The American Ruling Class: stupid and paranoid or just embarrassed?

Embarrassed and Ashamed

by digby

This says everything you need to know about our ruling elite:

When it comes to the anonymous contributions fueling the tens of millions of dollars in advertising this year boosting Republican candidates, you could say that American Crossroads was against them before it was for them.

Early this year, when an elite team of GOP operatives rolled out plans for the group and a linked network of other independent conservative organizations, they enthusiastically embraced the idea of public disclosure of donors, in part because of a professed commitment to transparency.

“I’m a proponent of lots of money in politics and full disclosure in politics,” Mike Duncan, an American Crossroads board member, said in May during a panel discussion focusing partly on Republican plans for outside group spending in the midterm elections in the wake of a January Supreme Court decision allowing more corporate spending with less transparency.

American Crossroads, the non-profit group Duncan helps lead with assistance from Bush-era operatives Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie, had recently registered under a section of the tax code – 527 – that requires regular disclosure of its donors, primarily because of its founders’ commitment to “full accountability” and “transparency,” explained Duncan, a former Republican National Committee chairman. During the panel, Duncan recalled “when we had the board discussion, we talked about the fact that we were going to be ahead of the curve on this."

But, less than one month after the panel, with American Crossroads entering its fourth month of existence struggling to raise money from donors leery of having their names disclosed, the Crossroads operatives spun off a sister group called Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies (or Crossroads GPS, for short), which they registered under a different section of the tax code – section 501(c)4 – that does not require donor disclosure.

With the Crossroads fundraising team, led by Rove, emphasizing to prospective donors the ability to give to Crossroads GPS anonymously, fundraising took off.

Through Oct. 12, more than 57 percent of the $56 million raised by the two groups had come through anonymous donations to Crossroads GPS, according to an analysis by POLITICO of Crossroads public statements and records on file with the Federal Election Commission and Internal Revenue Service.

The success Crossroads has had in attracting anonymous donors highlights a broader trend on the right in which political activity has increasingly shifted to non-profit corporations that can conceal donors’ identities. Republican finance insiders interviewed for this story say it is easier to get major GOP donors to contribute when there’s no risk of having their identities disclosed and being subjected to either additional appeals for money from other groups, or to criticism from President Barack Obama and other Democrats.

“Whether it’s legitimate or not, there is this near-hysteria, this belief that the Democrats are going to come after us,” if donors disclose their contributions to GOP-allied groups, said one person who was asked to donate the Crossroads groups. “Everybody is truly afraid that the Obama administration is going to target them.”


There are a couple of possibilities here. The first is that they truly are as stupid and paranoid as they are being portrayed. And that's a reasonable assumption. The Tea Bag revolution is being led by billionaires after all. They could be as idiotic as their followers. Certainly, the Wall Street Masters of the Universe have revealed themselves as cowardly, greedy and inept.

But it's more likely that they know very well that they are risking the disapprobation of their customers and society at large if they are seen to be buying elections. (The idea that the Obama administration is going to go after them doesn't pass the laugh test.)Certainly, it could make dinner parties uncomfortable for some of these people if it's known that they are supporting throwbacks like Sharron Angle. I suspect a good number of them are simply embarrassed about what they are doing and afraid of being held responsible for it.

It's true, however, that they are very, very touchy about the idea that the rubes don't appreciate being told to eat cake. When I wrote metaphorically that I was going to "sharpen my pitchfork" you could hear the frightened calls for smelling salts all over the blogosphere. So maybe they are really afraid the people are going to storm the barricades.

Whatever their excuses, it comes down to the same thing we've been seeing in all areas of our society the last few years. They wealthy simply don't believe they should be required to be held liable for anything they do and certainly not by the common folk. So they are banding together to rig the game in secret.

The funny thing is that they've always run things. But they had the good sense to keep up the pretense that they believed in democracy and were smart enough to share the wealth enough to keep the bourgeoisie contented. Now they're hysterically screeching and flailing about, grasping at every last penny like the world is coming to an end tomorrow. So maybe they really are just stupid and paranoid --- it wouldn't be the first ruling class that went down that road.


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