AP: Schwarzenegger Has Raised $113 Million

[DeepModem Mom]

Schwarzenegger Has Raised $113 Million
Nov 04

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is on pace to become the most prolific fundraiser in California history, with much of the cash flowing in from big businesses and executives, according to a review of campaign finance records by The Associated Press.

He has raised $113.4 million in the little more than three years since he launched his campaign to replace Democrat Gray Davis, who often was accused of having a "pay to play" approach to governing that favored his donors.

That amount is nearly as much as the $120 million Davis raised over seven years for two gubernatorial campaigns and to fight the recall effort. It also is more than three times as much as Schwarzenegger's Democratic opponent in Tuesday's election, state Treasurer Phil Angelides, has received during roughly the same period.

Schwarzenegger has done it despite having voter-imposed contribution limits on some of his campaign committees that Davis did not face until the 2003 recall campaign.

"Schwarzenegger has raised an average of $95,000 a day, which dwarfs the amount of money Davis raised," said Carmen Balber, a consumer advocate for the Santa Monica-based Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, which tracks the governor's campaign contributions and has been one of his biggest critics....

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/11/04/D8L64VOG0.html

[onehandle]

1. How many poor people would that feed?

Arnold, you're going to win.

Do the right thing.


Shove it all up your ass.

[Catherine Vincent]

2. That's not surprising.

He's "The Terminator". :eyes:

[Lautremont]

3. He's almost got enough to make Terminator 4, sounds like.

Or that long-mooted third Conan picture.

[savemefromdumbya]

4. why do people vote for him?

[xchrom]

5. unfortunately, i believe that shchwarzenegger represents

the new model of the repulick party that they will trot out.

in some ways he resembles landrieu and ben nelson{neb} and lieberman.

feh. can you say neo-liberalism?

[THUNDER HANDS]

6. well, you could do a lot worse

you could do a lot better, MUCH better, but you could do a lot worse than an Arnold-type republican.

[sugapablo]

7. Agreed...

At least he's not a religious ideologue.

A Republican, devoid of the religious rhetoric, I can at least accept as a person who just holds a different political view, and view as someone where compromise is possible.

But the relgio-nuts...I can't stand them in office. Because you can't compromise with them. There is no compromise when dealing with the absolute.

I just hate it when people I respect in life for what they've accomplished (The Austrian Oak, or a former Super Bowl Champion Steeler) tarnish their lives by turning over to the dark side.

[xchrom]

8. neo-liberalism continues the

problem of corporate control over state and federal governments.

you diminish say the role of a scaife, or haliburton but you get the industries that bring you nafta and cafta.

neo-liberals hold hands with neo-conservatives -- their goals simply do not diverge that much.

[THUNDER HANDS]

9. that's true in a lot of ways

But you can't win every election, the best you can do is hope that your opponent has some small level of competence, at least.

I'd rather have a Richard Nixon type than a George W. Bush type, even though I disagree with both on practically everything.

[xchrom]

11. what an interesting point of view.

either way america loses.

[Peace Patriot]

10. Do not despair, compadres! Restoring democracy in the U.S. is not going

to be easy. The Dark Lords have more pots of gold where that came from, and unconscionable power over election results (--California thoroughly Diebold now; we're in big, big trouble here). But I see many signs of hope (even in California), and I KNOW that we, the people, will win, in the long run.

One big sign of hope: Huge voter revolt--very intense in California, but all over the country as well--by Absentee Ballot voting. It's up to 50% and 60% in some places, and has increased in direct proportion to the cancerous spread of these Bushite controlled election theft machines. People DON'T TRUST the machines, and are looking for a way around the rigged electronics.

The election reform movement needs to get on this--with a LOCAL, BACKDOOR strategy to achieve transparent vote counts, by organizing these AB voters to put pressure on local election officials, to, a) HAND-COUNT the Absentee Ballot votes, and b) POST the results BEFORE any electronics are involved.

We can thus achieve a paper ballot system BY DEFAULT. If we can get election officials to comply with these simple, common sense demands--in response to the huge AB vote--even more people will vote by AB, because that will be the only way to get your vote counted. And the machines will begin to gather dust.

Lots of other signs of hope that we all know about. The Dems are going to wipe the floor with the Bushites in this election, and if the Dems don't win big, this rigged electronic voting system is going to brought down even faster (than with the AB voting strategy). I figure Diebold/ES&S knows this quite well, and will temper the vote stealing this time, to craft a Dem majority in the House that won't cause too much trouble. (Bear in mind that Diebold/ES&S controls results in our primaries, as well as in general elections.)

As for Schwarzenegger, I know a young man, whom I thought was quite intelligent, who is voting for Schwarzenegger because he likes his muscles and thinks he's funny. I kid you not. But I don't think that's the whole story re Schwarzenegger, by any means. I think he benefited from the first Diebold election in California--the weird Recall election in '03, which had 125 candidates on the ballot (making it very easy to switch/re-distribute votes). (Time mag and Larry King also helped, by giving him millions of dollars worth of free publicity--something a famous actor didn't really need--in the short 6-week campaign.) I believe it was the Recall election that raised the suspicions of our then-Sec of State, Kevin Shelley, who began investigating Diebold, then sued Diebold for their lies about the security of their machines, demanded to see their source code, decertified the worst of their machines (the touchscreens), and provided California with a paper ballot option, six months before the 2004 election. After that election (which Kerry won by a 10% margin in Calif.), Shelley was driven from office on entirely bogus corruption charges, and Schwartz APPOINTED Republican and Diebold shill Bruce McPherson as Sec of State. McDiebold (er...McPherson) made all the anti-Diebold stuff go away, and has been busy undoing all of Shelley's reforms.

As Greg Palast has revealed, Schwarzenegger met with Kenneth Lay and other Bushites in Los Angeles in May 2001. Ken Lay's problem at that time was that Enron's house of cards was about to collapse, and Enron had stolen $9 billion from the state of California (the state's entire budget surplus, built up by Gov. Davis). A good state government, of course, would try to get that money back--which Davis, Lt. Gov. Bustamante, and A.G. Lockyer tried to do, after Enron imploded. The Bushite feds, of course, sided with Enron, and the legal battle was joined. Enter Schwarzenegger--more than likely in a deal with the Bushites to cover all this up, and make it go away, just as McDiebold has done regarding Shelley's good government efforts to insure transparent elections.

The state's corporate media is as bad as any in the country. Corrupt, malfeasant, and completely unreliable as public watchdogs. The SF Chronicle, the Sacto Bee and the L.A. Times* are just funnels for corporate propaganda and black ops. They've lavished attention on this illegitimate poser of a governor, Schwarzenegger--and have boosted his polls, and are probably fixing his polls. He's a lot cleverer than Bush. He vetoed universal health insurance, then came right back with what I am sure will turn out to be a phony "green" program that will profit the big corporations that own California and no one else (--and, my best guess, will do nothing to save the planet).

Don't be surprised if California bucks the "blue" tide in the rest of the nation next week--and produces a whole of lot of "surprise" Bushite wins. It's all set up. The Dark Lords are determined to force California into the "red" column, against the will of the people. I only hope that DEBRA BOWEN--a good Dem election reformer running against McDiebold for Sec of State--survives it all. We desperately need her in charge of our election system. Californians do have a penchant for putting opposite party candidates in the down ticket state offices. But the situation is so highly rigged on some many fronts, I am not all that hopeful even about BOWEN.

--------------------------

*(The L.A. Times is a mixed bag. It has always given quite in-depth coverage--lengthy articles exploring all views--on many important issues, and has a great writing/research staff--which corporate mergers are now trying to kill off. You can often find alternative views/perspectives if you read far enough into L.A. Times articles--the sort of things that other newspapers and media organizations just lop off, in their short, simplistic coverage of news and trends. However, on the big ticket political items the L.A. Times has almost always gone with the rich, the rightwing and the Corporate spin. They are a bit like the WSJ--good reporting, because business people/investors MUST have accurate information--but dinosauric on the editorial page, and often rightwing on important headlines/newspin (subtitles, leads). The LAT is a bit more objective than the WSJ in this respect--it has a much broader and more culturally diverse readership--but the news vs. editorial policy analogy has some truth to it.)

[upi402]

12. raised it by pulling up his britches

with a fat wallet in back.

MAD TV did a Maria & Ahnold skit. I just can't understand her consorting with those that have harmed her family so much.
Anyway, she told him he was a washed up action hero and suggested he try running for governor, "You always wanted to be governor Arnold".
He said, "Nah, you know my family has nazis in it. I would never work".


Good for MAD TV. Shame on California. And Maria.

[aquart]

13. Starsuckers.