes paid on it?

Whatever else it is, someone was involved in criminal activity somewhere.

[monmouth]

2. Saw an item that said Bunny was in love with him...sigh..n/t

[unblock]

3. where you say "could" the law says "can't"

there are still maximum limits
and there are still limits on what the money can be used for.

if edwards did what he's accused of, then the law says it's illegal and he'll very likely pay a big price for breaking the law.



yes, campaign finance laws are a mess, but this is not a good example of the problems. better examples are the terrible practices that perfectly legal, such as corporate contributions, which (given corporations' profit-maximizing mandate) are practically guaranteed to be the moral equivalent of bribes.

[cali]

4. it's not that cut and dried at all

the funds in question weren't designated as campaign contributions. They weren't used as campaign contributions- unless they can prove that Edwards was using the monies to further his campaign. You're wrong about this not being a good example of the problem- at least according to several experts.