Donald Trump often says he was “getting into golf when everyone else was getting out.” “Golf is a large part of the portfolio of the Trump organization,” Trump’s associate corporate counsel observed in a West Palm Beach courtroom in August. Trump had added to that portfolio in 2011, buying his 18th course, in south Florida. […]

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One of the many strange and unnerving episodes in Donald Trump’s long march to the GOP nomination was his attempt to avoid criticizing former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard and avowed anti-Semite David Duke, who 25 years ago came alarmingly close to being elected governor of Louisiana. Asked in February by CNN’s Jake Tapper to […]

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Why do we criticize people for doing what they were hired to do? Take Thomas J. Donohue, for example. Day after day the poor guy gets pummeled by Washington non-profits and mainstream media for doing his job. He’s out there challenging healthcare reform; suing the SEC to stifle the regulation of financial markets; lobbying Congress […]

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Is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, like the NRA, an ancillary to the Republican Party? Consider.

At this point in the 2016 election cycle, the nation’s most powerful corporate lobby has spent $9,013,702 in support of Republicans and $7,639,325 in opposition to Democratic candidates.

The largest recipient of chamber cash has been Senator Pat Toomey, the Pennsylvania Republican in a dead heat with his Democratic challenger Katie McGinty. The chamber has contributed $1,908,300 to Toomey, and put $1,797,950 into a campaign attacking McGinty.

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In 1976, Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter squared off for the first presidential debate since Nixon and Kennedy high-mindedly locked horns. The campaign, to that point, had bogged down in childishness. Carter gave an interview to Playboy in which he affirmed that he had “committed adultery in my heart many times.” Thereupon, he was greeted at every stop on the campaign trail with signs like jimmy carter for playmate of the year and smile if you’re horny. Ford’s agriculture secretary told a dirty joke about black people, and that consumed half a dozen news cycles. Then, on September 23, all those voters pining for something high-minded amid the morass settled down for a serious discussion of the issues.

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