08.15.08
Money Matters
Don Benton has outraised David Carrier 10:1 in this election. Conventional wisdom says that the more money you raise, the more likely you are to win. We think that values win elections. And the source of campaign funds says more about a candidate’s values than anything else.
Don Benton has the distinction of being the State Senator who accepted the most campaign contributions from corporate lobbyists and political action committees (PACs). David Carrier will be the only State Senator who did not accept campaign contributions from lobbyists and PACs. We don’t think corporate and PAC money will lead us where our constituents want to go.
Elected officials should represent voters- period. We hope you agree, and will take this information into consideration when you choose who will represent the 17th District. Send the message that we’re ready to get government to work for us again.
DON BENTON’S CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS $213,000
as of Sept. 1, 2008
TOTAL SPECIAL INTEREST CONTRIBUTIONS $91,000
BANKING total $20,000
WA Indepent Bankers PAC (Lakewood) 500
Money Tree (bundled contributions) 3,500
WA State Pawnbrokers Association 1,500
Pawn Exchange (Issaquah) 1,000
Payroll Complete Services (Keith Smith) 1,600
WA Assoc. of Mortgage Brokers (Edmonds) 500
Bank of America, Inc. 3,200
IQ Credit Union 1,400
Wash Mutual PAC 700
Sav Pac Wash. Fin. Lea. 400
PMSA WA State Pac 500
Credit Union Legislative Action 700
Boeing Employees Credit Union 1,300
Thomas Young, Regents Bank 1,450
Monte Schwartz, Regents Bank 300
Ken Kirn, Columbia Cascade 1,000
Russell Investment Group 550
INSURANCE total $6,000
Progressive Insurance Co. (Tacoma) 1,500
Premara Blue Cross 1,500
Regence Blue Shield 700
Aetna Insurance Co. 500
WMLA Pac 200
Pemco Insurance 800
Insurance Physicians (Seattle) 800
CORPORATIONS total $17,000
Philip Morris Company 700
Reynolds Tobacco Company (Winston-Salem) 500
Wal Mart, Inc. (Bentonville, AR) 1,500
Weyerhauser 900
AT&T 1,600
Motorola Inc. 250
T Mobile 800
Holland America Line 1,500
Thomas Mears, Holland Inc. 1,450
Glacier NW (concrete, building supplies) 1,600
Eli Lilly & Co. 200
Les Schwab, Inc. 250
Vancouver Toyota 200
MacFarland Cascade Pole & Lumber 500
Alan Webb Nissan 500
Vine Street Properties (McKinley) 1,600
White Pages.com Inc. 200
Big I 900
Kemper Holdings 1,000
Nutter Corp. 800
POLITICAL ACTION COMMITTEES total $48,000
WA State Farm Bureau 800
WA State Dental PAC 700
WA Beverage Assoc. 1,600
WA Auto Dealers Assoc. 2,300
WA Software Alliance 350
WA State Farm Bureau 800
WA State Dental PAC 900
WA Education Association 1,600
WA Public School Employees 700
WA Affordable Housing 1,600
WA State Labor Council 200
WA Council of Fire Fighters 700
WA Taxpayer Assoc. 500
WA Organization of Vocational 250
WA Chiropractic Trust 1,400
WA Optometric PAC 1,100
WA Collectors Assoc. 1,600
WA VMA 800
Western WA Trial Lawyers 800
Central WA Lawyers for Working Families 800
Physicians EyePac (Seattle) 1,600
Farmers Employees PAC 800
MAC PAC 800
Puget Sound Pilots (Seattle) 1,400
Justice Pol. Action 800
Taseca Homes (Vancouver) 1,600
United Subcontractos Assoc. (Lakewood) 300
NW Sport Fishing Industries (Oregon City) 500
WSVMA 800
Justice PAC 800
Inland Northwest PAC (Spokane) 800
TPM PAC (Spokane) 400
International Union of Painters 1,400
Intl Union of Operators 200
Clark County Chiropractic Trust 1,000
Clark County Chiropractors 300
David Nierenberg- D3 Family Funds 2,900
Tapani Underground 300
Evergreen Memorial Gardens 100
Cam and Barbara Thomas, Underwood 2,900
Jeanne and Morris Bush 3,200
Brent McKinley, Vine St. Prop., Arlington 1,450
Bruce McCaw, Developer Bellevue 700
Yarrow Bay Development 500
Muckleshoot Indian Tribe (Auburn, WA) 800
Individual Chiropractors 2,100
James Sagen said,
July 25, 2008 at 12:32 am
It is funny to look at the list of contributions and see contributors who are not even represented by Don Benton. Do the Puget Sound Pilots care about the economic factors facing the citizens of the 17th District? And does Don Benton, in this economy, want to be taking money from predatory lending companies such as Money Tree? Additionally, why are Unions–the last bastion of high paying wage jobs–backing a man and a party that have have since their inception, attempted to destroy such organizations?
This is lunacy and is sad.
The people of the 17th District need to realize what is going on with this situation: Their money is being funneled from what they believe will pay their bills, to fund-raising for a man who will continually push them further in debt and potentially move them down the social and economic ladder. It is apparent in this list of donors that Don Benton offers no chance of social mobility for individuals that he claims to represent.
Dr. Carrier offers mobility and hope. Dr. Carrier is being offered money from the people that he will represent: the individual.
Don Benton’s signs say “Now more than ever.” This is only partially true. It should read, “Now more than ever I need to be out of office.”
Go Dr. Carrier. I am sorry that life has been so hectic for me, otherwise I would be out there on the ground with you.
LillianArcher said,
July 28, 2008 at 11:22 pm
This information is all very interesting, and luckily, the PDC swings both ways. As an Independent, I think it’s interesting that everyone seems to think listing Don Benton’s PAC contributions is a big negative to his campaign when there are twice as many Democrats receiving the same contributions from the same people.
Has anyone looked at Sen. Pridemore or Rep. Fromhold’s contributions? How about Sen. Margarita Prentice’s? They’ve all received checks from either Phillip Morris or RJ Reynolds. Wal-Mart’s also given hefty contributions to both Fromhold and Prentice. In addition, all of them, including the Democrat Majority Leader Sen. Lisa Brown, have received contributions from the big cell phone companies.
And what about the Governor? Christine Gregoire has received ridiculously generous donations from every organization above, and Gregoire shows bundled contributions from Moneytree totaling $4750.
The fact is, these kinds of contributions are being given out across the board, and, if a candidate is smart, they take them. Each of these candidates, both Democrat and Republican, has a record of winning elections over and over again so they must be doing something right.
Blasting Benton for accepting contributions that are also accepted by a number of Democrat leaders is absolutely ludicrous and, by definition, completely hypocritical. I’m not a Benton fan, but let’s at least try to be fair and objective here.
chucksr said,
September 22, 2008 at 8:15 am
Using terms like ‘blasting’ and ‘hypocritical’ obviously lowers the bar on any debate.
Perhaps the references to monies received is about ‘winning elections’, as stated, exclusively. However, once a senate seat is won, (as our focus needs to be) does the member go on to vote ‘no’ or ‘yes’ on what’s best for the those representated? Or does he or she vote according to those dollars donated, as many suspect? Could that have been the original point in stating it at all?
So, let me understand, there are about 50 State Senators in Washington State, and Don Benton takes $3,500 donation from Lending Tree and Christine Gregoire, as governor of the whole state, receives $4750 in bundled contributions from the same source. Well, dollar for dollar, that seems a lot for one senator out of 50 when the governor of the whole state receives less than double that amount. But then again, that’s only semantics.
My personal opinion about why Mr Horvath posted Senator Benton’s contributors was to draw attention to the AMOUNT of dollars contributed, and from whom. Senator Benton has the precarious position of having collected the most contribution dollars of all Washington State incumbants and challengers in 2008. For this reason alone, we as citizens, have the obligation to know and evaluate each and every contribution, no matter what party and what senator.