Sheldon Adelson vs Bernie... Plutocracy vs Democracy

A nexus of pure, unadulterated evil-- Trump and the Adelsons

Sheldon Adelson bought the biggest newspaper in Las Vegas for 140 million dollars. His net worth is something like 32 billion dollars and he represents the interests of the far right Likud Party among Republicans in the U.S. His bribes to Trump are over $25 million. He gives immense sums to Republicans in Congress. Bernie specifically named him in his wealth tax proposal, since he would owe $2.6 billion more in taxes when Bernie's proposal becomes law. The day after Bernie's proposal was made public, Adelson had one of his flunkies write an editorial for his newspaper: Bernie Sanders wants to eliminate rich people. Chock full of lies, it does make one of Bernie's points very well: the over-indulged super-rich are destroying democracy with their immense, untaxed wealth. Adelson:

One of Bernie Sanders’ charms, according to his followers, is that he’s an unapologetic advocate for his beliefs. Never mind that most of the 20th century stands as a monument to the catastrophic dangers of his collectivist philosophy, Bernie’s no phony!

True to form, comrade Sanders this week unveiled how he plans to pay for the gargantuan expansion of the federal government that will be necessary to provide his extensive handouts: He plans to harness the power of the state to fatten the Beltway bureaucracy with a new trillion-dollar pipeline carrying other people’s money.

Sen. Sanders would impose a “wealth” tax of up to 8 percent on rich Americans-- those making more than $16 million annually. His advisers project the new levy would raise $4.35 trillion over a decade, allowing a Sanders administration to pay for free health care, free day care, free college, free housing, free electric vehicles, free electricity and whatever else it can dream up to give away. Members of the Sanders camp also tout the proposal as a way to eliminate billionaires and to attack income inequality.

As for the latter, they have a point. Simply outlawing the accumulation of wealth and raiding the assets of high-earning Americans might indeed reduce income disparities-- by making everyone poorer. Is it any surprise that Bernie can barely bring himself to condemn the quasi-Marxists who have run Venezuela into the ground?

All this will no doubt appeal politically to certain voters who are unconcerned about the practical or moral intricacies of tax policy as long as they’re not the ones paying. But Sen. Sanders is notably silent on the economic ramifications of his confiscatory approach-- and how they might hurt the “little people” he supposedly wants to help.

“A wealth tax would have unknown effects on economic growth,” The Wall Street Journal reported. “The founders of successful companies would have a harder time holding on to controlling stakes as they grow.”

Meanwhile, Tyler Cowen of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University notes that a wealth tax would almost certainly lower “investments in human capital and the creation of new businesses.” That, in turn, means fewer jobs, lower wages and economic stagnation, hardly a recipe for uplifting lower-income Americans.

In real terms-- as opposed to the fantasyland of Sen. Sanders’ campaign rhetoric-- a wealth tax would be constitutionally dubious, destructive for Americans of all income levels, impossible to get through Congress and a nightmare to enforce and administer. But give straight-shooter Bernie credit: He’s upfront about his plans to destroy the U.S. economy.

It's hardly news that greedy billionaires don't want to pay taxes or that Bernie intends to change the fundamental way the economic abundance of this country is distributed. "Follow the money," said Brianna Wu, the progressive candidate taking on Boston New Dem Stephen Lynch. "Housing affordability is a crisis in Massachusetts, and who’s funding Lynch’s campaign? Real estate conglomerates. Health care costs are out of control, and the same people profiting from that price gouging are funding Stephen Lynch. As long as politicians are taking cash from billionaires, billionaires will continue getting the better end of the deal."

Shan Chowdhury, is running against the most corrupt New Dem in New York, Gregory Meeks, a Wall Street owned-and-operated hack who sits on the House Financial Services Committee, carrying water for the banksters. "The fact Adelson uses the term 'human capital' is gross and solidifies the rich and powerful only wanting to keep their wealth, and have no interest in reducing harm imposed by the current market," Chowdhury told us this morning. "It does not make sense to impose heftier taxes on people who do not have money, while the rich reap the benefits from tax cuts. We know it did not work with Reaganomics. It destroyed households and made people poorer. We can tax the richest people in the world up to 8% and they would still have more wealth than a lot of everyday people. By closing the wealth gap, we can retrieve funding for resources such as Medicare for All, Free Public College Tuition, and Guaranteed Homes. Having basic necessities will motivate consumers to participate in the economy. What’s even better about Sen. Bernie Sanders’ proposal is that it will cut away at big money influencers in our democracy. Let’s wipe out billionaires who pay elected officials to their bidding and make politicians accountable to the people. NO Finance, NO Insurance, NO Real Estate-- just the Working Class of America."

Rebecca Parson is the newest primary candidate Blue America has endorsed. This is an amazing woman, unlike anyone I've listened to talk about going to Congress since the first time I spoke with AOC. Rebecca is running for the Washington seat held by the head of the Wall Street-owned New Dems. What an amazing replacement she will be for him-- just as AOC has been for a former head of the New Dems! "Let's give credit where credit is due," she said this morning on reading the piece from Las Vegas. "Adelson is correct that a wealth tax would be impossible to get through Congress-- that's why we need a new Congress. One that isn't beholden to billionaires and their insatiable greed. Only then will we be able to get policies through that benefit the working class instead of the coddled-yet-ruthless billionaire class."

In Washington's 6th Congressional District, democratic socialist Rebecca Parson is fighting for just such a change. By rejecting corporate PAC and lobbyist money, she is free to pursue policies that nurture the working class and poor: national rent control, more social housing, Medicare for All, a federal jobs guarantee, and the Green New Deal. Her opponent Derek Kilmer, by contrast, takes millions in corporate cash every cycle and repays their generosity handsomely: by refusing to support Medicare for All or the Green New Deal. By voting to fast track the TPP against the express wishes of every labor union in his district. By voting to cut food stamps for 1.7 million people.

As Rebecca said herself, "It's time for a Congress that answers to the people, not its billionaire captors." Rachel Ventura is also running for a seat-- this one in Illinois-- occupied by a New Dem. Please consider contributing to all four of these extraordinary candidates by clicking on the Blue America primary thermometer over. Rachel told us that "The problem with having a millionaire as a representative, is that they are out of touch with the majority of the constituents in my district. In February of this year I approached Congressman Foster about signing on to the Medicare for All bill. I had just gone two years without insurance and was forced to pay the mandatory ACA penalty because it was cheaper than paying for coverage. It occurred to me that maybe he just doesn’t get it because he has probably never had to live without insurance." She continued:

When considering my finances as a single mom working two jobs, I had to make hard decisions like choosing to purchase life insurance (a cost of $300 per year) over health insurance ($13,000 per year). I made this choice because I feared what it meant to not have coverage in America. If the worst should have happened at least my children would have the death benefit. This is never a decision a parent should have to make. I remember choosing to not climb a tree with my daughters because an injury might also cause us to lose the house, or my ability to work. Millionaires don’t have to make these choices and they cannot relate to the fears that the rest of us have. They are out of touch with realities that most American’s face when it comes to every day decisions. Since most legislators tend to vote with their experiences and perceptions of their constituents, it means Foster is not able to see my district nor understand the needs of the people who live and work here. More than that, I have witnessed Foster looking down on those who have less. Judging a human being based on their financial state happens too much in this country and it is wrong.

Furthermore, running against an opponent who accepts millions in campaign contribution from only a few donors means he is more likely to represent the wealthy donors than my friends and neighbors in the 11th congressional district. These people, my people, would be better represented by someone who has suffered, made hard choices and “gets it” from real world experience. Wealthy donors means that candidate has the resources to reach voters easier through direct mail and endless TV commercials. In a district like mine where the median income is only $66,000 it means that we will have to stretch our small contributions and reach those voters through door-to-door volunteer efforts.

When looking at how Foster votes, he’s put businesses over American’s with Disabilities when he joined Republicans to gut the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). When he voted against net neutrality, he effectively said that those who can afford the highest speed internet should be able to buy it. He believes in a tiered healthcare system where poor people have something that “isn’t great,” but the rich can still afford the best. This is someone who clearly does not have me and my family in mind.

To make matters worse, he doesn’t even own property in my district. Initially in 2008 he was the representative of the 14th district and lost the seat. In 2012 he invested enough money to buy the IL 11th congressional seat, but chose to rent an apartment in Naperville.

But consider this, Foster is the 48th richest person in Congress at a net worth of $9.4 million. I know it is hard to imagine a male Caucasian multi-millionaire basically buying a congressional seat. Or is it?

And, if he is the 48th richest member of Congress, what kind of representation are the voters getting in those 47 other districts? Voters in Illinois’ 11th district have a chance to change this lopsided representation for the wealthy on March 17th 2020.

A Very Large Percentage Of American Jews Are Smart And Humane-- And Don't Vote For Republicans

A ballroom filled with aggressively right-wing Jews with "Make America Great Again" yarmulkas on, cheering loudly when America's very own would-be Hitler oozed how he would turn away refugees was horribly sickening to me. Most of my blood relatives are in Recife, Belém and Salvador in Brazil because, the U.S. turned them away as undesirables when they were fleeing for their lives from Czarist persecution. I wonder if pre-1932 Germany had anything like the Adelson Kapo Klub Konclave where Jews sat around cheering anti-Communism and law and order with yarmulkas embroidered with swastikas.

The interests of American Jews have long been allied with the Democratic Party. When the country was going all in for the corruption, narrow-minded bigotry and greed of the roaring twenties, Jewish voters were having done of it. Jews gave Warren G. Harding just 43% of their votes, splitting the rets between Socialist Eugene Debs (38%) and Democrat James Cox (19%). Almost all presidential candidates after Cox have gotten over 60% of the Jewish vote, exceptions being Jimmy Carter who still took a plurality in the 1980 three-way race and Mondale who only got 57% in his ill-fated attempt to prevent Reagan's reelection. The habit of Jewish voters giving landslide margins to Democrats began in a serious way in 1928 when Jews were among the first to recognize where Republican policies were taking the country. Jewish voters were all in for Al Smith (72%) against Herbert Hoover (28%) even before the Crash. And even Jewish Republican voters abandoned Hoover, whose share dropped from 28% to 18% when Roosevelt first ran. Jews gave Roosevelt 82% of their vote in 1932. That grew to 85% in 1936 and 90% in 1940 and 1944. That 90% of anti-Republicans didn't disappear with FDR. In 1948, Dewey (R) got 10% and Jews split their votes between Truman (75%) and the Progressive candidate, Henry Wallace (15%).

But America liked Ike and many Jewish voters did too, giving Adlai Stevenson just 64% in 1952 and 60% in 1956. After that, Jewish Americans have continued to support the Democrats ever since:

• 1960- Kennedy (82%), Nixon (18%)
• 1964- LBJ (90%), Goldwater (10%)
• 1968- Humphrey (81%), Nixon (17%)
• 1972- McGovern (65%), Nixon (35%)
• 1976- Carter (71%), Ford (27%)
• 1980- Carter (45%), Reagan (39%), Anderson (15%)
• 1984- Mondale- (57%), Reagan (31%)
• 1988- Dukakis- (64%), Bush (35%)
• 1992- Clinton (80%), Bush (11%), Perot (9%)
• 1996- Clinton (78%), Dole (16%)
• 2000- Gore (79%), Bush (19%)
• 2004- Kerry (76%), Bush (24%)
• 2008- Obama (78%), McCain (22%)
• 2012- Obama (69%), Romney (30%)
• 2016- Hillary (71%), Trumpanzee (24%)

None of that has prevented Republicans, over and over and over from trying to woo Jewish voters. But George H.W. Bush's 35% was a highhmark in recent years. In 2016, Trump tried too but only managed 24%, six points less than Romney got 4 years earlier. In 2020, Trump is going for it again-- and in a big way. Mob-affiliated far-right Israeli citizen Sheldon Adelson will help bankroll a ten-million dollar effort to persuade American Jews that fascism isn't as bad as they think it is.

Although the Kapos say they're "at the intersection of a very unique moment in time," this is basically what they say every four years-- and then, as you can see above, fail miserably.

This time they think because Trump openly supports the right-wing Likud agenda-- most American Jews don't-- the GOP will be rewarded with Jewish votes. Alex Isenstadt wrote that "At a time when Trump’s approval rating remains mired in the low-to-mid 40s, the offensive shows how Republicans are taking steps to contest any votes they can. Jews only account for about 2 percent of the U.S. population and have overwhelmingly supported Democrats in past elections. But GOP officials believe that siphoning off even a small portion the Jewish vote in a few battleground states could be critical in 2020. 'The Jewish vote will remain and largely loyal Democratic vote because of domestic issues largely, but if there was ever a cycle where Republicans could make inroads it is this cycle,' said Ari Fleischer, a former George W. Bush White House press secretary who now serves as an RJC board member. 'If you accept that there are sizeable Jewish populations in Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, [and] Michigan, the Jewish vote-- if we can make additional inroads-- can be very helpful in putting you over the top. The White House knows that.' The administration is going all-in on the strategy. On Saturday, Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and three White House officials-- Jared Kushner, Jason Greenblatt, and Avi Berkowitz-- all made pilgrimages to the Venetian, where RJC (AKA- Adelson's Kapo Klub Konclave) members were gathered for the third day of their annual spring conference. Before a sea of supporters waving 'We are Jews for Trump' signs, the president accused Democrats of opposing Israel and 'advancing by far the most extreme, anti-Semitic agenda in history.'" Most Jews aren't poorly educated morons and they don't fall for Trump's ugly gaslighting. They know a fascist slob when they hear him.

Where do Jews live? Not in states Trump is likely to win. These are the states with over a quarter million Jews and each state's PVI:

• New York- 1,768,770 (8.9%)- D+12
• California- 1,182,990 (3.0%)- D+12
• Florida- 629,120 (3.0%)- R+2
• New Jersey- 545,450 (6.1%)- D+7
• Pennsylvania- 298,240 (2.3%)- [even]
• Illinois- 298,035 (2.3%)- D+7
• Massachusetts- 293,080 (4.3%)- D+12

The only other states where Jews make up over 2% of the population are Connecticut (D+6), Maryland (D+12) and Nevada (D+1).

The Jewish voters who have been most susceptible to Republican messaging are right-wing Russian immigrants and Hassidics who basically vote the way their rabbis tell them to. These Jews are already part of the 24% of Jews that backed Trump in 2016 and, with the exception of Pennsylvania, where a sizable community of right-wing Russians have settled-- they're primarily is blue states where they won't have a serious impact on the outcomes.

Prior to taking the stage, Trump met privately with Adelson and his wife, Miriam, who together gave over $120 million to Republican causes during the 2018 midterms. The 85-year-old Adelson, who’s been undergoing cancer treatment, hadn’t been expected to be in attendance. But those close to the billionaire said he was intent on making the Trump rally, and when he entered the auditorium on a motorized scooter and wearing a red “Make America Great Again” hat, he was greeted with a standing ovation.

Democrats are deeply skeptical that the GOP will succeed in making inroads with Jews. Since 1992, according to exit polling data, the Jewish vote has remained remarkably stable, with Democrats winning between 69 percent and 79 percent in each presidential election.

Halie Soifer, the executive director of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, said that recent polling her group had conducted showed that Jews remained confident in the Democratic Party’s posture on Israel and that they overwhelmingly disagreed with Trump on an array of domestic issues. And, she pointed out, Republicans had long vowed to make gains with Jewish voters only to fall short.

“This is not new. We’ve seen different iterations of this in previous elections either in midterm or presidential elections, and each time it’s kind of repackaged with a different narrative in an attempt by Republicans to chip away at the Jewish vote-- and every time it fails,” Soifer said. “And while the repackaging might make it look like there are different reasons behind it-- and certainly we are in a slightly different political context today than we have been in the past-- the result is the same.”

...To some Republicans, highlighting issues surrounding Israel and anti-Semitism goes beyond simply appealing to the Jewish vote. Among those making the rounds at the Venetian this week was Dan Conston, who, as the president of American Action Network and Congressional Leadership Fund, the main pro-House GOP outside groups, has been arguing to major donors that portraying Democrats as unwilling to confront anti-Semitic forces in their party will help to boost Republicans with the suburban voters who abandoned them in 2018.

Ahead of this week’s conference, the group released digital advertisements tying swing-district House Democrats to Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), who has come under fire for using tropes widely viewed as anti-Semitic. While some senior Democrats have rebuked Omar, she has retained her seat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

“It's appalling that Democrats have stood by and tolerated openly anti-Semitic commentary from their own members,” Conston said. “If Democrats continue to stand by and do nothing, we think suburban voters across America will find it similarly appalling next election.”

That Jewish Republicans have emerged as outspoken champions of Trump’s reelection bid represents something of a turnabout. The RJC was torn over the president during the tumultuous opening days of his tenure, and broke with Trump over his handling of the violence in Charlottesville, when he equated white supremacists with counter-protesters.

Yet many key Jewish Republicans are now firmly in the president’s corner. That includes Fred Zeidman, a longtime GOP giver [and notorious Kapo] who chairs a New York City-based investment banking firm. Zeidman, who backed Jeb Bush in the 2016 GOP primary, initially harbored concerns about Trump’s position on Israel and was rankled by the White House’s failure to mention Jews in its January 2017 statement on Holocaust Remembrance Day.

But Zeidman, who met with Trump early in his White House tenure to discuss Israel, said he no longer had any doubts about Trump. The president, he said, had been “incomparable” in terms of “how good he’s been to Israel.”

Zeidman, who helped to oversee Jewish outreach on the George W. Bush, John McCain, and Mitt Romney presidential campaigns, recalled a recent conversation with Houston oilman Harold Hamm. During the Bush years, Zeidman told Hamm, he had a T-shirt quoting the late Israeli leader Shimon Peres as saying that “George W. Bush is the greatest president Israel has ever had.”

“I had,” Zeidman told the billionaire oilman, “to tear up my T-shirt.”

There are now 3.45 million Muslims living in the U.S. If the aggressive Republican Party outreach to Jewish voters this cycle is based on bigotry towards Muslims, that is not just certain to turn off many Jews, and it will super-charge Muslim voter participation in parts on Michigan, Texas, Florida, Virginia, Iowa, Pennsylvania and even Arkansas where they are large Muslim communities. And, by the way, if you're interested in helping with Ilhan Omar's (D-MN), reelection efforts against Trump and the Islamophobic bigots working overtime in their efforts to dehumanize her, you can click on the Blue America "Worthy Incumbents" thermometer on the right. There you will find the incumbents in the House who are doing the heavily lifting for the progressive agenda right now. No one needs the help more than Ilhan. Please consider contributing what you can to her campaign and to the campaigns of any of the other members who you feel have been doing an exceptionally good job this year.

Does Adelson Own The GOP? Or Is He Just Leasing It?

On Friday Alex Isenstadt reported for Politico that "a deluge of Democratic spending in the final days of the battle for the House has triggered recriminations among Republicans and forced the party to lean on its biggest patron to salvage their majority. Since the end of July, Republican candidates in the 70 most contested races have reserved $60 million in TV ads, compared to $109 million for Democratic hopefuls... The disparity is almost certain to grow, as former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg makes good on plans to spend nearly $80 million to help Democrats flip the House."

“From Democrat candidates to outside groups, we’ve never seen anything like this before,” said Brian Walsh, president of the pro-Trump America First Action super PAC. “They are dumping in cash by the truckload.”

Desperate for help, Republicans are turning to their go-to benefactor: Las Vegas casino mogul Sheldon Adelson. The 85-year-old ally of President Donald Trump has made another contribution in the range of $20 million to the House GOP-aligned Congressional Leadership Fund super PAC, according to two Republican officials familiar with the donation. Party leaders are hopeful he'll fork over even more.

Senior Republicans are in touch with other influential givers. On Tuesday, White House senior adviser Jared Kushner, who’s been in regular contact with Adelson and courted many of the party’s most elite donors in recent weeks, appeared at a board meeting of the influential Republican Jewish Coalition. That evening, at the Ritz-Carlton in Washington, he addressed a gathering hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

...Charlie Black, a longtime Republican Party hand who attended the breakfast, said the problem isn’t hard to diagnose: Democrats want to send a message to the president, so they’re pumping the war chests of House candidates with online donations.

“We’re raising more money than we usually do on our side, and they’re raising more than they ever do and it’s because of Trump," Black said. "He’s the great motivator.”

The National Republican Congressional Committee is expected to secure a loan to help the party compete in the final weeks. Party officials declined to divulge the size of the credit line though in previous election years the committee has received loans of between $10 million and $20 million.

...[A] blame game is underway. Many Republican lawmakers and strategists are frustrated with the NRCC over its failure to raise more money, they said in interviews. The committee has reserved $46 million on the TV airwaves, compared to $64 million by their Democratic counterpart. A committee spokesman said the NRCC has eclipsed its fundraising record by $20 million this election cycle.

But in the end, just as the Democrats are counting on Bloomberg; the GOP is counting on Adelson. It would be really useful if both sides just told both billionaires to stop, since their contributions 1-neutralize each other, 2- result in worthless TV ads do nothing to change the ballgame, 3- make a bunch of consultants and middlemen extremely wealthy but have no other impact on the election, and, at least in Adelson's case, results in immense public corruption on a grand scale. Pro-Publica exposed a piece of that corruption last week.

Justin Elliott reported that last February "Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s plane landed at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland for his first visit with President Donald Trump. A few hours earlier, the casino magnate Sheldon Adelson’s Boeing 737, which is so large it can seat 149 people, touched down at Reagan National Airport after a flight from Las Vegas. Adelson dined that night at the White House with Trump, Jared Kushner and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Adelson and his wife, Miriam, were among Trump’s biggest benefactors, writing checks for $20 million in the campaign and pitching in an additional $5 million for the inaugural festivities. Adelson was in town to see the Japanese prime minister about a much greater sum of money. Japan, after years of acrimonious public debate, has legalized casinos. For more than a decade, Adelson and his company, Las Vegas Sands, have sought to build a multibillion-dollar casino resort there. He has called expanding to the country, one of the world’s last major untapped markets, the 'holy grail.' Nearly every major casino company in the world is competing to secure one of a limited number of licenses to enter a market worth up to $25 billion per year. 'This opportunity won’t come along again, potentially ever,' said Kahlil Philander, an academic who studies the industry."

The morning after his White House dinner, Adelson attended a breakfast in Washington with Abe and a small group of American CEOs, including two others from the casino industry. Adelson and the other executives raised the casino issue with Abe, according to an attendee.

Adelson had a potent ally in his quest: the new president of the United States. Following the business breakfast, Abe had a meeting with Trump before boarding Air Force One for a weekend at Mar-a-Lago. The two heads of state dined with Patriots owner Bob Kraft and golfed at Trump National Jupiter Golf Club with the South African golfer Ernie Els. During a meeting at Mar-a-Lago that weekend, Trump raised Adelson’s casino bid to Abe, according to two people briefed on the meeting. The Japanese side was surprised.

“It was totally brought up out of the blue,” according to one of the people briefed on the exchange. “They were a little incredulous that he would be so brazen.” After Trump told Abe he should strongly consider Las Vegas Sands for a license, “Abe didn’t really respond, and said thank you for the information,” this person said.

Trump also mentioned at least one other casino operator. Accounts differ on whether it was MGM or Wynn Resorts, then run by Trump donor and then-Republican National Committee finance chairman Steve Wynn. The Japanese newspaper Nikkei reported the president also mentioned MGM and Abe instructed an aide who was present to jot down the names of both companies. Questioned about the meeting, Abe said in remarks before the Japanese legislature in July that Trump had not passed on requests from casino companies but did not deny that the topic had come up.

The president raising a top donor’s personal business interests directly with a foreign head of state would violate longstanding norms. “That should be nowhere near the agenda of senior officials,” said Brian Harding, a Japan expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “U.S.-Japan relations is about the security of the Asia-Pacific, China and economic issues.”

Adelson has told his shareholders to expect good news. On a recent earnings call, Adelson cited unnamed insiders as saying Sands’ efforts to win a place in the Japanese market will pay off. “The estimates by people who know, say they know, whom we believe they know, say that we’re in the No. 1 pole position,” he said.

After decades as a major Republican donor, Adelson is known as an ideological figure, motivated by his desire to influence U.S. policy to help Israel. “I’m a one-issue person. That issue is Israel,” he said last year. On that issue-- Israel-- Trump has delivered. The administration has slashed funding for aid to Palestinian refugees and scrapped the Iran nuclear deal. Attending the recent opening of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem, Adelson seemed to almost weep with joy, according to an attendee.

] But his reputation as an Israel advocate has obscured a through-line in his career: He has used his political access to push his financial self-interest. Not only has Trump touted Sands’ interests in Japan, but his administration also installed an executive from the casino industry in a top position in the U.S. embassy in Tokyo. Adelson’s influence reverberates through this administration. Cabinet-level officials jump when he calls. One who displeased him was replaced. He has helped a friend’s company get a research deal with the Environmental Protection Agency. And Adelson has already received a windfall from Trump’s new tax law, which particularly favored companies like Las Vegas Sands. The company estimated the benefit of the law at $1.2 billion.

...Adelson has spent the Trump era hustling to expand his gambling empire. With Trump occupying the White House, Adelson has found the greatest political ally he’s ever had.

“I would put Adelson at the very top of the list of both access and influence in the Trump administration,” said Craig Holman of the watchdog group Public Citizen. “I’ve never seen anything like it before, and I’ve been studying money in politics for 40 years.”

...The Adelsons came through with $20 million in donations to the pro-Trump super PAC, part of at least $83 million in donations to Republicans. By the time of the October 2016 release of the Access Hollywood tape featuring Trump bragging about sexual assault, Adelson was among his staunchest supporters. “Sheldon Adelson had Donald Trump’s back,” said Steve Bannon in a speech last year, speaking of the time after the scandal broke. “He was there.”

In December 2016, Adelson donated $5 million to the Trump inaugural festivities. The Adelsons had better seats at Trump’s inauguration than many Cabinet secretaries. The whole family, including their two college-age sons, came to Washington for the celebration. One of his sons posted a picture on Instagram of the event with the hashtag #HuckFillary.

The investment paid off in access and in financial returns. Adelson has met with Trump or visited the White House at least six times since Trump’s election victory. The two speak regularly. Adelson has also had access to others in the White House. He met privately with Vice President Mike Pence before Pence gave a speech at Adelson’s Venetian resort in Las Vegas last year. “He just calls the president all the time. Donald Trump takes Sheldon Adelson’s calls,” said Alan Dershowitz, who has done legal work for Adelson and advised Trump.

Adelson’s tens of millions in donations to Trump have already been paid back many times over by the new tax law. While all corporations benefited from the lower tax rate in the new law, many incurred an extra bill in the transition because profits overseas were hit with a one-time tax. But not Sands. Adelson’s company hired lobbyists to press Trump’s Treasury Department and Congress on provisions that would help companies like Sands that paid high taxes abroad, according to public filings and tax experts. The lobbying effort appears to have worked. After Trump signed the tax overhaul into law in December, Las Vegas Sands recorded a benefit from the new law the company estimated at $1.2 billion.

The Adelson family owns 55 percent of Las Vegas Sands, which is publicly traded, according to filings. The Treasury Department didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Now as Trump and the Republican Party face a reckoning in the midterm elections in November, they have once again turned to Adelson. He has given at least $55 million so far.

Gambling And Prostitution Czar Sheldon Adelson Is Underwriting The Republican Party's Overtly Racist Advertising

Macau/Vegas Mob-affiliated right-wing billionaire Sheldon Adelson continues to fund McConnell's Senate Leadership Fund and Ryan's Congressional Leadership Fund to the tune of tens of millions of dollars. He is, by far, the biggest contributor to right-wing politics in America, around $60 million so far this year... with plenty more coming. Among House races, the biggest Adelson cash dump has been in Wisconsin, against Randy Bryce, where hundreds of hours of vicious smear attacks have seriously changed the complexion of the race. An old friend of mine in Kenosha told me, "You can't escape the barrage of really ugly ads against Randy. Ryan is really doing a job on this guy. If there's a TV ad next week saying the Randy looked over someone's should in the 3rd grade to get a test answer, it wouldn't surprise me one bit. They don't want to talk about issues; they just want to attack, attack, attack on all this made-up personal crap... I hope it backfires on that little slimeball Ryan is pushing."

On Wednesday, one of the right-wing slime-buckets, Republican Nancy Douglass, who's been slanting the news on WLKG, her Lake Geneva radio station against Bryce for months, was forced to resign as chair of the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association. She appeared in an ad sponsored by Ryan's PAC, referring to Bryce as a deadbeat. Remember, Bryce is union iron worker who's been slaving away his whole life supporting a family. Brian Steil, a shady corporate attorney, has been busy working for a firm that specializes in sending Wisconsin jobs to low-wage hell-holes overseas.

Widely considered one of the most vicious broadcasters in the Midwest, Douglass is a frequent contributor to the Republican Party of Walworth County and has spent lavishly to support Paul Ryan and other right-wingers in southeast Wisconsin. An anti-union zealot and repulsive racist, Douglass represents everything that's wrong with the Trumpist party today. The Wisconsin Broadcasters Association is fortunate to be rid of her and her unAmerican propaganda.

Bryce may be getting the largest amount of Adelson sewer money thrown at him, but he's hardly the only one. Republican Party racism is on display big time as the party and its affiliated SuperPACS descend into a frenzy of white nationalism around the country. Jamiles Lartey has been watching for The Guardian as the GOP takes aim at non-white congressional candidates. Trumpism has given racism a seal of approval. He wrote that "as the 2018 midterm election campaign pulls into its homestretch, Republican attacks in two congressional races happening 3,000 miles apart have triggered alarm bells for targeting non-white candidates in an apparent effort to highlight their 'otherness.' The first comes from California’s 50th district, where Ammar Campa-Najjar is running as a Democrat for a seat currently occupied by the Republican Duncan Hunter. NBC’s Chuck Todd, a veteran political reporter and commentator called the spot 'maybe the most shocking and outrageous political ad I’ve ever seen,' in a Meet The Press Daily segment."

The ad zeroes in on Campa-Najjar’s heritage-- his mother is Mexican American and his father is Palestinian-- calling him a “Palestinian, Mexican, millennial Democrat” who is “working to infiltrate Congress” and a “security risk.”

“At best it’s desperate. That’s putting it mildly,” said Campa-Najjar, who also called the effort “blatantly ignorant” and “unhinged from reality.”

Last Wednesday a bipartisan group of dozens of national security veterans decried the spot as a “racist and bigoted” attack. “The baseless allegation that he is somehow a ‘security threat’ is an affront to our professionalism as national security experts, our American values, and our collective national dignity,” the group said in an open letter.

The ad accuses Campa-Najjar of being supported by the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood with no evidence, and despite the fact that Campa-Najjar is a Christian. “It’s just so interesting that we live in a world where Islamophobia even extends to non-Muslims,” Campa-Najjar told The Guardian.

...In a email statement to The Guardian, Hunter’s spokesman, Michael Harrison, declined to provide a source for the claims about the Muslim Brotherhood or the quote from Campa-Najjar’s father, but insisted that “the facts … raise national security concerns.”

Ironically, when Drunken Hunter was arrested and arraigned on a wide range of corruption, fraud and theft charges recently, Paul Ryan kicked him off the House Armed Services Committee since he really is a security threat. (And to make it worse, one of the groups he stole from was Wounded Warriors.) Hunter, a far right extrenmist, is a well-known philanderer and substance-abuser, who stole money to buy drugs and companionship from sex workers. First the San Diego area saw Duke Cunningham get thrown in prison-- a close "associate" of Duncan Hunter, Sr.-- and now it looks like Duncan Hunter will be the next San Diego member of Congress headed there.

“The fact is, there’s me, who was cleared by the FBI to work at White House, and there’s Hunter who was indicted by the FBI,” said Campa-Najjar. “So the law’s on my side and not his side as of late.”

David Schweidel, a professor of marketing at the Goizueta Business School at Emory University said ads like this may increasingly be more en vogue in the post-2016 election climate largely because Trump’s well-documented reliance on personal attacks proved effective enough to win the White House.

“We saw pundit after pundit kind of commenting on the fact that these personal attacks weren’t coming across as presidential and how ‘it’s the wrong temperament.’ Well, guess what, people responded to it,” Schweidel said.

He added that spots like Hunter’s are generally not intended to sway undecided voters, but to inspire the base to show up at the polls. As US politics continues its long slog towards ever-increased partisanship, elections become more about turning out the base and less about converting undecideds: which could mean negative and personal attacks only become more prevalent.

On the other side of the country, attack ads on a black congressional candidate’s former career as a rapper have taken on racist undertones in a district that, like California’s 50th, is predominantly white. Antonio Delgado, a Harvard Law graduate and Rhodes Scholar is running as a Democrat for a seat in New York’s 19th district currently held by Republican John Faso.

As a young man, Delgado released a socially conscious and political hip-hop album under the name AD the Voice in 2006.

Since the album came to light, a number of Republican groups have seized on it to paint Delgado’s flirtation with hip-hop as out of step with the values of the district. The Congressional Leadership Fund released an advert spot referring to Delgado as a “New York City liberal” and “[Nancy] Pelosi’s candidate” before clipping a handful of Delgado’s song lyrics, overlaying dramatically loud “bleep” sounds over words like “fuck,” “sex” and “porno.”

The ad also accused Delgado of “lacing his raps with extremist attacks on American values”, playing a clip where Delgado states, factually, that more civilian lives were lost during the Iraq war than the 9/11 attacks.

Faso didn’t place the ads, but has not condemned them either, saying in a statement this summer that “Mr Delgado’s lyrics paint an ugly and false picture of America.”

The subtext of the ads was seemingly illuminated in a New York Times article from July when Gerald Benjamin, a friend of Faso’s and director of the Benjamin Center at State University of New York at New Paltz, posed the question: “Is a guy who makes a rap album the kind of guy who lives here in rural New York and reflects our lifestyle and values?”

He continued: “People like us, people in rural New York, we are not people who respond to this part of American culture,” eventually sparking protests from students at his home campus in New Paltz. Benjamin later apologized for his remarks.

Delgado has said the ads are an effort to “otherize” him in the eyes of the white voters he needs to win.

“It’s insulting to people in the district that Faso believes they will buy into this sort of deception and dishonesty,” said Delgado’s campaign manager, Allyson Marcus, noting that a similarly themed Super Pac radio ad was even pulled by the local radio station WDST, which called the ad “highly offensive” and “factually distorted” in a statement.

“The truth is Antonio grew up in a working-class family in Schenectady, right here in upstate New York, where he learned the values of hard work and accountability. The real question is, why won’t Faso condemn these divisive and deceptive ads,” Marcus asked.

Faso did not respond to a request for comment.

How The GOP Hopes To Save Their House Majority-- Trumpanzee Jr, Adelson's Gambling Money And... Not Much Else

When people wanted to think Trump could turn into a normal president after the election-- fools-- there was speculation that he would put together an awesome, historic, bipartisan infrastructure plan that would unite the country. Instead, Trump, Ryan and McConnell decided to go for the tax scam for GOP donors, something that certainly killed any chance for a significant infrastructure effort. The tax scam also turned out to be a blow to the GOIP's slender hopes to holds onto power in Congress, something an infrastructure bill might have helped them accomplish. Señor Trumpanzee's campaign promise to "build the next generation of roads, bridges, railways, tunnels, sea ports and airports that our country deserves" was just more hot air and bullshit from the ultimate con-man.

So how are they going to persuade themselves they're going to hold onto Congress? Yesterday, the Washington Post reported that Miss McConnell suggested everyone get booked on Fox as often as possible. Sure, that's gonna do it. And Jonathan Swan reported something even more absurd: Jr. to the rescue. No really. Trumpanzee Jr. "is preparing to dive into the 2018 midterm elections."

Swan (with a straight face): "He wants to use his influence within the Republican base to 'expand our majority in the Senate and protect our majority in the House,' said a source close to the president's son. Expect Don Jr. to be raising money for Republican candidates and staging rallies. DTJ "offered to come down [to West Virginia] and campaign with Morrisey to defeat Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin." He also plans to dazzle the voters in Missouri, Montana and Indiana. "Jr. said he believes his brand of 'MAGA conservatism'-- pro-gun, anti-media, anti-establishment-- could make a difference in turning out the base in these states." He's even staffing up for his new hobby.

Meanwhile right-wing, mob-connected casino mogul, Sheldon Adelson, will funnel some of his Chinese profits into an effort to save the House. Jake Sherman and Alex Isenstadt reported yesterday that the GOP-sugar daddy wrote Paul Ryan a $30 million check for his Congressional Leadership Fund. Just like the founding fathers foresaw, right? Ryan and his team flew to Vegas to lick Adelson's assat his gaudy Venetian Hotel to get the dough.

As a federally elected official, Ryan is not permitted to solicit seven-figure political donations. When Ryan (R-WI) left the room, Coleman made the ask and secured the $30 million contribution.

CLF did not respond to requests for comment. The contribution will become public later this month in the organization's campaign finance filing.

Coleman said he would not discuss his dealings with Adelson.

...The $30 million contribution is three times as much as Adelson gave to CLF in 2016. And the cash comes much earlier in the cycle: In 2016, Adelson gave CLF $10 million in August, as the campaign headed into the homestretch.

Party officials have been paying Adelson their respects. In February, a number of House Republicans made their annual sojourn to Las Vegas to attend the annual retreat hosted by the Republican Jewish Coalition, an organization that Adelson helps to fund. Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) addressed the conference, and Ryan spoke by teleconference to a meeting of the group’s board.

CLF is one part of a two-pronged political organization designed to protect and bolster House Republicans. CLF is a super PAC, and the American Action Network is a nonprofit that boosts center-right policies. Ryan, and John Boehner before him, have backed the groups.

Is Mobster Sheldon Adelson Paying For The Trumpist Embassy In Jerusalem?

Bad for the Jews?

As far as I know, Henry Ford never offered to pay for an embassy Berlin. Tokyo Rose never offered to put up the yen to build an American embassy in Tokyo. Nor did Benedict Arnold offer to pay for one in London in 1780. But the Republicans appear to be ready for a whole new theory of outsourcing and the privatization of foreign policy. Early yesterday morning, AP reported that Señor Trumpanzee is considering an offer from Republican mega-donor Sheldon Adelson to pay for at least part of a new U.S. embassy in Jerusalem. Lawyers at the State Department are looking into the legality of accepting private donations to cover some or all of the embassy costs, the administration officials said." How about the Saudis? Are they chipping in too?

In one possible scenario, the administration would solicit contributions not only from Adelson but potentially from other donors in the evangelical Christian and American Jewish communities, too. One official said Adelson, a Las Vegas casino magnate and staunch supporter of Israel, had offered to pay the difference between the total cost-- expected to run into the hundreds of millions of dollars-- and what the administration is able to raise.

Under any circumstance, letting private citizens cover the costs of an official government building would mark a significant departure from historical U.S. practice. In the Jerusalem case, it would add yet another layer of controversy to Trump’s politically charged decision to move the embassy, given Adelson’s longstanding affiliation with right-wing Israeli politics.

It’s not clear if there is any precedent, nor whether government lawyers would give the green light to accept Adelson’s or anyone else’s donations for the embassy.

Adelson’s unconventional offer was made around the time Trump announced in December he would move the embassy to the disputed city of Jerusalem. It would address the president’s stated distaste for shelling out eye-popping sums for overseas diplomatic facilities. Although Trump has promoted the Jerusalem move as fulfilling a key campaign promise, he also was outspoken last month in blasting the $1 billion price tag for a new embassy in London.

Since Trump’s announcement, his administration has been sifting through options for fast-tracking the Israel embassy’s relocation. Last month, Vice President Mike Pence announced during a visit to Israel that the embassy would move by the end of 2019-- possibly earlier. Ambassador David Friedman, who lobbied for Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, has advocated moving the embassy as soon as possible.

The U.S. has looked at several possible sites. The most likely plan involves a phased approach to opening the embassy in Jerusalem’s Arnona neighborhood at an existing U.S. facility that handles consular affairs like passports and visas. The U.S. could initially retrofit a small suite of offices in that facility to accommodate Friedman and one or two top aides such as his chief of staff.

That would allow the administration to hang an “embassy” sign over the door and formally open it, perhaps in the next few months. The ribbon could be cut in time for Israel’s Independence Day, Yom Ha’atzmaut, which takes place in April.

The rest of the embassy staff would remain at first in America’s current facility in Tel Aviv. Over time, the Arnona facility would be expanded to accommodate more embassy personnel. The expansion could ultimately involve an adjacent property that currently houses a home for senior citizens, officials said. That property is already set to come under U.S. control in the next few years under a previous arrangement.

Retrofitting just a few offices could be accomplished at minimal cost. But expanding the new embassy into a full-fledged complex that houses the bulk of America’s diplomatic staff in Israel would easily cost more than $500 million dollars, officials familiar with the process said. Particularly pricey are the strict security requirements for embassies that are written into U.S. law.

It’s unclear how much of the cost Adelson might be willing to cover.

...Kathy Bethany, the former cost management director for the State Department’s Bureau of Overseas Building Operations, said she couldn’t recall any instances of the U.S. government accepting donations to build embassies during her tenure, which ended in 2014.

“I don’t know how well that would work,” Bethany said. “Would we be beholden to putting their name on the building? I’ve never heard of that.”

There are several ways, in theory, that it could happen. Short of donating directly to the embassy, citizens could always cut a general check to the U.S. Treasury, as politicians occasionally do to make a point about the national debt. The donors could unofficially “earmark” their dollars as being intended to offset the embassy’s cost.

The State Department’s Foreign Affairs Manual also lays out a formal process for accepting gifts from private citizens, including real estate. The process says gifts must be rigorously evaluated on a case-by-case basis and only allowed when the gift “would not give the appearance of a conflict of interest.”

Adelson, who donated $5 million to Trump’s inaugural committee, is one of the Republican Party’s biggest donors and a major supporter of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Adelson also finances Israel Hayom, a pro-Netanyahu newspaper that is distributed free throughout Israel.

If lawyers decide to allow donations for the embassy, it would come with significant political risk for Trump. The president already faces major criticism from Palestinians and others who say his decision to move the embassy to Jerusalem-- also claimed by the Palestinians for the capital of their future state-- tipped the scales unfairly in Israel’s favor.

Mort Klein, president of the pro-Israel group Zionist Organization of America and a close associate of Adelson, said accepting donations would be ill-advised. Klein said he knew Adelson was “deeply interested” in seeing the embassy relocate to Jerusalem but was unaware that the casino mogul had offered to help pay for it himself.

“This is a government project. It’s a government-run embassy,” Klein said. “I don’t want people to be able to say it was Jewish money.”

Ambassadorships are openly sold to wealth campaign supporters. So why not embassies? How about foreign policy in general? Is there anything Trump wouldn't sell?

Trumpanzee's Jews Aren't Anything Like Normal Jews

I wonder if all the vehement anti-Semitism on display from a newly empowered fascist movement-- they call it "alt-right" these days-- is making the modern day Bugsy Siegal-- Vegas mob boss Sheldon Adelson-- just a little nervous. If the Steve Bannon wing of the Republican power ever gains ultimate power, I'm sure there's a gas chamber that even someone as grossly rotund as Adelson can be stuffed into. Maybe that's why he's getting a little nervous about the fascist campaign to demonize H.R. McMaster. Normal people don't hear much about it, but the Bannon vs McMaster brawl is center stage in the fever swamps of the far right and inside TrumpWorld. Adelson weighing in is a big deal since he routinely funnels millions of dollars annually into the Republican Party from the Mafia, from interests in China and from interests in Israel.

Writing for Axios yesterday, Jonathan Swan reported that the virulently anti-union billionaire "has disavowed a campaign against National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, which is being pushed by a group Adelson funds, the Zionist Organization of America. Andy Abboud, who represents Adelson, tells me: 'Sheldon Adelson has nothing to do with the ZOA campaign against McMaster. Had no knowledge of it. And has provided zero support, and is perfectly comfortable with the role that McMaster is playing.'"

Since then Adelson has updated his position with a telephone clarification to Axios which emphasizes that Adelson doesn't know McMaster and hasn't developed an opinion about him. Adelson doesn't want his intervention to be interpreted as a political endorsement; but rather that he has had nothing to do with, and doesn't support, the campaign against McMaster.

This is of interest and some import because Adelson is one of the biggest financial contributors "in Republican politics, and his influence over national security and Israel-related matters is substantial. His is a voice listened to by President Trump and other senior White House officials like Jared Kushner." Not by serious policy experts, of course, but by grifters like Trump and Kushner. Zionist Organization of America represents the far right of Israeli politics in America and the Adelsons give them immense sums of money. Somewhat ironically, they have thrown their lot in with the alt-right, the center of American anti-Semitism and their completely deranged crackpot president, Mort Klein, is about one step away from buying a tiki torch and waving a swastika banner at shuel. Klein is very tight with Trump's neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic chief strategist, Steve Bannon, who accuses McMaster of being "soft on Israel and unserious about the threat of radical Islamic terrorism. He's called for Trump to 'reassign' McMaster 'to another position where he can do no further harm on these critical national security issues.' Klein is increasingly isolated in his opposition to McMaster. His only senior ally inside the White House is Bannon; the rest of the senior staff has united in disgust at the outside campaign against McMaster. David Friedman, Trump's staunchly pro-Israel ambassador, is vouching for McMaster, though he was unable to convince Klein."

David Frum noted on Twitter this morning that his rabbi had posted this comment (above) on his Facebook page. It's from a Charlottesville resident. Did Señor Trumpanzee think these were some of the "very fine people" marching around Friday and Saturday with Nazi and KKK symbols and waving "Elect Trump-Pence" signs? Virginia's governor certainly didn't think they were very fine.

As Emma Green pointed out for Atlantic readers yesterday, Trump's very fine Charlottesville marchers were obsessed with Jews. Trumpanzee can insist all he wants that the "Unite the Right" activities were about protecting their cultural heritage and the Robert E. Lee statue, but what does that have to do with "Jews will not replace us?" She wrote that "Marchers displayed swastikas on banners and shouted slogans like 'blood and soil,' a phrase drawn from Nazi ideology. 'This city is run by Jewish communists and criminal niggers,' one demonstrator told Vice News’ Elspeth Reeve during their march. As Jews prayed at a local synagogue, Congregation Beth Israel, men dressed in fatigues carrying semi-automatic rifles stood across the street, according to the temple’s president. Nazi websites posted a call to burn their building. As a precautionary measure, congregants had removed their Torah scrolls and exited through the back of the building when they were done praying... [T]he connection between African Americans and Jews is clear. In the minds of white supremacists like David Duke, there is a straight line from anti-blackness to anti-Judaism. That logic is powerful and important. The durability of anti-Semitic tropes, and the ease with which they slide into all displays of bigotry, is a chilling reminder that the hatreds of our time rhyme with history and are easily channeled through timeless anti-Semitic canards... [T]he violence in Charlottesville was part of a broader political context. The fringe right is reacting to other political movements with nostalgia, Feld said-- a yearning for people, including minorities like Jews and blacks, to 'know their place.'"

And while normal people were horrified by Trump trying to equate Nazis and the Klan with those protesting Nazis and the Klan, actual Nazis and the Klan applauded their president. KKK leader David Duke tweeted his gratitude to Trump: "Thank you President Trump for your honesty & courage to tell the truth about #Charlottesville & condemn the leftist terrorists in BLM/Antifa." A Nazi leader (Tim Gionet) of the Unite the Right movement who goes by the nom de guerre "Baked Alaska" tweeted that "President Trump is right! One side had a permit to speak, one side charged with clubs & weapons! Look at the facts people." So that's their crazy world. All these people really, really deserve each other. But the country doesn't. I'm sensing an uptick in the number of Americans who now think Trump needs to be impeached.

Paul Ryan's Personal Brand Sure Has Turned To Crap

Do you remember a woman with the nom de guerre "Valley Girl" from early blogging days? She's been around the netroots for as long as there has been a netroots and I value her advise. She just wrote to me to tell me that she's been watching Randy Bryce's speeches on line and that in her opinion, he will be this generation's Bernie Sanders. That's big.

Sunday we looked at how Randy has created-- seemingly in record time but in reality, over the course of years-- a platinum brand for himself, something the DCCC has been utterly incapable of helping their hapless batch of loser candidates do. But forget the DCCC for a moment; I want to talk about Paul Ryan's brand and how astonishingly rapidly it has been turning to crap. The media largely created Ryan over the years and the media has finally started realizing they've been had.

Ryan is not the fresh young face of some kind of humanistic conservatism. He's the same monster and the same fraud with the same austerity message that lies at the dark heart of conservatism. One of the biggest electoral questions for 2018 will be whether voters in southeast Wisconsin have come to that conclusion as well. Ryan, after all, gets re-elected with pretty big margins every cycle. Forget for a moment that the DCCC not only doesn't help his opponents but actively sabotages them and lets just stick to Ryan. Wall Street and other corporate special interests have invested millions of dollars into his career. The Finance Sector alone has given him $9,781,835, more than any other member of the House-- by far. (The second in Finance Sector bribes is House Financial Services Committee chairman Jeb Hensarling and his take has been a lot less, just $7,468,190. The crooked Democrat in the House who takes the biggest bribes from the banksters is Joe Crowley, as corrupt as Ryan and Hensarling, and his take has been considerably less than Ryan's-- $6,238,679. In any case, my point is that Ryan has, long ago, ceased to even make a plausible pretense of representing the working families of southeast Wisconsin. He represents Wall Street and the special interests that fill his campaign coffers year in and year out. And his personal brand is... worse than tarnished.

A couple of weeks ago, political journalist Brian Krassenstein wrote that Ryan was paid $20 million to get behind Trump. Does that sound believable? I had never heard that but it was worth reading the charges. A lot of Krassenstein's material comes from a very credible source, Scott Dworkin, of the The Democratic Coalition Against Trump.

You may recall that back on June 2 of last year, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan finally endorsed Donald Trump for the Republican nomination. While Ryan had been a holdout, questioning if Trump really was the right man to lead the Republican party in the 2016 election, something had obviously changed for him. It certainly wasn’t Trump’s words or actions, which seemed to have gotten more and more insane as time went by. So what could it have been? Money?

On August 29th, approximately three months after Paul Ryan endorsed Donald Trump, two of Trump’s largest campaign donors, Miriam and Sheldon Adelson donated a staggering $20 million to Paul Ryan’s super PAC, Congressional Leadership Fund. To put things into perspective, these donations represent approximately 40% of all the donations received by the Congressional Leadership Fund for the entire year of 2016.

While there is no smoking gun, it certainly appears that Ryan was paid big money to endorse a man that he knew was unfit to be President of the United States. It seems like the ‘swamp’ was only drained of the clean water, leaving the sludge and dead fish behind.

This is what Randy Bryce is up against-- for better and for worse, better because Ryan's brand is mud and worse because Ryan has millions and millions of dollars at his disposal to try to undermine Bryce's brand. For Randy Bryce to win he's not going to have to raise the tens of millions of dollars Ryan can raise by fluffing every special interest in the country-- but he is going to have to keep getting out his message about working families and equality of opportunity. If you can, please consider helping Randy out by tapping on the thermometer on the right and giving what you can. It takes a lot of $25 contributions to add up to even a tenth of what Ryan takes from just one big donor like the extraordinarily sleazy Mob-connected Adelson family!