Dark Pool Politics

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Non Profit's Dark Pool$

NYP Secret Pots of Public Dollars Guarantee Corruption

3 Days Ago

Rapfogel’s Albany enablers(NYP Ed)The report is called “Spending in the Shadows,” and it cites $3 billion in “off-budget” cash that will be spent in New York this year via “ ‘lump sum’ pots of money” on the sheer say-so of individual politicians. It’s a sweet setup for the pols, their pet projects and the groups that get the taxpayer cash. Remember, Rapfogel’s Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty got $90 million from all government sources last year. Thanks to secret money “pots,” key budget decisions don’t have to be debated publicly. They can be made after the budget is passed, on the whims of individual officials, and kept from public view. Groups that get cash can then direct donations back to the pols who arranged the funding, just as Rapfogel is thought to have done. It points to scandals involving Sen. Malcolm Smith, ex-Sen. Shirley Huntley and ex-Assemblyman Vito Lopez as examples.

Political Goodfellas Royals

Eight campaign consultants all but one are also lobbyists, have monopolized NYC elections system that only the Justice Department using the Sherman Antitrust Act can bust.  These consultants run every important campaign in New York.  The campaign monopoly is only part of a conspiracy that is not only about who gets elected.  It is also part of a second conspiracy to make money off of government as lobbyist or insiders. There is serious evidence of illegal coordination between the Independent Expenditure PACs and consultants

In this monopoly consultants work with each other at the same time they are oppose them in other races.  Some consultants help other consultant’s candidates often at the expense of their own clients. Two Consultant Lobbyists the Advance Group and the Parkside Group were involved in every competitive council race and even some that did not have races through Independent Expenditure PACs they control. These IE PACS have muscled their way in to having seats at the table along the Democratic Party bosses that will pick the next council speaker.  The big 8 along with the special interests whose millions fund PACs, have sabotage the whole idea of local representation and local elections. The pols are more loyal to the centralized campaign consultants and their money backers, the new ruling class, than they are to the voters in their districts. The consultants work like Wall Street investors who trade in dark pools beyond the control of regulators. In NY's dark pool campaign consultants/lobbyists, special interests and elected officials make deals with each other hidden from public view. To understand the reasons for the takeover you must also be aware that the business opportunities for consultants don’t end on primary or election day. In an excellent investigation of the dangers the newly elected Cuomo would face from lobbyist, Wayne Barrett wrote in  the Village Voice in 2010. that campaign consultant lobbyist "Sheinkopf one of the worse consultant lobbyist, makes kings so he can then make deals with the kings he’s made."

Exploiting NYC, NYS Campaign Finance Law Loopholes

Melissa Mark-Viverito and Carl Kruger exploit campaign finance loopholes