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August 2, 2008

Andy Ostmeyer: Money isn't always the factor

I’m too quick to shoot politicians, or so I learned last week.

I recently noted that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had dumped millions into political campaigns over the years, with recipients of the largesse including Kit Bond ($19,000) and Roy Blunt ($11,000). The implication was that anyone who took the money would ride to the rescue even if that rescue is bad business and even worse policy, the latter being an arrangement for private profit and public losses, as others have noted.

Then I slipped away for a vacation, only to come back and find that both men I’d singled out had voted against the bill, despite the contributions.

Blunt, speaking to the Christian Science Monitor, said that among his concerns was this: “We missed a huge opportunity to really restructure these (government-sponsored enterprises) in a way that ... would minimize the potential for this same kind of problem in the future. ... We have actually almost ensured that the same kind of problem will come again sometime in the future.”

Bond also worried about a bailout of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, noting that any rescue must be done in “a responsible manner to protect the taxpayer and prevent a similar crisis in the future.”

It made me wonder how often politicians swim against the money tide.

The answer is more often than they may get credit for, especially from trigger-happy media types.

With the help of Sean Tanner, research director for maplight.org, we tracked a couple of pieces of energy legislation (knowing that oil companies are big donors) to see how politicians voted.

One of those was the Senate vote on the Renewable Fuels, Consumer Protection and Energy Efficiency Act of 2007, which promotes the increasing use of renewable fuels, boosts the efficiency of everything from buildings to cars, and promotes research on capturing greenhouse gases.

Oil and gas producers, petroleum refiners, chambers of commerce and mining, chemical and manufacturing companies were among those who opposed the bill, according to Tanner’s group. It was favored by labor unions, alternative energy and environmental groups, and corn and soybean growers.

The bill passed, with 65 senators voting yes. According to maplight.org, 55 of the 65 senators who voted for it received more money from the opponents of the legislation than the proponents. And, often, the opponents’ giving dwarfed the contributions of proponents.

New York Democrat Hillary Clinton, for example, got $411,177 from those lined up in favor of the bill, while she got nearly $2.3 million from opponents. Minnesota Republican Norm Coleman and South Dakota Republican John Thune each got more than $1 million from opponents of the bill, and less than $200,000 each from proponents. Yet all three voted for the legislation.

The Web site also tracked other Senate votes on the Consumer First Energy Act of 2008, which would remove $17 billion in tax breaks for big oil companies and impose a 25 percent windfall profits tax on those same oil companies that refused to invest in new energy sources.

Republican Sen. Charles Grassley, of Iowa, got $48,950 from companies, including oil and gas producers, that opposed the bill, and $17,000 from those who favored it, including consumer groups and environmental policy organizations. Yet, he voted for it, as did U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, the Illinois Democrat, who took $130,664 from opponents of the measure but only $51,700 from proponents.

There’s hope yet for politicians.

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