Green is the colour of untainted money but only when it goes to the right people

POLITICAL donations are always questionable, except when they come to your party.

Bob Brown in the Australian Financial Review April 15, 2000:

THERE is a growing wave of corporate largesse that is eating at the fabric of our democracy.

The Age January 21, 2006:

GREENS leader Bob Brown said yesterday the parties should return the money because it was tainted by the damning evidence before the federal government's inquiry into AWB's activities in Iraq. "This underscores the need for us to follow Canada's lead and get rid of corporate donations to political parties," he said.

Bob Brown moralises in The Sydney Morning Herald, August 14, 2009:

THE current political culture in Australia decrees that if you hand a minister $10,000 in a paper bag marked "for you" in return for a talk about your business plans, it is a bribe. But if you hand the $10,000 to a party official to sit next to the minister at dinner and discuss your business plans, that is OK. It is a sham. Democracy is being eroded by money. The ideal of one person, one vote, one value is eroding under the monetarist epithet that influence is there to be bought. Your power is directly proportional to your purse, and if you are out of the power circle your powerlessness is proportional to your poverty. All democracies in this age of materialism face the same degradation of the pivotal democratic ideal of equality.

The SMH on Saturday:

THE Australian Greens' campaign at the last federal election was largely bankrolled by wotif.com founder Graeme Wood who made the largest single political donation in Australian history. Mr Wood, whose wealth was estimated at $372 million in last year's BRW Rich 200 list, gave $1.6m to fund the Greens' TV advertising campaign, helping to significantly increase votes for the party in key states. The donation easily surpasses the previous record for a single private political donation, a gift of $1m to the Liberal Party during the 2004 election by a conservative British politician, Michael Ashcroft. Senator Brown said he would be "forever grateful" for Mr Wood's donation, which was both selfless and hazardous.

Bob Brown on Saturday:

GRAEME is an extremely thoughtful and long-sighted character whose sheer common sense has led him to success in business as well as becoming a leader in ecological wisdom in an age where that is badly needed. His donation to the Australian Greens gave us an ability to stay in the competition for public airspace before the last election in a way we have never been able to achieve in previous elections.

Who's mad -- the US or the gunman? The Age splash yesterday:

A GUNMAN on a collision course in 'mad America'

Targeted by the Right? Paul Krugman, New York Times January 8:

[GABRIELLE Giffords] has been the target of violence before. And for those wondering why a Blue Dog Democrat, the kind Republicans might be able to work with, might be a target, the answer is she's a Democrat who survived what was otherwise a GOP sweep in Arizona, precisely because the Republicans nominated a Tea Party activist. (Her father says that "the whole Tea Party" was her enemy.) And yes, she was on Sarah Palin's infamous "crosshairs" list.

Or by the Left? Markos Moulitsas founder of the Daily Kos, June 2008:

I'D argue that we can narrow the target list by looking at those Democrats who sold out the constitution last week. I've bolded members of the Blue Dogs for added emphasis. Giffords, Gabrielle (AZ08). Not all of these people will get or even deserve primaries, but this vote certainly puts a bullseye on their district.

Moulitsas tweets January 9:

MISSION accomplished, Sarah Palin

BlueBoy on Daily Kos January 6:

TODAY I saw that Giffords voted against Nancy Pelosi. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords is now dead to me.

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