How 'Citizens United' is helping Hillary Clinton Win the White House

[LongTomH]

Clinton’s massive campaign machine is built of the very stuff — super PACs, secret cash, unlimited contributions — she says she’ll attack upon winning the White House.

Indeed, a Center for Public Integrity investigation reveals that Clinton’s own election efforts are largely immune from her reformist platform. While Clinton rails against “unaccountable money" that is “corrupting our political system,” corporations, unions and nonprofits bankrolled by unknown donors have already poured millions of dollars into a network of Clinton-boosting political organizations. That’s on top of the tens of millions an elite club of Democratic megadonors, including billionaires George Soros and Haim Saban, have contributed.

Far from denouncing their support, Clinton has embraced it, personally wooing potential super PAC donors and dispatching former President Bill Clinton and campaign manager John Podesta on similar missions.

Several of the big-money groups crucial to the Clinton-for-president effort are led or advised by one man, Clinton scourge-turned-disciple David Brock, who’s also seized control of — and defanged, former staffers say — a prominent, nonpartisan watchdog group that helped lay groundwork for what’s become the Clinton email server scandal. Each of the groups plays a specific role, from advertising to opposition research, in bolstering the Hillary for America campaign committee Clinton herself leads.

https://www.publicintegrity.org/2016/04/07/19521/how-citizens-united-helping-hillary-clinton-win-white-house

[Firebrand Gary]

1. You do realize that citizen united was about and directed at Hillary right?

[LongTomH]

2. Referencing Clinton's 'reform-minded campaign'.......

“It’d be like tobacco companies coming out and saying they wanted to fight against lung cancer,” said Dylan Ratigan, the former MSNBC television host and author of New York Times bestseller Greedy Bastards, who hasn’t yet endorsed a presidential candidate. “In a way, the Koch brothers have more credibility than Clinton on election money issues — they’re at least upfront about how they want to use money to buy politics.”

A Center for Public Integrity/Ipsos poll conducted in late February indicates many potential general election voters are likewise concerned about how serious Clinton is about remaking the nation’s campaign system —a monumental challenge under any circumstance, but a goal supported by the vast majority of Americans.

Half of all poll respondents overall — and nearly four in 10 self-identified Democrats — said Clinton is relying on super PACs and big money too much. That compares to 18 percent overall who said Clinton is relying on them the “right amount” and 5 percent who said “too little.”

And when asked, “If elected president, which of the following would do the most to reform the campaign finance system and make it less reliant on big money?” Clinton trailed both Sanders and Trump among respondents.

Hillary Clinton describes campaign finance reform as one of her campaign’s “four fights." But about half of all respondents in a new Center for Public Integrity/Ipsos poll — and nearly four in 10 Democrats — say Clinton’s campaign is too reliant on super PACs and big money.

[SamKnause]

3. Hillary would not be in the race if her campaign only

depended on contributions given from citizens.

She could not compete with Bernie on a fair playing field.

She is barely keeping up with him even though she continues

to fund raise and take money from Super Pacs.

[LongTomH]

4. 'Citizens United' was originally directed against Clinton, but......

Call it pragmatism, call it ruthlessness. By any name, Clinton’s acceptance of big-money politics means trouble for Republicans, who’ve been reveling all decade in the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.

The ruling freed corporations, unions and certain nonprofits to raise and spend unlimited amounts of money to advocate for and against political candidates. Conservatives have embraced Citizens United more widely than liberals, many of whom consider poorly regulated political money a poison that weakens democracy.

What initially prompted the high court’s decision? A dispute over a decidedly anti-Clinton movie that a conservative nonprofit organization called Citizens United wanted to broadcast during the 2008 presidential primaries.

“Wouldn’t you know that Hillary Clinton has become one of the greatest beneficiaries of the Citizens United Supreme Court decision,” Citizens United President David Bossie said. “It is an irony that is not lost on me.”

[oldandhappy]

5. And she is right leaning centrist which tells me a lot about supreme appointments

[RiverLover]

6. Exactly. The 'oh so imp' reason we must vote for her even though she plays for a different team

is not a reason at all. Why would a corrupt conservative EVER pick a SCJ willing to end Citizens United? Especially when that corrupt politician is the largest superpac recipient (& creator of superpacs) in the race. And she's also managed to skirt around the pathetic laws still in place on campaign finance.

sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2015/12/01/super-pacs-dark-money-and-the-hillary-clinton-campaign-part-1/

https://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2015/12/03/behind-the-clinton-campaign-dark-money-allies/