Republicans get (more) teleco dollars
Ever since I posted the little piece about Verizon building a massive infrastructure for the Republican National Congress, I have been thinking about the whole contribution business. Today, I finally got a handle on everything. According to OpenSecrets.org, Republicans get a disproportionate amount of contributions from the telecom industry. Of the total $6.65 million in contributions, nearly 62% has gone to the GOP, while Dems got 38%. The biggest supports of GoP are Bells. SBC gave 67% of its dollars to GoP while Verizon and BellSouth kicked in withy 62% and 59% of their total contributions . BellSouth’s contributions were nearly $1.12 million, twice the $551,000 that AT&T kicked in. The way the numbers are laid out, it seems the telecom business doesn’t trust Democrats much. Not that I blame them. Look at the 1996 telecom act debacle. On the flipside, the recent regulations show that GoP can be, how shall I say politely, easily *managed.*
Actually, Om, the 1996 telecom bill was passed by a Republican House and a barely Democratic Senate. And if I recall, it was sponsored by Larry Pressler (R-SD). It’s pretty safe to say it was the Republicans that drove that boat.
True…. but its was Genius Gore’s grand idea and anyway he could not push the complete bill through and compromised.