"EA Sports released a new version of the video game 'NBA Jam' that features Obama, Biden, Bush, and Cheney. Bush and Cheney play the first half, then Obama and Biden try to come back from a 6 billion point deficit."
-Jimmy Fallon
By Zach Carter
September 28, 2010 - 5:02pm ET
A full 90 members of Congress who voted to bailout Wall Street in 2008 failed to support financial reform reining in the banks that drove our economy off a cliff. But when you examine campaign contribution data, it's really no surprise that these particular lawmakers voted to mortgage our economic future to Big Finance: This election cycle, they've raked in over $48.8 million from the financial establishment. Over the course of their Congressional careers, the figure swells to a massive $176.9 million.
The complete list of these Crony Capitalists is below, along with the money they pulled in from Big Finance, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics (opensecrets.org). The career data goes back to 1989. Of the 69 House members who voted with Wall Street on both the bailout and financial reform, 60 are Republicans, while nine are Democrats. All 21 Senators who voted with Wall Street on both issues are Republicans, and Republicans raked in over 90 percent of the total campaign contributions.
And here are all of the Cronies, along with their Wall Street hauls:
| Senator | 2010 Wall Street Cash | Career Wall Street Cash |
| Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) | $1,600,000 | $4,900,000 |
| Sen. Robert Bennett (R-UT) | $1,500,000 | $2,600,000 |
| Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO) | $333,600 | $3,300,000 |
| Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC) | $1,500,000 | $3,300,000 |
| Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) | $2,500,000 | $3,500,000 |
| Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) | $451,700 | $1,200,000 |
| Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) | $3,100,000 | $3,300,000 |
| Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) | $3,200,000 | $4,700,000 |
| Sen. John Ensign (R-NV) | $1,300,000 | $2,600,000 |
| Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) | $1,100,000 | $2,000,000 |
| Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) | $233,200 | $1,100,000 |
| Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) | $1,400,000 | $2,600,000 |
| Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) | $1,400,000 | $4,700,000 |
| Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA) | $1,500,000 | $4,200,000 |
| Sen. John Kyl (R-AZ) | $2,800,000 | $3,800,000 |
| Sen. Dick Lugar (R-IN) | $412,200 | $2,500,000 |
| Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) | $947,600 | $34,000,000 |
| Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) | $4,300,000 | $5,300,000 |
| Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) | $268,200 | $909,700 |
| Sen. John Thune (R-SD) | $1,600,000 | $3,900,000 |
| Sen. George Voinovich (R-OH) | $435,200 | $2,800,000 |
| 21 Republicans | ||
| 0 Democrats | ||
| Senate Total | $31,881,700 | 97,209,700 |
| House Member | 2010 Wall Street Cash | Career Wall Street Cash |
| Rep. Rodney Alexander, R-La. | $106,500 | $422,300 |
| Rep. Spencer Bachus, R-Ala. | $611,600 | $4,400,000 |
| Rep. Gresham Barrett, R-S.C. | $20,400 | $806,700 |
| Rep. Marion Berry, D-Ark. | $24,900 | $663,700 |
| Rep. Judy Biggert, R-Ill. | $395,000 | $1,900,000 |
| Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Mo. | $1,200,000 | $3,800,000 |
| Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio | $1,300,000 | $3,700,000 |
| Rep. Jo Bonner, R-Ala. | $90,400 | $702,200 |
| Rep. Mary Bono Mack, R-Calif. | $190,000 | $733,400 |
| Rep. John Boozman, R-Ark. | $257,700 | $491,000 |
| Rep. Dan Boren, D-Okla. | $123,100 | $722,200 |
| Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Va. | $92,700 | $1,400,000 |
| Rep. Charles Boustany Jr, R-La. | $226,300 | $934,600 |
| Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas | $157,000 | $840,500 |
| Rep. Henry Brown, R-S.C. | $35,700 | $494,000 |
| Rep. Vernon Buchanan, R-Fla. | $336,800 | $1,400,000 |
| Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif. | $180,300 | $940,300 |
| Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich. | $588,000 | $1,700,000 |
| Rep. John Campbell, R-Calif. | $413,400 | $1,200,000 |
| Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va. | $2,100,000 | $4,400,000 |
| Rep. Mike Castle, R-Del. | $749,100 | $3,200,000 |
| Rep. Howard Coble, R-N.C. | $23,400 | $502,500 |
| Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla. | $110,000 | $686,000 |
| Rep. Mike Conaway, R-Texas | $161,500 | $711,800 |
| Rep. Ander Crenshaw, R-Fla. | $86,100 | $717,000 |
| Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas | $90,600 | $606,900 |
| Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa. | $177,900 | $881,000 |
| Rep. Chet Edwards, D-Texas | $324,200 | $1,900,000 |
| Rep.Vernon Ehlers, R-Mich. | $8,500 | $292,200 |
| Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, R-Mo. | $143,900 | $904,400 |
| Rep. Mary Fallin, R-Okla | ($1,000) | $340,700 |
| Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen, R-N.J. | $86,200 | $840,300 |
| Rep. Jim Gerlach, R-Pa. | $251,600 | $1,800,000 |
| Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas | $140,000 | $1,100,000 |
| Rep. Wally Herger, R-Calif. | $171,500 | $1,100,000 |
| Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich. | ($1,000) | $300,600 |
| Rep. Bob Inglis, R-S.C. | 0 | $572,800 |
| Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. | $173,900 | $1,600,000 |
| Rep. Mark Kirk, R-Ill. | $1,900,000 | $4,200,000 |
| Rep. John Kline, R-Minn | $170,900 | $989,100 |
| Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif. | $31,800 | $748,000 |
| Rep. Daniel E. Lungren, R-Calif. | $147,700 | $622,500 |
| Rep. Howard McKeon, R-Calif. | $132,100 | $1,100,000 |
| Rep. Gary Miller, R-Calif. | $144,500 | $902,000 |
| Rep. Harry Mitchell, D-Ariz. | $130,900 | $558,000 |
| Rep. Sue Myrick, R-S.C. | $93,600 | $1,200,000 |
| Rep. Soloman Ortiz, D-Texas | $40,200 | $381,700 |
| Rep. George Radanovich, R-Calif. | $24,900 | $462,000 |
| Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Ala. | $128,200 | $1,000,000 |
| Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Ky. | $50,200 | $468,000 |
| Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla. | $127,000 | $986,000 |
| Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis. | $531,500 | $1,900,000 |
| Rep. Jean Schmidt, R-Ohio | $121,900 | $519,700 |
| Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz. | $39,700 | $1,200,000 |
| Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa. | $30,700 | $403,600 |
| Rep. Mike Simpson, R-Ind. | $20,500 | $266,900 |
| Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo. | $112,500 | $524,200 |
| Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas | $258,900 | $1,300,000 |
| Rep. Mark Souder, R-Ind. | $40,500 | $405,800 |
| Rep. Zack Space, D-Ohio | $169,300 | $476,300 |
| Rep. John Sullivan, R-Okla. | $79,200 | $494,800 |
| Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb. | $202,600 | $1,400,000 |
| Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas | $42,500 | $603,400 |
| Rep. Patrick Tiberi, R-Ohio | $555,500 | $2,800,000 |
| Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich. | $81,700 | $929,400 |
| Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore. | $180,700 | $732,400 |
| Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn. | 0 | $715,700 |
| Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C. | $155,500 | $580,200 |
| Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va. | $90,400 | $1,100,000 |
| 60 Republicans | $15,873,400 | $72,443,800 |
| 9 Democrats | $1,108,400 | $7,233,000 |
| House Total | $16,981,800 | $79,676,800 |
Brad DeLong catches someone wondering if I am actually advocating war as a solution to our problems. Against stupidity, the gods themselves …
To be fair, though, I understand from the Times that whenever I mention in my column that WWII ended the Great Depression, the paper gets a lot of mail accusing me of being a warmonger. Amazing.
But maybe this is an opportunity to reiterate a point I try to make now and then: economics is not a morality play. It’s not a happy story in which virtue is rewarded and vice punished. The market economy is a system for organizing activity — a pretty good system most of the time, though not always — with no special moral significance. The rich don’t necessarily deserve their wealth, and the poor certainly don’t deserve their poverty; nonetheless, we accept a system with considerable inequality because systems without any inequality don’t work. And before the trolls jump in to say aha, Krugman concedes the truth of supply-side economics, that’s not an argument against progressive taxation and the welfare state; it’s just an argument that says that there are limits. Cuba doesn’t work; Sweden works pretty well.
And when we’re experiencing depression economics, by which I mean a situation in which it’s hard to create sufficient demand to achieve full employment — mainly because short-term interest rates are up against the zero lower bound — the essentially amoral nature of economics becomes even more acute. As I’ve said repeatedly, this is a situation in which virtue becomes vice and prudence is folly; what we need above all is for someone to spend more, even if the spending isn’t particularly wise.
The trouble in practice is that conventional modes of thought tend to prevail even when they shouldn’t; in particular, public spending on the scale needed never seems to happen. That’s why Keynes facetiously proposed burying bottles full of cash in coal mines, so people could dig them up again: since any proposal to spend money on things we need got shot down on grounds of prudence and efficiency, he proposed completely pointless spending instead.
And what actually ended up doing the trick was spending that was beyond pointless, it was actually destructive – a sort of cruel joke on the part of the gods of economics.
The point is that it would have been much better if the Depression had been ended with massive spending on useful things, on roads and railroads and schools and parks. But the political consensus for spending on a sufficient scale never materialized; we needed Hitler and Hirohito instead.
WASHINGTON — The income gap between the richest and poorest Americans grew last year to its widest amount on record as young adults and children in particular struggled to stay afloat in the recession.
The top-earning 20 percent of Americans — those making more than $100,000 each year — received 49.4 percent of all income generated in the U.S., compared with the 3.4 percent earned by those below the poverty line, according to newly released census figures. That ratio of 14.5-to-1 was an increase from 13.6 in 2008 and nearly double a low of 7.69 in 1968.
"Recent analyses have shown that income inequality in the US has grown steadily for the past three decades and reached its highest level on record, exceeding even the large disparities seen in the 1920s, before the Great Depression. Norton and Ariely estimate that the one percent wealthiest Americans hold nearly 50 percent of the country's wealth, while the richest 20 percent hold 84 percent of the wealth.
But in their study, the authors found Americans generally underestimate the income disparity. When asked to estimate, respondents on average estimated that the top 20 percent have 59 percent of the wealth (as opposed to the real number, 84 percent). And when asked to choose how much the top 20 percent should have, on average respondents said 32 percent -- a number similar to the wealth distribution seen in Sweden".
The author is conflating wealth and income inequality here. The data I presented was on income inequality (top 1% receive 17.1% of all income) while Norton and Ariely present wealth data (top 1% have 50% of total wealth).
Nevertheless, the point stands. Americans have their values right; they are just ignorant. I would say that is the fault of the media.
