Backing a moron like Trump and the entire parties response to covid shows they did.

You don't get to divorce the party from its leader

This post was edited by NetflixAdaptationWidow on Jul 16 2021 05:32pm

Obama outraised McCain and Romney by comparably lopsided margins in 08 and 12...

That's a pretty naïve take on social media. There's a reason why the whole world is coming down on their power and authority. Their power is monopolistic. It's like saying you can easily find any information you want when in reality if the google algo decided it's not showing up in the first 50 pages of a search well it might as well not even exist.

As far as free market comment, we both know the 'free market' doesn't exist in its absolute form and very few people actually argue for that. It's pretty obvious though on most issues aside from social ones like gay marriage or whatever republicans are much closer ideologically to the free market tenants. Whether it's environmental, regulatory, gun control, fiscal spending, etc.

Obama's donation numbers were skewed significantly towards small dollar donations ($1000 or less) compared to McCain or Romney.

Whoa, these are very different things you're referencing. Shouldn't you be looking at corporate money instead of total money? Competitive and/or symbolic races are going to raise a ton of money no matter what but that doesn't really address the statement that Republicans are the party of big business.

For example, let's look at 2018 and Beto vs. Cruz: https://www.opensecrets.org/elections-overview/large-vs-small-donations?cycle=2018&type=M
Cruz had raised 14 million from small donors which was 31% of money raised. Beto raised 37 million from small donors which was almost 47% of what he raised. Even if you look at this tab, you'll see that it's not corporations that are donating, but MEMBERS of said corporation: https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/beto-o-rourke/contributors?cid=N00033540&cycle=2018&recs=100&type=I

I think what you're probably looking for is PAC contributions by corporations. For example, take a look at Lockheed Martin: https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/recipients?id=D000000104&cycle=2018

Anyone else find it weird that Black will get in the weeds over the smallest things but never when it benefits Democrats

This post was edited by NetflixAdaptationWidow on Jul 16 2021 07:26pm

all one can take from this is that dumb American people love to throw money at pandering appropriating already born rich yet eternal losers like Beto

It's kinda hard to disentangle the corporate donations in specific races from the race's topline numbers. In general, PAC spending has lost importance in recent cycles.
What I found interesting is the category of "outside spending" in presidential races. In 2012, outside spending favored Romney over Obama by $300m, but in 2016 and 2020 it flipped completely and outside spending broke massively against Trump.
I couldn't find the same data for congressional races.



The share of small donor money among a candidate's total is a very flawed proxy for grassroots support vs support by big business. In recent years, Democrats had built a fundraising juggernaut with ActBlue, and Republicans have only begun to close this gap with WinRed. When it is much easier for Democrats than Republicans to donate small money to your preferred candidate, the higher small donor share for Democratic candidates only has limited meaningfulness.


Looking at individual companies doesnt tell us all that much about the overall lean of corporate America unless you create a list with all Fortune 500 companies. It's not exactly surprising that an arms manufacturer like Lockheed Martin favors the GOP, just like it's not surprising that a tech company like Google favors Dems. https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/alphabet-inc/recipients?id=D000067823

Or look at Walmart, which includes a sizeable share of PAC donations and also showed an overall Dem lean: https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/wal-mart-stores/recipients?id=D000000367
Back in 2016, Walmart was still leaning Republican: https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/wal-mart-stores/recipients?toprecipscycle=2020&id=D000000367&candscycle=2016

I've donated to one candidate in my life and I'll never do it again. I'll let you guess who that is.



It probably makes sense to break it down by industry then. Energy, finance, etc. are more likely to favor the GOP.