Dismantling the Empire

The real differences show up when one examines who contributes what to whom. By industrial categories, Cunningham’s top contributors, based on FEC data released August 2, 2004, are defense electronics ($66,550), defense aerospace ($39,000), lobbyists ($32,500), miscellaneous defense ($29,200), air transport ($26,500), health professionals ($24,700), and real estate ($23,001). Busby’s top contributors are listed as “retired.” Cunningham’s number one financial backer is the Titan Corporation of San Diego, which gave him $18,000. It has recently been in the news for supplying Arabic translators to the Army, several of whom have been identified as possible torturers at Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad. Titan’s $657 million Pentagon contract, which had to be approved by the House Appropriations Committee’s National Security Subcommittee, of which Cunningham is a member, is the company’s single biggest source of revenue, so it’s a clear case of a political payoff.

Lockheed Martin, the world’s largest weapons manufacturer, gave Cunningham a whopping $15,000. Cunningham’s number three source of funds is MZM Inc. of Washington, D.C., whose government clients, in addition to the Pentagon, include the “U.S. intelligence community,” the “Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force,” and the Department of Homeland Security. MZM gave Randy $11,000 for his services. Next in line is the Cubic Corporation of San Diego, which has numerous multimillion-dollar contracts with the Pentagon to supply “realistic combat training systems” and surveillance and reconnaissance avionics. It gave Randy $10,000. General Dynamics ponied up $10,000 for the congressman, as did San Diego’s Science Applications International Corporation, or SAIC as it is commonly known. SAIC’s largest customer by far is the U.S. government, which accounts for 69 percent of its business according to SAIC’s filings with the SEC. (SAIC was supposed to build a new, pro-American TV and radio network in Iraq but bungled the job badly.) The remainder of Cunningham’s top contributors reads like a Who’s Who among the merchants of death: $9,500 from Northrop Grumman, $8,000 from Raytheon (which makes the Tomahawk cruise missile), $8,500 from Qualcomm, and $7,000 from Boeing. All this for just one congressman.

Busby’s biggest contributions are $2,000 from an outfit called “Blue Hornet,” which designs websites, $1,835 from members of the Cardiff School Board, and $1,080 from employees of Mira Costa College.

One ingenious measure of how money displaces people in our political system, compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, is the zip codes from which each candidate gets his or her individual contributions. For Cunningham the chief one is 92067, Rancho Santa Fe, with $62,795 in donations. Rancho Santa Fe is well known as a beautiful, underpopulated enclave of extremely wealthy people, many of them foreigners. It is followed by 92037, La Jolla, not a poor town, which chipped in $24,000 for Cunningham. The next two zip codes are 20003 and 20007, both of which are in Washington, D.C. Cunningham received the fewest donations from 92065, Carlsbad. Busby’s are the direct opposite. Her best zip code is 92007, her hometown of Cardiff, the residents of which have given her $8,415, followed by 92009, Carlsbad; 92014, Del Mar; and last 92091, wealthy Fairbanks Ranch, which gave her a mere $1,000. Cunningham’s money comes from the following localities, in descending order: San Diego, Washington, D.C., New York City, and Orange County, California. Busby’s comes entirely from the San Diego metropolitan area.

Cunningham knows with precision who gives him money and what its providers expect of him. As the Japanese like to say, you don’t have to tell a geisha what to do. He has 100 percent ratings from the National Right to Life Committee (he is adamantly opposed to giving women the right to choose), the League of Private Property Voters, the Christian Coalition, and the Business-Industry PAC, and an 80 percent rating from the Gun Owners of America. Over the last decade he has received $44,600 from the National Rifle Association, more than any other member of Congress except Representative Don Young, a Republican from Alaska. There are no places in the 50th District to go hunting, least of all with an Uzi or an AK-47.