[Cross-posted from the ProgressMass blog. Like ProgressMass on Facebook and follow on Twitter.]
We all know that Republican Scott Brown is one of Wall Street’s favorite members of Congress. We know that Brown raked in contributions from big banks and investment firms while working behind the scenes to water down regulations on Wall Street. We know that, even after the financial reform bill was passed, Brown worked hard on Wall Street’s behalf to loosen the rules and allow Wall Street to continue gambling away our economic stability.
But how does that happen? How does Wall Street capture the attention of someone like Brown? Can Wall Street honchos and other financial services muckety-mucks simply rent out Republican Scott Brown like a clown for a kid’s birthday party? Yup.
You might not recognize many – or any – of the names of the folks hosting and co-chairing this past weekend’s Brown fundraiser, so let’s do a brief roll call.
· Host Tim Litle might be this Chairman of Litle & Co., a payment processing company.
· Host George Noble might be this investor who headed Noble Partners hedge fund, before it went under in 2009 due to “poor performance.”
· Co-Chair Daniel Bathon might be this General Partner and Chairman of Windspeed Ventures, a private equity investment firm.
· Co-Chair Harvey Bines might be this lawyer from Sullivan & Worcester, focusing on corporate finance and investment management.
· Co-Chair Dennis Burns might be this managing director of Morgan Stanley Smith Barney.
· Co-Chair Jim Canty might be this Partner and co-founder of Clough Capital Partners, a global investment management firm.
· Co-Chair Rich Churchill might be this “retired venture capitalist and former partner with TA Associates [private equity firm] and a co-founder of M/C Venture Partners [private equity firm].”
· Co-Chair Charles Clough might be this Chairman, CEO, and co-founder of Clough Capital Partners, a global investment management firm.
· Co-Chair David Fialkow might be this Managing Director and Co-Founder of General Catalyst Partners, a venture capital firm.
· Co-Chair Steve Karol might be this Managing Partner and Founder of Watermill Group, a private equity firm.
· Co-Chair Tom Litle might be this President & CEO of Litle & Co., a payment processing company.
· Co-Chair Jeffrey Newton might be this Managing Director of Gemini Investors.
· Co-Chair Pete Nicholas might be this co-founder of Boston Scientific medical device firm.
· Co-Chair Rod Nordblom might be this Chairman of Nordblom Company, a real estate investment firm.
· Co-Chair Jim Rappaport might be this CEO, Chairman, and Director of New Boston Real Estate Investment Funds. (You may recognize Rappaport as the 2002 Republican candidate for Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts spurned by Mitt Romney in favor of Kerry Healey.)
· Co-Chair Robert Reynolds might be this CEO of Putnam Investments.
This assembled group of investors, businessmen, and financial services bigwigs paid handsomely to have Republican Scott Brown’s full attention yesterday from 4pm to 6pm. What were these investors discussing with Brown (and asking him for) behind closed doors for two hours? Hey, they were probably just talking about the Boston Celtics’ playoff run – though maybe, just maybe, they were thanking him for watering down regulations on Wall Street and asking him to keep up the great work.
Indeed, Republican Scott Brown can raise money from just about whoever he wants. He just can’t honestly call himself an “independent” voice when he is so inextricably tied to the Wall Street set. In fact, Brown’s “He’s For Us” slogan seems rather appropriate when it’s immediately above this list of names; he is for them. When Brown says he’s “the People’s Senator,” these are the “people” to which he is referring. It’s no surprise that Brown is generally very secretive about who is raising campaign funds for him.
Just remember that, while Republican Scott Brown is unwilling to hold public town hall forums at which voters can ask him questions, he is perfectly happy to hobnob with the Investor Class, for a price.
… and that’s to support the Elizabeth Warren campaign however we can. Tens of thousands of people, each with a few dollars to donate, can make a dent in his advantage with rich, powerful big-money interests. (It’s a lot harder to raise the same amount of money from many people than it is from a few). We can talk to family and friends about her candidacy. Those of us who are highly motivated and can carve out the time can do some volunteer work. And of course making sure to vote for her in November.
I know a bunch of these people, and they are all very successful. But many a tremendous civic leaders in the Boston area and in their local communities. If I had the money to attend, I would. These are some very nice people.
You think Warren doesn’t have a similar list, perhaps even more Wall Street and out-of-state than Brown’s?
Please, spare me.
“… many are tremendous civic leaders…”
… is the idea that these folks were chatting about “civic” matters.
I am sure that many of them are nice people, give to charity and don’t torture small animals. They are “nice”, unless, of course, you want to raise the cap gains tax to match the income tax. Then you better find another country club ’cause no one is going to want to share a tee time with a socialist.
First, you make a presumption that this is what these contributors are all about. How do you know their motivations?
Secondly, you demonize a legitimate public policy position — making the US globally competitive in attracting and retaining capital investment — which conflicts with your wrongheaded world and tax policy view, therefore these people are not nice.
Lastly, I’ve never played golf with a socialist, but I suspect it would be excruciating.
The game truly is excruciating.
I’ll have a beer with you.
Warren does not have a list “even more Wall Street.” Have you been paying any attention at all the past few months? The vast majority of wealthy Wall Street financiers hate her, as has been well reported, such as this from Vilifying Rival, Wall St. Rallies for Senate Ally:
Or perhaps you’d like to look at the latest available data of political contributions by sector, where Scott Brown received $1.97 million from the financial sector while Elizabeth Warren received $135,000 (source: Center for Responsive Politics)
Fidelity, State Street, Liberty Mutual, Raytheon, Mass Mutual, lots of local law firms, and a few Wall Street outfits.
Sure, PACs and companies always support an incumbent. But if Lizzy were so great for Joe and Jane Investor, you would think the non-Wall Street finance companies would be all behind her. But they’re not.
And for good reason. Her ill-advised policies prescriptions scare the crap out of these NON-WALL-STREET financial companies. Like Fidelity. And State Street. And local insurance firms.
Get it?
to refer to large financial firms that trade stocks. Fidelity is one of them.
Elizabeth Warren is actually great for anyone who isn’t able to make five- and six-figure campaign contributions in order to influence a Senator to do their bidding to bend the tax code more favorably in their direction. Scott Brown’s that guy.
She is not great for financial firms that want to gamble with my money on risky strategies and then get bailed out because they’re ‘too big to fail.’
…that says a lot about the circles you travel in, not that there’s anything wrong with that per se as long as we acknowledge the context. If you can find a similar list for EW let us know, but we’ve had posts about “the Goldman Sachs primary” and “the JP Morgan primary” which if I recall correctly were both unanimous for Brown.
and the circles I travel in. But that’s ok. I like that reputation.
One “t” short of a full deck, no?
For fundraising, the second quarter reporting period ends on June 30.
Scott Brown is obviously reaching into many deep-pocketed republicans to raise a ton of money. He also had John McCain visiting Boston and doing a fundraiser for him on Friday.
It’s obvious. When Scott Brown reports his numbers for this quarter, he will show a really big jump in the amount he gets. He will try to claim that he now has momentum, and might even claim that the native American thing is what caused the increase.
At any rate, it will be hard to beat Scott Brown this quarter, unless lots of people donate $3 immediately at http://www.elizabethwarren.com
You know the teachers scamming millions off the rest of us? They should have the loot to pump up the Senator’s cash stash.
Instead, their union bosses funnel the money (although not in Wisconsin or Indiana anymore.)
Not a Surprise that a GOP troll says that there is no need to contribute to Warren’s campaign, at exactly the same time that Scott Brown is raising tons of money from some of the wealthiest members of the Massachusetts finance industry.
Just like corporations, unions are required to have PACs, which are contributed to voluntarily.
As for knowing about you I was just going by what you said. Of course if you followed the example of many of us and used a version of your name as your handle we might know more about you.
We all like sheep; shepherds, maybe not so much.
In any case, one can tell quite a lot about volks, it seems to me, by examining what they DO use when they do not care to use their names.
The subject being not strictly political, Paddy McWoolite proposes to examine it in a lesser forum.
Happy days.
A fine dog, but when she got old, she couldn’t control her bowels, and had to stay outside. This one’s contributions are bringing back memories …
Your loss.
Good boy.
That’s really not true anymore, post-Citizens United. Just FYI.
How would I or other mere morals reach such an exalted state?