May 20, 2012

Its Customers Are Decimated By Foreclosure, But Wells Fargo Lobbies Against Increased Oversight

Norman Rousseau, a Newbury Park, California resident, spent last Saturday trying to fix an old RV. His house was being foreclosed upon by Wells Fargo and he apparently wanted to make sure his family had somewhere to live. But Sunday mid-morning, he shot and killed himself, CBS Los Angeles reports. The Rousseau family has been
Continue Reading >>>

May 19, 2012

Koch Operative Steered $55 Million To Front Groups Airing Ads Against Democrats; Ads Assailed Candidates Over Abortion, 9/11, Medicare

Charles and David Koch, the billionaire owners of of Koch Industries, are known as big spenders when it comes to lobbying and influencing public policy. Now, a new document filed with the IRS reveals how the Koch political machine funneled over $54.5 million in previously undisclosed funds to a litany of front groups designed to
Continue Reading >>>

May 19, 2012

Goldman Sachs Is Paying Dick Gephardt’s Lobbying Firm To Weaken Financial Regulations

Rolling Stone’s Matt Taibbi released a new article last week where he laid out how Wall Street is at work undermining the toughest provisions of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law passed last year. Taibbi writes: The fate of Dodd-Frank over the past two years is an object lesson in the government’s inability to institute even
Continue Reading >>>

May 18, 2012

11 More Democratic Legislators Leave ALEC

We’ve just received word from the Progressive Change Campaign Committee — which has been campaigning to get Democratic Party lawmakers to quit the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) — that an additional eleven Democrats have now left the corporate front group . Here are the eleven who have announced they will be leaving: – 8 Pennsylvannia legislators: Sen.
Continue Reading >>>

May 18, 2012

Crime Pays: Walmart Outperforms Dow by 4% Since Bribery Scandal Broke

On April 21, the New York Times’s David Barstow broke a major story about Walmart’s alleged extensive bribery in Mexico to expand its presence there.  Yet, as you can see from the chart above, Walmart’s stock has recovered all of its value since the story, and it has outperformed the Dow by 4%.  The threat
Continue Reading >>>

May 18, 2012

Marijuana Advocates Spend Big And Defeat Drug War Proponent In Oregon

As we’ve covered before at Republic Report, one of the reasons why marijuana remains illegal and the drug war continues to rage is because special interest groups like police unions and the alcohol industry spend a lot of money to lobby for the drug war. In Oregon, advocates of medical marijuana and other anti-drug war
Continue Reading >>>

May 18, 2012

VIDEO: Virginia Democratic Party Chairman Refuses To Talk About His Lobbying For Scam Schools

In many places, being the leader of a chapter of a political party is an honor. It’s a position that you can use to advance your party’s values and goals. But Virginia Democratic Party chairman Brian Moran — brother of Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA) — is using his clout in a different way. In addition
Continue Reading >>>

May 17, 2012

How Citizens United Is Leading To More Racism In TV Campaign Ads

This morning, the New York Times broke the news that Joe Ricketts, the billionaire founder of TD Ameritrade, is planning to unleash a race-baiting advertising assault against President Obama late in the campaign. Rickets, who used his Super PAC to fund an upset victory in Nebraska’s Senate election this week, intends to finance the anti-Obama
Continue Reading >>>