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a state with 2 parties that are basically 2 wings of one party, a party of the rich (how much money does it take to run for office and how do they acquire that money)

To add to your point, a majority of the members of congress are millionaires [1]. Keep in mind that reporting rules don't require disclosure of amounts above $1M, just that they are "over $1M". So it's getting harder to track the wealth and it's corruptive effects.

[1] http://www.opensecrets.org/new...

Federal tax receipts, historical. In 1957 tax receipts were basically $80 billion. In 2013, tax receipts were $2,775 billion.

Population of the US, historical. In 1957, there were about 172 million people. In 2013 there are about 317 million.

Inflation calculator. A 1957 dollar is worth about $8.46 in 2013

Tax receipts in 1957, per capita: $465. Correct for a 2013 dollar (multiply by $8.46) and you get about $3900 (the Federal Government also ran a real cash surplus and the national debt decreased).

Tax receipts in 2013, per capita: $8754. Or a bit more than double that 1957 per-capita after you adjust for inflation (deficit - pushing over $2000 per person).

Essentially, the Federal Government is taking about twice out of everybody's pocket as it did back in the "high tax" 50s. The difference is in the deductions allowed today versus then, so the actual, effective tax rate was dramatically different than what many suspect. And given that the overwhelming majority of tax receipts come from high income people (the top 10% pay more than 70% of all Federal income taxes, and when you include SSI/FICA - which they would all cap out - and capital gains, approximately 88% of individual, and 40% of ALL, Federal receipts comes from the income of these top 10%), we are witnessing a massive wealth redistribution at the hands of the Federal Government. The fact it's happening so poorly is not a reflection on the taxpayers, but the inefficiency and corrupt nature of the Federal Government.

Given that being in Congress makes one quite wealthy, perhaps a lot of that redistribution is strictly for the benefit of those IN Government. It's still a Federal Government by the people and of the people, but increasingly FOR Government, not for the people.

JPmorgan. The most outspoken company against crypto currencies Donated over $30k to his campaign. https://www.opensecrets.org/po...

This doesn't make any sense to me either. Current pills containing hydrocodone are a mixture with other drugs, mostly other drugs that have a higher toxicity, and part of the reason for that is to keep people from taking too many of them. If you OD on Vicodin, it's not the 5mg of hydrocodone that kills you, it's the 500mg of acetaminophen. For a 50kg person, you can get to a reasonably toxic quantity of acetaminophen (200 mg/kg) with 20 vicodin, which gives you a dose of 100mg of hydrocodone, or 2 mg/kg. Quick googling found this: http://toxnet.nlm.nih.gov/cgi-... that gives animal toxicity studies showing an LD50 for hydrocodone in the range of 86 mg/kg (mice) to 375 mg/kg (rats). Granted, you certainly don't want to take anything *near* to the LD50 of any drug, but the highest dosage for a Zohydro pill is 50 mg. For a 50kg person to get a dose of 1/4 the mouse LD50 would be over 20 pills. As noted, if those 20 pills were vicodin, then they would also be toxic, but only because of the acetaminophen. And really, if you're downing 20 of *any* prescription painkiller, you almost certainly have a different goal in mind than temporary pain relief. I just really don't see this as causing much harm, and potentially helping a fairly specific set of people who need it.

People who are intent on abusing pills can get around the acetaminophen simply by breaking the pills up, putting them in cold water, and running them through a coffee filter. This is known as cold water extraction.

Part of the reason for the acetaminophen in painkillers is because of a loophole in the 1970 Controlled Substances Act that classified pure Hydrocodone as a strictly controlled Schedule II drug (Which Zohydro will fall under). However, Hydrocodone combination products, such as Vicodin, which contains Hydrocodone and acetaminophen, into the less strict Schedule III classification. As a Schedule III drug, combination drugs such as Vicodin can be refilled as many as five times, while Schedule II drugs can be filled only once.

So why is there so much pushback against Zohydro, when it clearly fits a need and will be more difficult to obtain and abuse than Vicodin? I think it might have to do with the fact that it's put out by a tiny company (Zogenix) rather than one of the big players. Teva Pharmaceuticals who literally spent millions on lobbying last year has a competing product "TD Hydrocodone" which they're trying to get to market, but Zogenix beat them to it. If Zohydro were delayed for a little while, perhaps they could get to market with their competing drug and given their vastly larger resources they'd likely win market share. Another large company Purdue Pharma (the makers of OxyContin) also have something in the works

Read the submission. It is long and the meat is at the end.

The Obama administration refused to use laws related to subsidized imports to stop off-shoring. Now the visual artists have some real legal ground to stand on to compel the administration to stop or tariff subsidized overseas work.

Yeah, right. Legal ground. That works really well with Obama.

Statutory deadlines for Obamacare? Hey, Obama's got a pen and a phone and he can just ignore them.

Congress still in session? No biggie, he'll make "rescess" appointments not subject to Senate confirmation anyway.

As if Obama's going to go against an industry that has him bought and paid for

This iteration is as highly inconvenient as the first, as once again the perpetrators ignore the fundamental principles of responsibility and other people's rights.
Oh, and

Since 2006, epidemiological studies have documented six additional developmental neurotoxicantsâ"manganese, fluoride, chlorpyrifos, dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane, tetrachloroethylene, and the polybrominated diphenyl ethers.

RTFA.

And now folks you see why Lamar Smith wants to hobble the EPA.

Meanwhile in North Carolina you have 30 year Duke Energy vetran Governor Pat McCrory who has been using the power of the govt in NC to sheild Duke Energy from lawsuits as a result of massive pollution. Spilling things like arsenic, lead, mercury and other things into NC waterways. In every single lawsuit the McCrory administration intervened and shut the lawsuits down. Now you have the lastest massive spill

Was covered on Rachel Maddow's show last night (Tuesday, 2/11/14, A disastrous toxic spill broke NC interference for governor’s former firm) and was shocking.

officials at the state Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) invoked a provision in the federal Clean Water Act allowing them to step in as plaintiffs against Duke Energy when Duke was being sued by environmental activists over the toxic coal ash ponds at its facilities.

In N.C. for state residents (citizens) to sue, they have to give a 60 days written notice.

• ~ On day 58 of the 60 day notice, for the first spill, the DENR, Department of Environment and Natural Resources, stepped in and said we will handle it.
• ~ The group discovered a second Duke Energy plant was polluting and gave their 60 day notice that they intended to sue, on day 60 the DENR stepped in and said we will handle it.
• ~ The same NC Citizens group discovered a 3rd Duke site polluting and put in their 60 day notice to sue, you guessed it, on day 60 the DENR stepped in and said we will handle it (basically voiding the lawsuit).
• ~ All three sites continue to pollute the ground water (NC. citizen's drinking water) today with no attempts to clean anything up.
• ~ They Duke Energy were fined less than $100,000.00. I wonder how much the clean up will be and as with the oil companies if they will be paid twice. Usually these companies have another shell company to do the clean up and hide the extent of the damage. For the oil companies in the gulf research 'corexit', 'oil' and 'dispersants', you will see the similarity.

The state reached settlements worth a collective $99,000 for those incidents. (Duke Energy)

You see the new head of the DENR use to work for Duke Energy, when he took over the organization, he changed their charter to one of protecting corporate industry and changing regulations so that the industries would not run afoul of the legislation. And yes he is a Republican. And N.C. Governor is a Republican.

Amy Adams, resigned in November 2013, saying she was dissuaded from levying sanctions against companies like Duke since McCrory took office in 2010. Amy was interviewed by Rachel and it was extremely informative.

I would be very concerned for my health, the health of my children due to the state of my drinking water if I lived in North Carolina. Another fail of

I see your point although I don't fully agree. Aside from that though, look at what we have here. These companies have been caught red handed. And nothing is going to happen to them. Token fines, no jail at all. How is more taxes going to solve this? If someone is above the law then no amount of money will matter. It's time to outlaw corporate bribery but that's not going to happen. Take a walk around this site http://www.opensecrets.org/ and see how pervasive it is. Non-partisan also. We keep playing the two party shuffle and it only gets worse and worse. Until we unite to take back our country we're fucked. We need to put aside our differences that they use to divide us and get these fuckers out of office but that wont happen because everyone thinks their side is okay when they are all rotten.

And now folks you see why Lamar Smith wants to hobble the EPA.

Meanwhile in North Carolina you have 30 year Duke Energy vetran Governor Pat McCrory who has been using the power of the govt in NC to sheild Duke Energy from lawsuits as a result of massive pollution. Spilling things like arsenic, lead, mercury and other things into NC waterways. In every single lawsuit the McCrory administration intervened and shut the lawsuits down. Now you have the lastest massive spill

What you are linking to is a partisan political press release from oil industry frontman Lamar Smith of SOPA/PIPA fame. Remember him? Yep he's the sponsor of SOPA/PIPA and big hollywood has him in their pocket too. He has been against the clean air act and have been trying to shutdown the EPA for a while now. I cannot take his words as gospel so is he lying? maybe. who knows. He's a politician in the pocket of big oil and big media/hollywood. Take a look at his top industry donors Says a whole lot.

What you are linking to is a partisan political press release from oil industry frontman Lamar Smith of SOPA/PIPA fame. Remember him? Yep he's the sponsor of SOPA/PIPA and big hollywood has him in their pocket too. He has been against the clean air act and have been trying to shutdown the EPA for a while now. I cannot take his words as gospel so is he lying? maybe. who knows. He's a politician in the pocket of big oil and big media/hollywood. Take a look at his top industry donors Says a whole lot.

As I understand it, the FCC is generally comprised of people who have been employed by, or are personally very close to, the 'communications' industry, as is true for most government commissions. The bill, introduced in the House by Waxaman, only seeks to make the FCC ruling stick, so it is most likely that whatever your perception of 'net neutrality' may be, I suspect the people on that board will not be making anything of the sort. Net neutrality is the avenue of revenue being pursued by crony capitalists seeking to capture the Internet.

Are you at all familiar with SoundExchange? Because it is exactly what you are proposing, and they have driven the costs of online radio stations to be higher on a per listener basis than the costs of OTA radio stations. The one I am personally familiar with is SomaFM. I did a back-of-the-envelope comparison of SomaFM with a local San Francisco radio station on a per listener basis and I was amazed to see that SomaFM is paying through the nose to keep their 'commercial-free, listener-supported' radio station up and running, despite the fact that the infrastructure to distribute online is vastly more efficient than terrestrial based radio stations..

What the ISPs really want is all the benefits of being a common carrier without any of the responsibilities. And that's exactly what they got with the Net Neutrality ruling. Given that AT&T is in the running for the top campaign donor in the country, it's unlikely that will change anytime soon (Seriously, it would be easier to list the politicians not on the take from AT&T).

That's it exactly. Not only is this data not private, it has never been private. It has always been sold between companies, and is the entire basis for a multi-billion dollar industry. The CFPB is simply purchasing this information at the market price, just like hundreds of other companies do on a routine basis. As the joke goes, capitalists will sell the rope to hang themselves.

You can bet the NSA collects this exact same information. The NSA collects this information to conduct drone strikes, and find citizens to murder. The CFBP wants to use this information to regulate banks. Yet, this congressman doesn't talk about the NSA. Does it surprise anyone at all, that banking & finance sectors contribute heavily to his wallet? http://www.opensecrets.org/pol...

This is another politican who has been bought and paid for, and is fighting against the best interests of the people he supposedly represents.

AT&T is the third largest campaign contributor in the US, giving approximately $5000 to 386 out of 435 Congressmen, and 66 of the 100 Senators, so it's safe to say AT&T already is the ruling party!

What I'm awaiting, though, is the change to inaugurate President Stephen Colbert!

Strangely.....well, maybe not so strangely, Goldman Sachs has provided since 1989 $11,460,036 to Democrats and $8,005,125. Like most corporations they could give a shit what party it is though, it's more about their ability to help out Goldman Sachs interests.

http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/toprecips.php?id=d000000085&cycle=A

Shoot anyone against it.

Also. The FCC is filled to the gills with politically well connected, revolving door sycophants there to do industry's bidding before jumping back on the gravy train. It's the poster child for a watchdog agency overrun and infested with regulatory saboteurs and common's-hating overpavers.

http://www.npr.org/2011/05/20/136492206/new-republic-the-fccs-revolving-door-is-shameless

http://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/search_result.php?agency=Federal+Communications+Commission&id=EIFCC

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62718-2004Nov19.html

http://articles.latimes.com/2013/aug/30/business/la-fi-mo-powell-20130830

http://www.theverge.com/2012/11/20/3670940/michael-powell-fcc-chariman-cable-companies-mercy-contet

There have been plenty of very wealthy individuals who create foundations Rockefeller, Ford, now Gates and Zuckerberg. They can do a lot of good, arguably more than Ted Turner donating $1B to the UN.

I sure prefer to see it spent this way then surreptitiously funding political activity through tax exempt organizations like George Soros.

Yeah, fuck Ted Turner and his billion dollars to provide food aid during famines/wars, medicine for pandemics, and water for kids dying of thirst. Where the fuck does he get off?

There have been plenty of very wealthy individuals who create foundations Rockefeller, Ford, now Gates and Zuckerberg. They can do a lot of good, arguably more than Ted Turner donating $1B to the UN.

I sure prefer to see it spent this way then surreptitiously funding political activity through tax exempt organizations like George Soros.

The difference is that Ted Turner made his donation from his personal assets. Zuckerberg is having Facebook issue the stock from it's shares on hand. So, in reality, it is Facebook that is making the donation, not Zuckerberg and the donation is being made to Zuckerberg's charity.

I sure prefer to see it spent this way then surreptitiously funding political activity through tax exempt organizations like George Soros.

1) One of the big drivers behind patent reform was the National Association of Realtors. The reason why is in the link.

2) They are the 5th largest all time donor to federal politicians. They pay both political parties nearly equally.

3) They are the part of the Finance-Insurance-Real Estate (FIRE) sector, which as a group, "is far and away the largest source of campaign contributions to federal candidates and parties" per the link.

Hence the overwhelming numbers. I'd be curious to see what other goodies are buried in that bill.

1) One of the big drivers behind patent reform was the National Association of Realtors. The reason why is in the link.

2) They are the 5th largest all time donor to federal politicians. They pay both political parties nearly equally.

3) They are the part of the Finance-Insurance-Real Estate (FIRE) sector, which as a group, "is far and away the largest source of campaign contributions to federal candidates and parties" per the link.

Hence the overwhelming numbers. I'd be curious to see what other goodies are buried in that bill.

Actually, you'd be surprised at how little a Congresscritter costs. http://www.opensecrets.org.

It's difficult to pin down an exact date.

• It could have been when we started re-electing Congressmen the vast majority of the time, no matter how unpopular they were.
• It could have been when gerrymandering made its debut.
• It could have been when political parties started, leading people to vote for their team rather than who they thought was the best candidate.
• It could have been when money started to mean more than votes.
• It could have been one of the many instances where we have traded liberty for security.

His profile doesn't seem to have Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon listed as major contributors, so I'd guess this man is honestly trying to do something for his constituents.

The profile lists American Cable Association — just to dampen your enthusiasm. Not that I necessarily disagree with the Association's stated goals, but you are displaying utmost naivete, when stating, a career politician is "honestly trying to do something for his constituents." He and his likes are walking illustrations for the dire need for term-limits.

It's also worth noting that he is doing this in spite of Verizon being a major source of funding.

Verizon — which does not produce any content itself — is happy to sell you ever fatter Internet-access. The bill would hurt Verizon's competitors (liek TimeWarner) far more, than Verizon itself.

he is retiring at the end of the current Congress

Retiring does not mean dying — man's children and nieces will still need good jobs, for just one example... And he himself may appreciate a fee for a public speech, may he not? Who better to pay that fee, than the businesses he helped?

he came out in favor of gay marriage this year

WTF does that contradiction of terms have to do with Internet Service Provision? Off-topic much?

His profile doesn't seem to have Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon listed as major contributors, so I'd guess this man is honestly trying to do something for his constituents. It's also worth noting that he is doing this in spite of Verizon being a major source of funding. Also related and notable, he is retiring at the end of the current Congress -- he came out in favor of gay marriage this year too, and in West Virginia that probably means something. I get the impression he's trying to leave a good legacy, and it's nice to see that.

My source for that number was the Bureau of Labor Statistics report I linked in my post above (located with a quick web search). They lump "Education, training, and library occupations" together in the 39.2% union represented number; I'd have to look elsewhere to see exactly what portion of that is specifically government-run public schools (though that's the biggest portion of the "education" market to start with). No "janitorial/maintenance" is not lumped in --- they're a separate line ("Building and grounds cleaning and maintenance") with only 11.4% representation.

Searching around, I found what appears to be a more comprehensive state-by-state report on teacher's unions at
http://www.edexcellencemedia.net/publications/2012/20121029-How-Strong-Are-US-Teacher-Unions/20121029-Union-Strength-Full-Report.pdf
If you want to nearly entirely avoid unions, go to Florida, North or South Carolina, Mississippi, or Arkansas.

Given your (oft well founded) distrust of government, why do you think government employees shouldn't be allowed to band together to make sure they don't get screwed over by their management? You do realize that union donations are, in the grand scheme of things, pretty small --- politicians are "hearing" a lot more loudly from anti-union and pro-privatization advocates. Here's the page I found on OpenSecrets.org listing public sector union donations: https://www.opensecrets.org/industries../indus.php?ind=P04 . On the total list of "special interest" groups, they're 15th down the list (https://www.opensecrets.org/industries../mems.php) --- not completely insignificant, but outspent 2:1 by, e.g., "securities/investment" who would love privatization and wage-slashing action. And even that's a drop in the bucket (not "boatloads") compared to total private-sector lobbyist spending. Overall, union funds for campaigning are only a tiny fraction of their worker's paychecks --- and working-class folks only take home a fraction of the money going to anti-union oligarchs (who have a lot more disposable income for corrupting government officials to their will).

For a test of public sector union "corruption" based on data rather than hand-waving, one might ask whether public sector (union) employees actually earn ridiculously more than their private sector counterparts. If they don't, then "eeeevil unions" apparently aren't doing much harm (and, if they do, it may be that private sector employees are getting shafted...). Here's a CBO report I found on the topic: https://www.cbo.gov/publication/42921 --- I see slightly higher wages+benefits for similar educational levels (below doctorate level), but not exactly signs of massive evil fraud --- to reasonable approximation, you're earning about the same amount either way.

I am part of Feinstein's constituency and she doesn't bring shit home for us.

Of course she does: Dianne Feinstein sponsored or co-sponsored 163 earmarks totalling $211,598,500 in fiscal year 2010 ranking 14th out of 100 senators.

No one that I ever talk to supports her or any of her whack-job policies.

You failed to talk to a lot of people: In 2012, Feinstein claimed the record for the most popular votes in any U.S. Senate election in history, having received 7.75 million votes.

I dislike these people as much as you do, but they have popular support for a reason. You shouldn't ignore that.

Nope, they are actually simple concepts and simple to implement. Go back to the start of the country and you'll find that corporation != person. That's something the Supreme Court decided in 1819, See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood for more details, They also decided that corporations can't be limited in their contribution in 2010.

The simple fact is corporation are not people and therefore are not guaranteed the right of freedom of speech. In my opinion campaign contributions should be limited only to people and that amount set to a reasonable maximum for each person. Individuals are already limited to giving set amounts for campaign contributions per candidate. Here's an overview of current campaign contribution limits: http://www.opensecrets.org/overview/limits.php

If only people were allowed to give a campaign contribution and it was set at a reasonable limit then freedom of speech is preserved and corruption is greatly reduced. That last bit is exactly why it will not happen. It's a rather simple and straightforward solution and one inline with the current constitution (minus all the legal shell game of changing standard definitions).

I'm sorry, but I don't believe this whatsoever. I distinctly remember our president campaigning on an end to the revolving door of industry lobbyists and executives to head political positions and vice versa.

A little googling later . . . : https://www.opensecrets.org/obama/rev.php

Oh. Well, then. . .

LOL. Are you serious?

Do you have any idea the sheer levels of nepotism and cronyism on the right?

President Bush, under the direction of VP Cheney, awarded contracts to the company Cheney previously was CEO of.

CGI Federal, while apparently rather incompetent, has actually been a government contractor for decades.

Not to mention the completely idiotic 'fact' that the president of CGI Federal became a donor to Obama after he got the contract. Yeah, and he became one to Mitt Romney also. Obama, apparently you got scammed there, he's playing both sides!

http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary.php?id=D000048534

Timeline of the anti-trust case:

"May 18, 1998: The big day. The U.S. Justice Department and 20 state attorneys general file an antitrust suit against Microsoft, charging the company with abusing its market power to thwart competition, including Netscape.

September 6, 2001: U.S. Justice Department says it no longer seeks the breakup of Microsoft and wants to find a quick remedy in the antitrust case. "

Timeline of Microsoft political donations.

.... then the wealthy have more speech than you.

Both of you bleed red. But you're the one who gets sent to the front.

OpenSecrets.org - See who's giving & who's getting.

In related news, the USA has no plans whatsoever to do anything about the environment.

I guess that's what happens when you let J.R.Ewing, et. al. run the country.

Re-election rates for Congress over the years: http://www.opensecrets.org/bigpicture/reelect.php

you guys have got to be kidding or you've got to be really disconnected from reality.
almost *every single* member of congress is already *at least* a millionaire. No shit:

http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2013/01/new-congress-new-and-more-wealth.html

and it's not like this is even a new thing. It's been this way a LOOONG time.
So if you honestly think that the salary these d-bags are pulling is anything more than tip money for the golf caddy to these guys you're living in a fantasy land.

Bullshit. Peoples willful ignorance is what keeps an honest person off the ballot. They follow the bling wherever it goes. Turn off the TV and go to opensecrets, or votesmart, or better yet, congress itself. Yay! They're still up!

There is no excuse...

They went after the National Association of Realtors. The fifth largest all-time donor to federal politicians since 1989.

When big political donors get upset, politicians will act.

Every nation gets the government it deserves.

A government program that feels its duty is to review the contents of every American email, phone call, and SMS, regardless of such superficial things like 'warrants'? You own it, Americans. After decades of inviting the federal government to fix your problems, this is what you get. From the Midwest corn farmers enjoying their subsidies to the inner city food-stamp-reared-baby-machines, Americans have sold themselves for pennies on their liberty. Worse, you don't even get a good deal with your Faustian compromises. You awarded yourselves a universal healthcare program that is neither universal nor financially sound. Your social security program seizes your salary and barely beats inflation on returns (if you even get it back).

This is what you get. You've handed so much of your agency to your political class, they can't help but think they can make the best decisions for you. Perhaps that's why the wealthiest counties in America ring the capital. Perhaps that's why your representatives make 300% per capita GDP in salary and have an average net worth nearly 30x the average American family's. Perhaps that's why they see fit to exempt themselves from the laws they write.

You've fed the megalomaniacs. Good luck telling them you want your 'privacy' back.

Well I must admit that I can't remember exactly where I had heard that "the campaign with the largest budget wins, every time", and can't seem to find it just now. Still, a quick search gave me this nice chart.

Since I don't have House/Senate results memorized, I only glanced at recent Presidential elections. At first sight, this does not seem to support my statement. But these figures are per party. I am pretty sure that, typically, the incumbent party will typically spend a much larger percentage of total funds on their eventual candidate (post primaries) than the opposing party. Simply because the primaries select their incumbent candidate quickly, almost without fail.

Now if we look again at the charts and remember which party was incumbent for each of the cycles, I think it might still turn out -- I can't unfortunately find a convenient chart demonstrating it just now -- that the candidate with the largest funds has won the election, at least in recent Presidential races.

I am not sure what you were trying to say about putting a dollar value on "free media coverage" -- sorry if I misunderstand you. Are you saying we must compensate, in some way that isn't just hand waving, for a perceived Democrat bias in the media and then we will find it is surprising that Republicans ever win anything at all?

Also, I was under the impression TP candidates are, even more so then usual, funded primarily by business rather than individuals? Not sure about that though.

As far as I can tell, the internet companies have done more that any others is trying to hold back the NSA.

Meh.

Concerns over the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), as well as attempts by intelligence agencies to collect user information from email and social networking sites, appeared on the second-quarter lobbying disclosure reports of several tech firms.

The topic wasn't mentioned in any first quarter 2013 reports, before public revelations that the National Security Agency was collecting data on American citizens from email and social networking sites.

While it's not clear from lobbying reports how much money or time each of the companies, or trade associations that represent them, have spent on the specific subject of FISA, the resources each one (of Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Yahoo! and Twitter) has available are substantially larger than any of the watchdog or civil liberties groups. In fact, each one of these five groups lobby substantially more than the other eight organizations that disclosed lobbying on FISA -- combined.

In the first three months of 2013, (Google) spent $4.1 million, which put it on track to spend less than 2012, but still a substantial amount. In the second quarter of 2013, however, spending contracted, coming to about $3.6 million.

Why, it's almost like nobody cared until, by shear coincidence, something happened in the second quarter of this year.

Google spend more than 7 times as much in the same timeframe.

Well, the issue is Obama overturning an ITC ruling favouring not Google but Samsung over Apple. So dragging Google into it is a kind of distraction.

Apple paid Obama $308,081 in 2012 Samsung paid Obama $1,000 in 2012 ( as $250 and $750).

How likely is it, do you think, that Obama will turn around and veto the recent Apple-requested ITC ban on Samsung products?

Wow. You actually believe Obama made that decision himself? Let alone because of some minor campaign distribution?

Let me tell you something - the reason Samsung keeps getting into legal trouble is because they are criminals. Their chairman had to resign because of a major corruption scandal (which supposedly was the reason Samsung became so big), facing jail time. He was later pardoned and now again is chairman of Samsung.

Google spend more than 7 times as much in the same timeframe.

Well, the issue is Obama overturning an ITC ruling favouring not Google but Samsung over Apple. So dragging Google into it is a kind of distraction.

Apple paid Obama $308,081 in 2012 Samsung paid Obama $1,000 in 2012 ( as $250 and $750).

How likely is it, do you think, that Obama will turn around and veto the recent Apple-requested ITC ban on Samsung products?

Wow. You actually believe Obama made that decision himself? Let alone because of some minor campaign distribution?

Let me tell you something - the reason Samsung keeps getting into legal trouble is because they are criminals. Their chairman had to resign because of a major corruption scandal (which supposedly was the reason Samsung became so big), facing jail time. He was later pardoned and now again is chairman of Samsung.

Google spend more than 7 times as much in the same timeframe.

Well, the issue is Obama overturning an ITC ruling favouring not Google but Samsung over Apple. So dragging Google into it is a kind of distraction.

Apple paid Obama $308,081 in 2012 Samsung paid Obama $1,000 in 2012 ( as $250 and $750).

How likely is it, do you think, that Obama will turn around and veto the recent Apple-requested ITC ban on Samsung products?

Wow. You actually believe Obama made that decision himself? Let alone because of some minor campaign distribution?

Let me tell you something - the reason Samsung keeps getting into legal trouble is because they are criminals. Their chairman had to resign because of a major corruption scandal (which supposedly was the reason Samsung became so big), facing jail time. He was later pardoned and now again is chairman of Samsung.

Obama got $308,081 from Apple in 2012
Obama got $1,000 from Samsung in 2012 (as $250 and $750)

Even disallowing the home team advantage, I really would be surprised if Obama does Samsung the same favour he extended to Apple last week and overturns this ban.

Obama got $308,081 from Apple in 2012
Obama got $1,000 from Samsung in 2012 (as $250 and $750)

Even disallowing the home team advantage, I really would be surprised if Obama does Samsung the same favour he extended to Apple last week and overturns this ban.

Obama got $308,081 from Apple in 2012
Obama got $1,000 from Samsung in 2012 (as $250 and $750)

Even disallowing the home team advantage, I really would be surprised if Obama does Samsung the same favour he extended to Apple last week and overturns this ban.

Google spend more than 7 times as much in the same timeframe.

Well, the issue is Obama overturning an ITC ruling favouring not Google but Samsung over Apple. So dragging Google into it is a kind of distraction.

Apple paid Obama $308,081 in 2012
Samsung paid Obama $1,000 in 2012 ( as $250 and $750).

How likely is it, do you think, that Obama will turn around and veto the recent Apple-requested ITC ban on Samsung products?

Google spend more than 7 times as much in the same timeframe.

Well, the issue is Obama overturning an ITC ruling favouring not Google but Samsung over Apple. So dragging Google into it is a kind of distraction.

Apple paid Obama $308,081 in 2012
Samsung paid Obama $1,000 in 2012 ( as $250 and $750).

How likely is it, do you think, that Obama will turn around and veto the recent Apple-requested ITC ban on Samsung products?

Google spend more than 7 times as much in the same timeframe.

Well, the issue is Obama overturning an ITC ruling favouring not Google but Samsung over Apple. So dragging Google into it is a kind of distraction.

Apple paid Obama $308,081 in 2012
Samsung paid Obama $1,000 in 2012 ( as $250 and $750).

How likely is it, do you think, that Obama will turn around and veto the recent Apple-requested ITC ban on Samsung products?