The race for State Senate in the 17th legislative district will be heating up soon after the general election officially ‘starts’ after the August 19th primary. The primary, designed to produce a candidate to take on incumbent senator/serial fund raiser Don Benton, was rendered moot when software developer Martin Hash dropped out in favor of David Carrier, economics instructor and political activist. Hash worried about splitting the party in two and felt stopping Benton was more critical than personal achievement at that level. After Hash’s gesture, the real concern for Democrats shifted to how to keep pace with Benton in terms of money.
Benton is widely regarded as the most prolific fundraiser in the Washington State legislature. He even released a DVD in 2006, “How to Raise More Money Than You Ever Dreamed Possible.” While the title sounds more self-help than selfless begging for money, Benton does bring home the bacon. The question is, where does all that delicious bacon (er, money) come from?
The answer? Not from you, dear district…who Don Benton so proudly claims to work for. Don Benton’s campaign is funded by some less-than savory industries: banking and insurance companies, PACs and the omnipresent “Big Tobacco” (Phillip Morris, R.J. Reynolds, et. al.). Lets not forget some other notable Benton contributors: Wal-Mart, the National Rifle Association and numerous cell phone carriers, like AT&T, Motorola and T-Mobile.
Okay, no surprise here, just basic Republican skullduggery. As unfortunate as it is, we’re already numb to corporations and special interests when they fill GOP campaign coffers. The real head scratchers in the Benton contributor list are the donations from payday lending firms like Money Tree, and their employees. The Seattle Times ran a story a while back detailing Benton’s coziness with the industry and how that may play into their legislation seeing greener pastures. Since then, companies like Money Tree have continued their financial influence. In fact, according to the Seattle Times, “during the 2004 election, the state’s top 10 payday loan companies boosted their political contributions almost eightfold to nearly $200,000.”
Money Tree president Dennis Bassford has seen first hand the increase of donations from these companies, as his was at the forefront during the 2004 election. Collectively, politicians statewide picked over $122,000 from Bassford’s Money Tree…up from just $17,200 in 2000. Bassford attributed the increased contributions to the “maturing industry” of pay day lending.
One of the political benefactors of the “maturing” payday lending industry? Senator Don Benton. After siding with the industry’s legislative positions on bills aimed at reigning in payday lending’s most controversial practices, Benton sounded a lot like his buddy, Dennis Bassford. Payday lending firms’ political contributions were growing “proportionate to the business.” Hey Don, your talking points are showing!
What is payday lending anyway? In the most basic sense, payday lending is a short term loan service, designed to get people over the hump until pay day. The catch is that most loans are offered at incredibly high interest, sometimes forcing borrowers to keep borrowing loans to pay off loans. This locks them in a cycle of credit dependency and erases any hope of financial independence. Critics decry the business as profiting from financial hardship…kind of like robbing an old lady of her purse. Then taking her shoes and making her walk home. In the winter. In Alaska.
While the reality of payday lending may not be nearly that bad, it isn’t exactly the kind of “good neighbor” you’d expect to donate to the campaign of a State Senator. Its okay though, because it’s a maturing business. How can a business like Money Tree not mature in an economy like this, where we routinely see people out of work and losing their homes. Its okay…just borrow from tomorrow to pay for next year. It’ll all work out!
In an election where Benton’s opponent, David Carrier, has pledged not to accept ANY donations from PACs or special interests, contributions like this and others will be heavily magnified, and for good reason. Maybe with all this talk about change this election season, voters will send Sen. Benton to the unemployment line and to Money Tree…where he’ll be asking for money again, but for an entirely different reason.
I’ve posted this same comment on David Carrier’s blog, since he posted about it as well:
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 – how far from the Moneytree has her apple fallen?
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 huge Benton fan, but let’s at least try to be fair and objective here.
I notice you have not mentioned anything about the payday loan issue. Do both Ds and Rs take money from these legal loan sharkers?
Completely agree that campaign contributions are a problem on both sides of the aisle. That is why supporting public financing of campaigns is so important.
If I understand correctly, David Carrier is not and will not accept these types of campaign contributions so it is legitimate for him to point out this difference between himself and Benton.
I did mention, actually, that Christine Gregoire has received a bundled contribution of $4750 from Moneytree employees. So yes, both Ds and Rs take money from these contributions.
I believe David Carrier has made this pledge — it just seems to be a moot point to use it as an attack when his colleagues and endorsed candidates are accepting the contributions that he condemns.
If Gregoire is taking money from the loan sharks she should be criticized for that.
My point is David Carrier does not deserve any similar rebuke.
The Wa State Supreme Court just ruled that police cannot arrest passengers simply for being in a car that smells of marijuana. Seems to me that if Dr. Carrier isn’t smoking it, then he isn’t guilty even if his colleagues are lighting up around him.