Posted on 02/10/2012 2:01:49 PM PST by IbJensen
(CNSNews.com) – House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Thursday that President Barack Obama chose to embrace so-called “super PACs” (political action committees) for his re-election campaign so that billionaire philanthropists Charles H. Koch and David G. Koch would not “decide who the next President would be.”
“The president made a decision, which I think was a wise one, that he was not going to unilaterally disarm and leave the field to the Koch brothers to decide who will be president of the United States and would control the Congress, and his commitment was for full disclosure,” Pelosi said.
The Kochs, who serve as president and executive vice president of Koch Industries -- the second largest privately held company in the U.S. -- are benefactors of primarily conservative and libertarian causes.
Pelosi's comments came during a press conference to announce support for the Disclose Act, which would require political action committees (PACs) to release the identities of their top donors.
She was asked by a reporter: 'In the interim before Congress is to enact this, do you think that Super PACs who support both the president's campaiugn and the Congressional Democratic campaign should voluntarily disclose -- "
Interrupting with a response of "absolutely," Pelosi defended the president, who once called unlimited campaign fundraising by corporations a “threat to democracy,” and praised his decision to now rely on Super PACs for the 2012 campaign.
“And by the way, we’re asking people to contribute to us if they want to elect more reformers to Congress, so that we can do away with super PACs, we can do away with secret contributions, we can reform the system, we can amend the constitution to overturn the Citizens United decision,” Pelosi added.
Others in the House Democratic leadership also weighed in.
“I’m a big baseball fan. I’ve never been to a baseball game, ever, where one side was told you don’t get bats,” said Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.). “He’s going to compete, fairly and effectively, and as the Leader said, nobody should expect this President to cede the election to Karl Rove and the Koch brothers.”
The Disclose Act’s sponsor, Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), said the bill would make super PACs more transparent and accountable, and “get rid of secret money” in politics.
Among other things, the proposal would require super PACs to identify the top five donors for each political ad, require corporations to inform their shareholders of their campaign spending, and have leaders of super PACs provide an approval message at the end of each ad.
In 2010, in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled that the federal government could not limit the amount of political campaign contributions made by corporations and other organizations. The decision created super PACs -- independent political action committees that can accept unlimited contributions anonymously, but can have no contact with the political candidates they support.
During his 2011 State of the Union address, President Obama criticized the Supreme Court, saying: “With all due deference to separation of powers, last week the Supreme Court reversed a century of law that, I believe, will open the floodgates for special interests, including foreign corporations, to spend without limit in our elections.”
Pelosi never ceases to amaze me with her lies, just when you think she can not top her last lie. She out does herself with this BS lie! Obarry boy is worried about money that is why he changed his mind. I guess his billion dollars in campaign donations is falling short, people are on to his BS. Koch Industries is an above average company to work for.
Why can't we amend the Constitution to prohibit the stupid and the ugly to sit in Congress?
If I recall correctly, the Won made a similar decision when running against McCain when he saw how much money he was raising.
Just curious: has anybody here experienced anything negative from the Koch’s or even heard of such a thing?
And by that I mean something unethical, sleazy and/or manipulative, not the left’s idea of negativity, meaning working to make a profit.
i’d be willing to bet that some of the missing MF Global money will be traced to Obama’s campaign warchest AFTER the election. So, Koch is not such a big fish when you have a former Governor of NJ who was the head of Goldman Sachs, missing money that no one can find and Obama taking random foreign donations that no one was interested in tracking back in the 2008 election cycle.
So George Soros gets to decide instead.
$25 Million to support cancer research and none of it went to Planned Parenthood. How can you cure cancer without Planned Parenthood?1 THE HORROR!
The Koch Brothers are despised by the left because they’re conservatives and support ONLY conservative candidates.
Saul Alinsky: Pick a villain. Demonize him
“Just curious: has anybody here experienced anything negative from the Koch’s or even heard of such a thing?”
Around a decade ago, I saw a hit piece (may have been 60 minutes).
It claimed they were rounding to their favor, when measuring oil tanks...had to do with Royalty owed to Indian tribes. It also claimed that they falsified pipeline inspection records.
I have no idea if this was white noise, standard problems in the industry, or something uniquely wrong with Koch.
It was in an era where there was alot of infighting in the Koch family over company control...so it may be a very different company today.
MoveOn.org, Lumpy Riefenstahl, Keith Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, etc. have built some scary boogeymen out of the Koch brothers out of the ether.
They tell the little children of the left scary stories about imaginary villians to make them cry.
Princess Loonatune speaketh again.
it’s both astonishing and terrifying that this ridiculous, brawling, retarded woman was ever speaker of the house. it’s even more astonishing that we survived.
The Koch Bros....evil boogeymen and dragons who strike fear deep into the darkness shrouded confines of the LIEberals nefarious hearts. I never knew the Koch Bros had Soooooo much influence and sway. But if they drive the LIEberals in fear like the cross does to vampires then all power to the Koch Bros.....
On a nice sunshine-filled San Francisco day she is still an idiot.
I worked for Koch for 16 years.
A challenging and learning experience.
I don’t think Nancy would know Charles or David if they poured her tea.
So Eric—help me out here—what is it about the Koch bros that liberals go lunatic over? Please edumacate me on this...
She is so full of bullshit I can smell her all the way to Tennessee!!!
If they did not exist, the Left would have to invent them.
Ha, the Koch brothers don’t give that much. Not compared to Soros and a lot of other big democrat donors.
What a laugh.
Of course media never brings this up for a democrat to offer a sputtering explanation for.
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