ow that Prince Eric has been elevated to his new position of House Majority Leader, Cantor’s made good on his pledge to lead a repeal vote against Obamacare in the House, now controlled by Republicans.
So, it should come as no tremendous surprise that Cantor is being especially well-funded by the managed care industry, which doesn’t want its sweet deal of dominating entire states, cherry-picking healthy policy applicants from the in-need by denying scores of millions coverage for “pre-existing conditions” and not having to bother with the poor who can’t pay for regular insurance but don’t qualify for Medicaid.
According to today’s Washington Post, major health care firms and their employees gave $2 million in the past two years to the election campaigns of Cantor and the new Republican Speaker of the House John A. Boehner.
The Post says that Cantor received at least $5.6 million from corporate donors, including $2.4 million from firms and employees in the fionance, insurance and real estate industries. Some of Cantor’s biggest Virginia donors are the big Richmond lobbying firm of McGuire Woods and Dominion followed by Altria and others.
The money puts Cantor well above his House colleagues in terms of business money received. Midterm elections in 2010 showed a big increase in corporate finding.
Little wonder that “Young Gun” Cantor continues to do the bidding of big business, such as trying to shoot down regulations and taxes on corporations. Of course, Cantor at times does reverse on himself. I interviewed him in 2009 and he told me that “we’ve got to get the federal government out of the capital markets.” When I reminded Cantor that he voted for George W. Bush’s TARP bank bailout he was silent for about 20 seconds.
The Main Street types in Virginia’s GOP love Cantor. Their “Pravda”, the Richmond Times-Dispatch regularly features Cantor in a positive light on its front page. Occasionally their “Politifacts” fact checker raps his knuckles for being a little too slick with facts, but it’s quite a cushy deal for the hometown boy from Henrico County and his wife who’s on the board of Media General, owner of the Richmond paper (no matter how many times the TD editors claim t’ain’t so).
One wonders if Prince Eric is still selling “Coffee with Cantor” morning meetings at the Capitol Hill Starbucks for a couple grand or so a latte.
If you want to see big bucks from big business at work, look no further.
Peter Galuszka