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Barack Obama ... Democratic presidential hopeful    Fleeced Brits help Obama     By JAMES CLENCH Published: Today     AMERICAN Presidential hopeful Barack Obama has had an unlikely campaign contribution – from thieves who fleeced the bank account of a British couple. Shocked Tania Parker discovered the account had been mysteriously emptied after she tried to withdraw money from a cash point. When she called Lloyds TSB stunned Tania was told fraudsters had illegally made two donations totalling £210 to fund Obama's race for the White House. She told The Sun: "It's crazy, I couldn't believe it. I'm...

FORWARD OPERATING BASE KALSU, Iraq , Feb. 26, 2008 – “Gas! Gas! Gas!” But for the contribution of one black American inventor, that familiar call might not echo through Army bases as soldiers train with gas masks against chemical-weapons attack. Army Capt. Christee Cuttino, Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 703rd Brigade Support Battalion, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, personnel office, sings a spiritual song to the audience at the African-American/Black History Month program on Forward Operating Base Kalsu, Iraq, Feb. 21, 2008. Photo by Sgt. Kevin Stabinsky, USA  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Similarly, the blood bank...

A new primary system Why do we use the same primary voting system in the 21st century that we did in the 18th? The old system was set up to counter the inconveniences of time and distance. Advances in communication have overcome these obstacles yet we vote as if those advances had never been made at all. A new system could be devised which would take special interests, party bosses and smoke filled back rooms out of the process. This new system would give the power to the party faithful and ensure that the party nominee would be chosen by...

Find out who in your area contributed to which presidential candidate. Candidates for President must register with the Federal Election Commission and file quarterly reports to disclose campaign finance information. This database provides campaign finance information for the current front-runners for president. Search your community's contributions for the 2007-2008 Presidential Candidates. Source: Federal Election Commission: Itemized individual contributions from the first three quarters of 2007 SEARCH PAGE: Presidential campaign contributions by zip code http://www.orlandosentinel2.com/data/campaign2007-2008/

Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign called on rival Barack Obama to shut down a political action committee he controls that has contributed money to elected officials in early presidential contest states. Clinton communications director Howard Wolfson posed the demand to chief Obama strategist David Axelrod during a television interview Sunday and the campaign followed up with a press release shortly after. Wolfson accused Obama of using the PAC in "apparent contravention of campaign finance laws." The aggressiveness of the Clinton camp is a testament to the increasingly tight race between the two in Iowa, where polls show Obama in...

With all the madness in the world, I meditated Tuesday on two matters of great gratitude. One is that through vigilance and good fortune we have, so far, gone six years without another major attack on U.S. soil. The other is that I wasn't one of the Texas officials who was forced to attend a workshop in Austin in which PR flacks would try (under a $20,000 contract) to teach me techniques for selling Gov. Perry's massive toll road boondoggle. It was a small part of a $7 million to $9 million campaign that will include feel-good ads pushing Perry's...

Democratic presidential candidate and leading Chinese fundraiser Hillary Clinton has announced she is returning $850,000 in contributions delivered to her campaign by Norman Hsu. With any luck at all she expects to be able to shovel the funds out the back door before the FBI comes knocking on the front. Ms. Clinton brings real experience to the task. 22 contributors to Bill's 1996 campaign either pled guilt or were convicted of criminal campaign finance or money laundering violations. At least some of the sources were reported to be members of the Chinese Red Army's intelligence division. There is no word...

August 30, 2007 Washington Post FEC SENDS A MESSAGE ACT Fined $775,000 The Federal Election Commission yesterday issued the latest in a string of six-figure fines against partisan political groups -- this time, against America Coming Together, a group financed by George Soros and labor organizations that sunk more than $100 million into campaign activities intended to help Democrats in the 2004 elections. The decision to fine the group $775,000, the FEC's third-largest penalty in its three-decade history, was intended to send a stern message to independent groups. The FEC has said it will crack down on groups that raise...

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and other prominent Democrats scrambled to unload thousands of dollars of contributions from one of the party's leading fund-raisers, amid questions about his ...techniques and news [of] a warrant for his arrest... Election-law experts said the pattern raises red flags that justify a probe into whether the wealthy Mr. Hsu was improperly reimbursing the others for their donations... Beyond his $23,000 in personal contributions to Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Hsu had raised well over $1 million for the New York senator's presidential campaign, making him one of her top 20 "bundlers." ...[and] hundreds of thousands of dollars...

You may have given money to an accused sexual predator to use for his legal defense — and not even know it. If you gave money to former congressman Mark Foley's re-election campaign, that's exactly what's happening. Even if you didn't contribute you should be disgusted this vestige of public trust is being used by Foley to help him worm out of the hole he could be in. And it's not just his legal defense he's using the money for.

Tennesseans have given more than $1 million to announced presidential candidates. That's according to disclosure reports reviewed by the Center for Responsive Politics that have been filed through July 15th. The documents show that Republican Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts, leads in disclosed contributions from Tennessee with more than 380-thousand dollars. Some officials say the one-million-dollar figure is likely to more than double once unannounced candidate Fred Thompson files a campaign finance disclosure. Thompson has not yet been required to file, though he has been raising money. His campaign spokesman has refused to give any figures, but some Republicans...

Edwards predicting big second-quarter drop-offBy Sam Youngman June 22, 2007 Former Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) is expecting a significant drop-off in campaign contributions for the second quarter that might look like a pittance compared to the dollar amounts Democratic rivals Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) and Barack Obama (Ill.) are expected to raise. Though it would not be unheard of for a campaign to try and lowball its fundraising expectations, an e-mail to supporters from senior adviser Joe Trippi, of Gov. Howard Dean’s 2004 campaign, tells Edwards’s fans the campaign is two-thirds of the way to its goal of $9...

Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani, a prodigious fundraiser who will campaign today in California, is partner in a law firm with a generous political action committee -- one which gave nearly 40 percent of its contributions to Democrats in the 2006 midterm elections, including $5,000 to then-Democratic House leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco. The 2006 donations from the political action committee of the Houston-based law firm of Bracewell & Giuliani -- known as "Bracepac'' -- included $3,000 to California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein and $500 to Jerry McNerney, who defeated Republican Rep. Richard Pombo in the East Bay's hotly...

Boston, MA - After nearly 1,000 Debate Watch House Parties and a highly successful national call day during "Sign Up America!", Governor Mitt Romney has signed up over 24,000 new supporters from across the country in just 24 hours. The success of this event is an indication of Governor Romney's broad-based grassroots and finance support and will help him spread his vision for conservative change in Washington. Addressing today's success, Governor Romney said, "Over the past 24 hours, hundreds have gathered at house parties and manned phone banks across the country in our successful effort to sign up 24,000 new...

Somebody's been a naughty girl...

In a show of financial muscle, Sen. Hillary Clinton today kicks off a fund-raising effort of volunteers working to direct donations from $25,000 to $1 million to her presidential campaign. The million-dollar target for some fund-raisers demonstrates the overheated pace of the 2008 money race and raises the stakes for Sen. Clinton's competitors. Her allies will be able to generate that level of giving by soliciting checks of as much as $4,600 -- the maximum allowed for the primary and general election -- from friends and family, and recruiting others to become money raisers for their account.... This strategy --...

Ben Franklin’s quip nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes, rings true for most of us. If you run a retail store you pay sales taxes on the money you collect. If you are a professional you become liable for corporate or personal income tax or both the very moment a client or a patient pays your fee. Regardless of your job, you pay taxes. You pay a tax when you drive your car to work. You pay taxes when you buy a loaf of bread. You pay taxes when you go out to eat or...

WALNUT CREEK, Calif. - Placing a neatly folded bill or a clutch of coins into a collection plate as it passes along the pew calls up a Norman Rockwell image of American life. But IRS rules taking effect this month may further change the way Americans contribute to houses of worship. The Pension Protection Act of 2006 prohibits donors from declaring contributions to churches or other charitable organizations unless they can produce records of the transactions. Several clerics said they knew nothing about the change before a reporter called asking for comment. "It probably will make a difference," said the...

In case you missed it, the President signed the new Pension Protection Act on August 17th. Most of the 400 pages of the Act deal with the under funding of pensions. However, if you keep paging through to page 301, you will see a section titled: Modification of Recordkeeping Requirements for Certain Charitable Contributions. Yes, that has nothing to do with pensions but it does affect the charitable contributions that you deduct on your tax return. Do you drop some cash into the church basket every week? And keep a logbook of the amount given each week? Then at tax...

The more William Molina heard about toll road plans, the more outraged he got, until finally he picked up his camera and did what he does best. Molina spent the past several months shooting more than 40 hours of footage at public meetings in San Antonio and nearby towns, talked to activists, tried to talk to toll road advocates and spliced together a film documenting what he says is a nexus of tremendous change. "I just wanted to capture history," the veteran filmmaker said. "One day we're going to look back at this and say, how did this happen." "Truth...