Show me the money!
Posted in Democracy Alliance, Media Matters on Nov 19th, 2007
Just when you think the left wing money machine is running at full capacity, a new front of funding moves in to play.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The term of choice in political giving these days is straight out of the world of finance — donors have become “investors.” Now, liberal California venture capitalists have come up with the natural corollary — political “mutual funds.”
The new venture, being launched Monday, is the work of Andy and Deborah Rappaport’s New Progressive Coalition, a San Francisco-based organization they like to call the Charles Schwab of politics.
Through a rigorous vetting system, the coalition identified 37 Democratic-leaning organizations and distributed them among three funds. The idea is to guide potential contributors through the myriad liberal causes and groups that dot the political landscape.
That’s right, they see politics as an investment. Meaning, they actually want to control government. And if you think Democracy Alliance is sitting this effort out… think again.
The effort is part of an evolution in liberal giving, where donors big and small are looking to organizations with proven track records or long-term missions instead of funding new, fleeting groups that disappear at the end of an election cycle.
A coalition of top dollar Democratic donors — the Democracy Alliance — met in Washington this month to hear formal presentations from established political groups eager for a share of the tens of millions of dollars the alliance is expected to have at its disposal.
The alliance, whose membership is by invitation only, has helped finance such Democratic-leaning organizations as the New Democratic Network, Media Matters and the Center for American Progress. These are high-profile operations, some with big budgets, that seek to influence the political debate in Washington.
Similar efforts are under way in a handful of states, modeled after a Colorado coalition of wealthy donors who helped raise funds for state legislative races. Donors and strategists recently met in New Mexico to create interest in similar funding organizations to assist liberal and Democratic-leaning organizations at the state level.
Gag.
