Why Soros Is Buying District Attorneys

Elections for local district attorneys were once political yawners.  The contests were uninteresting,  void of partisan politics and starved for big money donors.  All that has changed in recent years as billionaire George Soros has emptied his coffers to tip the scales for liberal Democrat candidates.

Beginning in 2014, the hedge fund kingpin has poured tens of millions of dollars into races for county district attorney across the nation.  His goal is to remove pro-law enforcement, anti-illegal immigration and anti-sanctuary city DA incumbents and replace them with handpicked ideologues.

Soros launched his campaign four years ago with a $50 million donation from his Open Society Foundation to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).  To gain more political leverage, he shoveled millions into political action committees (PAC) targeting law-and-order district attorneys.

Why are county district attorneys so important to Soros?  DA's have wide discretion to decide which crimes to prosecute, what charges to file, who to prosecute and whether to permit plea agreements.  They have the power to accept or reject police evidence in recommendations for prosecution.

With that much authority, district attorneys have the opportunity to reshape the criminal justice system to fit Soros' progressive model. 

The mogul and ally ACLU favor candidates who support open borders, amnesty for illegal immigrants, a moratorium on the death penalty and reduced sentences for so-called low level offenses, such as drug crimes.  However, his candidates rarely mention these issues.

Soros' wealth has found its way into races in Philadelphia, San Diego, Los Angeles, Chicago, Orlando, Houston, several Florida counties, Mississippi and San Antonio.  Political action committees and shadow groups are showered with cash, usually at least $1 million per contest.

Until Soros waded into these arcane races, most voters could not even name their local district attorney.  A contested battle for the position usually attracted little interest and far less than $1 million in donations.  That was before Soros began using his finances and political clout to tilt the equation.

His modus operandi is to employ powerful Washington-based law firm Perkins Cole to establish a PAC with a name that is politically sanitized.  The PACs are branded "Justice and Safety," "California Justice" and "Public Safety."  The names are deliberately obtuse to hide Soros' real agenda.

Soros funding flows through his foundation and some of the 100 organizations with ties to the magnate.  The carpetbagger prefers to remain in the background, the puppet master hidden behind the veiled curtain of secrecy. He never publicly endorses a candidate for district attorney. 

Rather the tycoon orchestrates an infusion of cash for his chosen candidate, swamping war chests raised by opponents.  The money allows the challenger to dominate the air waves with ads smearing the incumbent.  Opponents are caught off guard when they discover Soros is financing the attacks.

Consider what happened to incumbent Bexar County District Attorney Nico LaHood in his reelection campaign this spring.  Soros blindsided LaHood, investing nearly $1 million in Joe Gonzales to oust the incumbent for the sin of opposing San Antonio's sanctuary city status.  LaHood was trounced.

The campaign playbook calls for recruitment of anti-law enforcement organizations such as Black Lives Matter and pro-immigration groups to join forces with the ACLU in stirring up activists in the community.  The result creates the appearance of large scale opposition to the office holder.

A few incumbents are fed up with Soros' meddling.  In the race for DA in San Diego, the incumbent struck back slamming Soros on the airwaves.  In the ads, a picture of Soros is superimposed over masked, black-clad street demonstrator.  The inference is clear: Soros is a threat to public safety.

Despite the push back, Soros has racked up many successes, toppling incumbent district attorneys around the nation.  His funding is creating a national liberal agenda on criminal justice by buying one county district attorney at a time.  There is only one way to stop Soros.  Voters are the best defense.

Don't ignore your local district attorney race.  Research the positions of the candidates.  Use online sources to find out which PAC's are involved in the race.  Learn if the organizations have links to Soros.  Then decide whether you want an independent DA or one beholden to George Soros.

Microsoft Cashes In With Obama

President Obama may be opposed to the Keystone project, but he favors the money pipeline than runs from Redmond, Washington, to The White House.  During his past two presidential campaigns, millions of dollars have flowed from Microsoft's headquarters to Obama campaigns.

Microsoft, a corporate behemoth, shoveled $815,536 from its Political Action Committee (PAC) to the Obama re-election campaign in 2012, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-partisan organization that posts the information online at OpenSecrets.org.

The center combed Federal Election Commission records to collect the data.  Its findings paint a graphic picture of the way Washington works, where companies that do business with the federal government are politically active in national campaigns.

Microsoft's largess extended far beyond its PAC donation. Executives and managers from Microsoft passed the hat and collected nearly $1 million in contributions for the president's campaign last year.  With 90,000 employees, there was fertile ground to be tilled by Microsoft managers.

The money was raised by so-called bundlers.  Don't be fooled by the innocuous sounding word.  Bundlers are arm-twisters who canvass friends, acquaintances and fellow employees for donations.  The solicitations usually are led by individuals who bump up against personal giving limits.

Microsoft wasn't finished after the brazen bundlers were done.  They forked over another $764,059 to help fund the festivities surrounding the president's inauguration.  For the first Obama inauguration, Microsoft doled out even more, $852,167.

Therefore, it came as no surprise when the military announced on January 3 that it had signed the most comprehensive Microsoft contract ever.  The Department of Defense (DOD), despite facing supposedly Draconian sequester cuts, agreed to pay Microsoft $617 million over three years for software services.

The department is Microsoft's single largest customer.  In the past, the DOD has tested new versions of Windows and Office for the Redmond-based company.  The cozy relationship no doubt has been tightened by Microsoft's political involvement.

And the DOD is not the only large government customer.  The Department of Agriculture two years ago issued a contract to Microsoft for its web-based email and other services, beating out IBM and Google.  At the time, the agreement was called the "largest federal contract" for cloud computing.

However, Microsoft's chummy relationship with Obama may be tested.  Federal investigators are poking their noses into claims that a Microsoft executive provided monetary kickbacks to Chinese officials in exchange for government issued contracts.

There are other allegations involving business relationships in Romania and Italy, too.  The probe is being conducted by the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

The allegations have sullied Microsoft's reputation.  But don't discount an investigation that results in a slap on the wrist and nothing more. After all, money covers a multitude of sins in Washington.

The 22 Billion Dollar Question

What could the nation do with $22 billion?  Fund research to cure cancer?  Build hospitals in under served rural areas?  Issue grants to study Alzheimer disease?  Bankroll shelters to house battered women? Support efforts to end cruelty to animals?

There are many good uses for that large sum of money. Unfortunately, the $22 billion already has been spent and not a single worthy cause benefited.   

Instead those billions ended up in the pockets of politicians. From 1998 through 2010, groups, individuals and corporations funneled more than $22 billion into federal campaigns to help elect candidates for president, senate and the house.

Those eye-opening dollar signs were calculated by the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-partisan group which publishes the numbers on its website, OpenSecrets.org.  The figures do not include the millions spent in local and state elections every year.

The media would have you believe that most of that money lined the pockets of fat-cat Republicans.  However, in recent elections, Democrats hold a decided edge over their GOP brethren, outspending Republicans in three of the last four election cycles. 

This election year will likely be no different.  According to the latest data, President Obama has outspent his challenger Mitt Romney by more than $70 million.  Obama has tallied $204 million in spending versus $131 million for the former governor.

Some political pundits are forecasting spending in this presidential election will eclipse $2 billion.  Obama is doing his part to reach that plateau.  The president already has hosted 197 fundraisers since launching his re-election campaign in 2011, triple the number (86) George W. Bush held for the entire 2004 campaign, according to a report in USA Today.   

The mind-numbing dollars showered on political candidates raise legitimate questions about the impact on elections.  The cash tsunami has corrupted the political system, stymied good candidates from running and made influence peddling a Beltway parlor game.

Here are three common sense suggestions on how to take most of the money out of politics:

FREE MEDIA:  Every candidate for federal office gets a limited amount of free air time on television along with gratis radio and newspaper ads.  The media donates the advertising space and writes it off its corporate taxes.  If necessary, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) could force television and radio stations to cooperate as a license requirement.  Outside of news coverage, candidates cannot buy another smidgen of advertising. 

TIME LIMITS:  Candidates for federal offices cannot begin campaigning until three months before the election.  No exceptions. Today's campaigns are prolonged marathons which add millions to the cost.  In many countries, such as the United Kingdom, there are time restrictions on campaigns.

THREE DEBATES:  The four major networks host three debates for president, senator and representative.  No more, no less.  The debates would give every voter a chance to near the candidates. Questions would be submitted in advance to help candidates prepare and to eliminate the media's penchant for reserving its harshest questions for Republicans.

With these modest changes, spending on campaigns would plummet. The biggest losers would be the television networks, who depend on federal campaigns to generate billions of dollars in advertising revenue to fill up their corporate coffers.

This campaign season television stations are expected to grab 75 percent of political advertising budgets.  Research firm Washington Analysis projects $4 billion could be spent on advertising this year on behalf of federal, state and local campaigns across all media platforms, including the internet.

For that reason, big media will lobby furiously against any change in the status quo.

Without change, the cost of American elections will rocket into the stratosphere.  From 1998 to 2010, election spending for federal candidates, including president, soared by 125 percent.  When will the political arms race end?

Never.

Not unless Americans elect candidates dedicated to reforming the current political system.  Now, finding a candidate willing to forfeit the political pot of gold may be nearly impossible.

But there are at least 22 billion good reasons to make this a priority for the nation.