February 11, 2004
AVAILABE--ONE POLITICAL PARTY, CHEAP (via mc):
Democrats’ soft money running low (Alexander Bolton, 2/11/04, The Hill)
The network of soft-money fundraising groups known as the “shadow” Democratic Party has fallen significantly short of its fundraising goals even as the presumptive Democratic nominee, Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), faces heavy Republican attacks in coming months.Eight of the largest and most prominent liberal soft-money funds — known as 527s after a section of the federal tax code — have raised less than 10 percent of their expected outlays for the 2004 election.
“My view is that most soft-money donors are not going to move money to outside groups to keep it flowing into federal campaigns because the incentives for giving this money are not there,” said Fred Wertheimer, the president of Democracy 21, who spearheaded the lobbying effort to pass the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act.
No wonder George Soros spent all that money--he pretty much owns the Party now.
Posted by Orrin Judd at February 11, 2004 8:23 PM
Sort of a Darwinian Gresham's Law at work, eh?
Posted by: jim hamlen at February 11, 2004 10:00 PMpe·tard ( P ) Pronunciation Key (p-tärd) n.
1. A small bell-shaped bomb used to breach a gate or wall.
2. A loud firecracker.
3. The McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform Act.
[French pétard, from Old French, from peter, to break wind, from pet, a breaking of wind, from Latin pditum, from neuter past participle of pdere, to break wind.]
Word History: The French used pétard, “a loud discharge of intestinal gas,” for a kind of infernal engine for blasting through the gates of a city. “To be hoist by one's own petard,” a now proverbial phrase apparently originating with Shakespeare's Hamlet (around 1604) not long after the word entered English (around 1598), means “to blow oneself up with one's own bomb, be undone by one's own devices.” The French noun pet, “fart,” developed regularly from the Latin noun pditum, from the Indo-European root *pezd-, “fart.”
Source: The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at February 11, 2004 11:11 PMWondering...
Is the expression "Poot" derived from the original meaning of "Petard"?
Posted by: Ken at February 12, 2004 6:05 PMI thought Soros was a savvy trader? Aren't you supposed to buy low and sell high?
Posted by: Robert Duquette at February 13, 2004 10:45 PM