They pay, pols vote, we lose.

Step 1: D.C. pols take campaign money from financial institutions.
Step 2: D.C. pols approve multi-billion dollar bailout for financial institutions.
Step 3: regular Americans lose free political speech.

via Memeorandum: a whole lot of big D.C. names got campaign money – a lot of it – from the very company they’re now vilifying.

Will Obama, McCain, Dodd Return Contributions From AIG Employees?

AIG employees kept doling out donations to politicians, including presidential candidate Barack Obama, after getting bailed out with federal funds last year, raising the question of whether those politicians will now return the money.

AIG executives gave more than $630,000 during the 2008 political cycle even as the company was falling apart

Barack Obama got over $100,000; McCain got almost $60,000. The list also includes V.P. Joe Biden; Sen. Hillary Clinton; Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.), chairman of the Senate Banking Committee; and Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D-Pa), who is chairing the AIG hearing on Capitol Hill.

This is exactly the kind of story that gets the Campaign Finance Reformers up in arms. Clearly, or so close to clear that it might as well be the nose on your face, AIG employees were giving money hoping for more federal largesse later on. And they got it.

It looks dirty. Real dirty.

You watch: this is going to mean We Need Stricter Controls on campaign contributions! We Need More Limits on individual support (via pocketbook) for individual campaigns!

We Need Full Public Funding of Campaigns!