35 Billionaires Set to Buy the Presidency

Original Link: http://www.opposingviews.com/i/politics/2012-election/35-billionaires-set-buy-presidency

By Dr Billy Kidd

Thirty-five billionaires got onboard the Romney Super PAC bandwagon and are set to buy the presidency. As they fork out big checks — like the $40 million David Koch is said to have written — they expect something in return.

Why wouldn’t ya? Politics affects the businesses of every one of these billionaire donors.
For instance, every time the U.S. and the Iranian president have a mashup, David Koch and
his brothers make something like a hundred million on the oil-futures market. With Romney
expected to blow Iran out of the water, it’s said that David will become the first trillionaire.

Other billionaires on the Romney Super PAC bandwagon are trying to buy their way around
Koch, who seems to have cornered the game. For instance, big time donors and Wal-Mart heirs, Jim and Alice Walton are said to want to put an end to union labor in the U.S. Romney seems to be amenable to this anti-union drive. He mocked Obama on this issue when he said, “We don’t need more policemen, firefighters or teachers.” But wages are not the real issue, here.

This is a bidding war. The billionaire who antes up the biggest Super PAC donation expects
the future Romney White House to fulfill three of his or her wishes. That is why Las Vegas
gambling titan Sheldon Adelson is said to be outraged that David Koch upped the ante for
Romney’s ear without telling him. Adelson should have known, however, that this is no
gentleman’s game. When you buy the White House, it’s anything goes.

Take billionaire Harold Simmons. He wants to make North Texas a pay-to-play nuclear waste
dump. C’mon, you don’t expect Simmons to play fair in order to win the future president’s ear. No. This is the guy who invented Swift Boating, the attacks that took out John Kerry in 2004. So we’re talking a really nauseating game, here. There are absolutely no rules in the new politics of Super PAC spending, not with Simmons in the game.

Regardless, there is a word of caution spreading around. The wild card in this game to buy
Romney’s ear is billionaire Paul Singer. He’s betting that gay Republicans will become a
fighting force, not just in the Army, but on the floors of Congress. Suppose he wins this bidding war and out-donates all the other billionaires? People are afraid to ask him what he’ll ask Romney to do in return. Romney’s five boys in tights at the inaugural? Nobody knows. But not to worry if you’re severely conservative.

David Koch has allies in this battle of the big-bucks, Super PAC donors. Billionaire Harold
Hamm reportedly wants to keep on fracking until all of North Dakota is one big oil spigot. For
that to work, he needs that Keystone pipeline put in immediately. That’s the only way he’ll be
able to get his sludge down to the Gulf and get the refined gas exported to Europe, where prices are twice that of what’s paid in the States.

And then there’s Wyoming billionaire and mutual fund manager Foster Friess. It’s said he can’t believe these oil ratchet-heads are running away with the game. Allegedly, he’s threatened to get his neighbor, Dick Cheney, in on this bidding war. It’s reported that Friess said to Romney that “We’ll promise to put Dick back in the bunker at the Naval Observatory if you’ll go along with our demand to downsize America.”

Downsize America!

That’s the new code word for dumping all Wall Street financial regulations, exporting the profits of corporate and private equity firms to safe havens, arresting Occupy Wall Street slackers, and dividing the middleclass against itself. The thought of it has got Idaho billionaire-donor Frank VanderSloot twisted up into a tizzy.

It’s reported that VanderSloot is willing to go out moose hunting in order to bring Sarah Palin
onboard. And that should put Fox News in his pocket. What’s more, Frank reportedly wants to get his own show out of this: The Downsizers. It’ll make Trump’s Apprentice look like wimpy
kids’ stuff. But that isn’t the end to the craziness this bidding war has brought on.

It’s said that vulture capitalist Wilbur Ross is taking up French so that he can speak to Romney’s inner child. That’s the Mitt-kid who puts his inner dog out on a very long leash. Ross also has a fallback strategy. “With Romney,” Ross allegedly said, “you must approach him after he’s assessed the all the speculative options. That’s when we’ll get him to run off with all the cash— government pensions, Social Security, the whole bag-lady of entitlements.”

As you can imagine, this game creates a logistics problem for a reporter. As fast as you track down the information on one big donation, ten others multi-million-dollar checks have been written. And the game keeps getting bigger. According to Clare O'Connor at Forbes Magazine, there are a couple dozen more Super PAC donors out there, such as:

● Henry Kravis, who invented modern day leveraged buyouts

● Jerrold Perenchio, who owns Univision

● Julian Robertson, the guy who hedges on the hedge funds

● Wall Street brontosaurus, John Paulson

● Leveraged buyout master, Marc Rowan

● He who out-trumps the Donald on N.Y. properties, Steven Roth

● The other Manhattan property mogul, Stephen Ross

● Robert Rowling, the oil titan

● Bill Marriott, who owns half a hotel chain,

● The co-owner of the hotel chain, Richard Marriott

● Wall Street funds titan, Bruce Kovner

● The natural resources guy, Thomas Kaplan

● Hedge fund head hancho Paul Tudor-Jones II

● The king of coal, Joseph Craft

● Brokerage firm titleholder, Charles Schwab

● Marketing champ, Leslie Wexner

● Supermarket superhero, John Catsimatidis

● Wall Street warlock, Louis Bacon

● Jim Davis, the footwear mastermind

● Hedge fund Godzilla, Ken Griffin

● Billionaire H.P. CEO, Meg Whitman

● The guy who tried to buy Chicago, Sam Zell

● The hedge fund prodigy, David Tepper

With so many billionaires, where do you begin if you want to make a side bet on who wins
Romney’s ear by making the biggest Super PAC donation?

Myself, I’m betting on David Koch. He’s just so far ahead of the others. David got in the game way back with Baby Bush, who took the cash and ran with it. Reportedly, he is willing to go all the way, again, and will probably be responsible for a full billion dollars of Super PAC money going into this Buy the Presidency game.

And what can you say to that but, “Good luck, David. Hope you dictate good policy after the
election!”