Centrists May Look Good On Paper, But They're Not Offering What Voters Want

How important are tax cuts to the very wealthy? Very, very, according to the Center for Public Integrity. "In late June 2017," writes the Center for Public Integrity team, "Texas political mega-donor Doug Deason had a stern message for Republicans seeking  campaign donations: The 'Dallas piggy bank' was closed until they repealed Obamacare and passed major tax cuts. Deason said he had urged about two dozen of his wealthy Texas friends to do the same. The billionaire Koch brothers Charles and David also hinted at withholding money. Just weeks later, the GOP effort to repeal Obamacare collapsed. Tax reform, which one Republican senator said would make repealing Obamacare look like a piece of cake, ominously loomed as the next item on the GOP agenda, and time was running out. Panic set in. By November, as Congress struggled to push a massive tax cut bill forward, Rep. Chris Collins from New York summed up the stakes: 'My donors are basically saying: Get it done or don’t ever call me again.' Lawmakers got it done. Just days before the holiday break, relieved Republicans delivered those wealthy donors what they wanted: one of the biggest tax cuts in history, one that would almost exclusively benefit the wealthy."

And the pay-off? "From the time the tax bill was first introduced on Nov. 2, 2017, until the end of the year, a 60-day period, dozens of billionaires and millionaires dramatically boosted their political contributions unlike they had in past years, giving a total of $31.1 million in that two months... The Center’s analysis found that 144 wealthy donors, some household names and some behind-the-scenes, contributed at least $50,000 to Republicans and conservative groups in that time frame. For 87 of those, three out of five, the surge of giving at year’s end reflected a marked change in their giving behavior. Most telling, say campaign finance experts, is that 25 wealthy donors gave all their 2017 money in the final two months of the year, the first time they did so during the previous four off-election years-- 2009, 2011, 2013, 2015... The evidence shows that big donors, collectively, acted to leverage their clout to help push through the tax cut law that would enrich the kinds of corporations, limited partnerships, real estate holdings and huge investments that many of them own, campaign finance experts say."

The Wall Street banksters who want to see Trump rotting in prison-- like most normal Americans do-- have a problem. They know Trump is driving the U.S. over the cliff but they are getting panicked about the prospect of an ultraliberal Democratic nominee bent on raising taxes and slapping regulations on their firms. They especially can't abide the progressives who are in it for real, not like faking like Kirsten Gillibrand and Kamala Harris. Their bête noires are Bernie and Elizabeth Warren. And their knight in shining armor is Bloomberg, of course, even as they now realize that Bloomberg isn't going anywhere in a Democratic Party coming under more and more control from an animated grassroots outside the Beltway.

“I’m a socially liberal, fiscally conservative centrist who would love to vote for a rational Democrat and get Trump out of the White House,” said the CEO of one of the nation’s largest banks, who, like a dozen other executives interviewed for this story, declined to be identified by name for fear of angering a volatile president. “Personally, I’d love to see Bloomberg run and get the nomination. I’ve just never thought he could get the nomination the way the primary process works.”

...On Wall Street, executives love Trump’s tax cuts and soft-touch regulatory posture. But as the nation comes off the longest shutdown in American history amid warnings of an impending economic slowdown, there is also a clear preference for a change to more predictable leadership.

...After mentioning Bloomberg, Wall Street executives who want Trump out, list a consistent roster of appealing nominees that includes former Vice President Joe Biden and Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Kamala Harris of California. Others meriting mention: former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, former Maryland Rep. John Delaney and former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke, though few really know his positions.

Bankers’ biggest fear: The nomination goes to an anti-Wall Street crusader like Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) or Sanders. “It can’t be Warren and it can’t be Sanders,” said the CEO of another giant bank. “It has to be someone centrist and someone who can win.”

This was a much-discussed poll Gallup took in November (above). It doesn't really mean anything because everyone has a different definition of "moderate" and the other descriptors. PPP did a survey of Democratic primary voters last week and, as you can see, the liberal v moderate question yields the same answer as the Gallup poll. Now look at how these voters came down on specific issues:

Now those are my kind of moderates!