WhatFinger


Business as usual and the Democrats and the media just need to get a grip

Dems Get Media PAC Money Too!



The Democrats and the news media have been in a tizzy since it was revealed that Rupert Murdoch’s News America PAC gave $1 million to the Republican Governors Association in June.

Support Canada Free Press


Yet as TV Newswer reports while the donation is very large donations by media company PAC’s to political parties is very common and all part of their strategic plan to advance corporate interests.
Yahoo! News’ Michael Calderone advances the story, and looks at where else the News America PAC gave money. When it comes to US House and Senate races, the PAC gave Republicans and Democrats a nearly equal amount of money, though Democrats received slightly more than Republicans. Your TVNewser editor decided to see what the other media PACs did with their money. General Electric, which owns NBC Universal, gives money through its GEPAC. According to Opensecrets.org, in the current 2010 election cycle, GEPAC has given $581,400 to Democratic candidates in the House and $108,500 in the Senate. That is compared to $302,600 for House Republicans, and $107,000 for Senate Republicans. Before you start screaming “bias!” it appears that GE has a habit of giving more money to whichever party it believes has more power and influence. In 2002, 2004 and 2006, Republicans received more money from the PAC than Democrats. Walt Disney gives to politicians through the Walt Disney Productions Employee PAC. The PAC gave almost the same amount of money to Democrats and Republicans in both House and Senate races, with Democrats receiving just a little bit more than their Republican counterparts. Comcast, which is the nation’s largest cable company, and is closing a deal to acquire NBC Universal, gave $572,600 to Democratic House candidates with $461,000 going to Republicans. In the Senate it gave $131,750 to Democrats and $101,500 to Republicans. As with GE, it typically gave more money to Republicans when they were in power. CBS gives money through its CBS PAC, and split donations fairly equally between Democrats and Republicans. The exception is in the Senate, where Democratic candidates received slightly more from the PAC. CNN parent Time Warner gave more money to Democrats than Republicans in 2010, but as with the other PACs, the divide between the two was not huge, and when Republicans were in power, they tended to be ion the receiving end of more money. What should the takeaway from this exercise be? Yes, News Corp.’s donation to the RGA was much larger than any of the PACs spent on House or Senate races, but at the end of the day, these companies seem to be pragmatic with where they give their money.
So while the Democratic Governors Association is turning the donation into a fundraising issue it is really just business as usual and the Democrats and the media just need to get a grip.


View Comments

Don Irvine -- Bio and Archives

Don Irvine is the chairman of Accuracy in Media and its sister organization Accuracy in Academia. As the son of Reed Irvine, who launched AIM in 1969, he developed an understanding of media bias at an early age, and has been actively involved with AIM for over 30 years.


Sponsored