Chart of the Week: Money, It's a Gas!

Here is a chart that shows the respective shares of billionaires' dollars donated to Super PACS through the primaries. Of course this will change as the respective presidential campaigns grind on towards November:

Media mogul, Steven Spielberg, made a $100,000 contribution to the Obamanator, but it doesn't affect his chart because the proportion to non-billionaire contributions was too small. Bill Maher, comedian cum political commentator contributed $1 million. Forbes, from which this chart comes, uses it "400 richest" list to define billionaire.

The LA Times recently ran an investigative report on PAC spending. The largely anonymous "Center for Patient Rights" (it uses a Phoenix PO box for its business address) sent $55 million to right-wing organizations during the 2010 election which conducted a coordinated campaign against Democratic congressional candidates. This unearthed example of secret spending to influence elections is what candidate Elizabeth Warren was referring to when she claimed Americans know that "the game is rigged". Indeed, but US Person doubts they fathom how cynically corrupt and dysfunctional our political system has become. The infamous Koch Brothers et al, who hide behind a innocuous facade of non-partisan philanthropy (check PBS), plan to spend a billion dollars according to people on the inside to recapture the White House and Congress. $400 million of that will be from Koch controlled entities. That amount is more than Senator John McCain spent on his entire 2008 campaign. It took two years of old school digging by diligent reporters to find out what the "Center for Patient Rights" was doing to the nation's so-called electoral system in 2010. Why is not the CMM reporting on the aftermath of Citizens United? This compensation list from AP for top media executives shows the main reason:

• Les Moonves, CBS, $69.9 million
• David Zaslav, Discovery Communications, $52.4 million
• Philippe Dauman, Viacom, $43 million
• Robert Iger, Walt Disney $31.4 million
• Jeff Bewkes, Time Warner, $25.9 million

Across the pond, Europe is facing a money crises as Greeks voted on Sunday to form a new government. The election has been deemed critical to the survival of the Euro zone as currently constituted. Faced with threats of economic Armageddon, Greeks gave pro-bailout parties a majority in parliament.  Nevertheless, many investors are moving their money into the European "core".  All of the money is not remaining in Europe, but is invested in the world's reserve currency.  Ten year treasury yields hit a 120 year low.  The flow of money, as deranged news anchor Howard Beale in the classic film "Network" [video clip] discovered, is "inexorable and immutable".  And it is making the position of over-leveraged European banks even more precarious: