[continued from previous message]   
      
   companies known to exploit it, including Glenwood and the Durst   
   Organization, another real estate powerhouse.   
      
   Documents the investigators obtained provided unusual insight   
   into what watchdog groups had long asserted: Corporations were   
   strategically dividing up huge contributions to maximize their   
   giving — and their influence. The use of limited-liability   
   companies concealed the magnitude of their gifts from public   
   view.   
      
   In one instance in 2012, the Real Estate Board of New York   
   solicited donations for Lewis A. Fidler, a Brooklyn Democrat who   
   at the time was running for a State Senate seat (whose previous   
   occupant had pleaded guilty to accepting bribes).   
      
   James Whelan, a senior vice president for the board, a major   
   lobbying force, emailed a Durst executive, Jordan Barowitz: “If   
   you could find one of your more obscure LLCs, that would be   
   grand.”   
      
   Mr. Whelan, through a spokesman, declined to comment. Mr.   
   Barowitz said the requested donation was never made.   
      
   The Moreland Commission wanted to press to close the LLC   
   loophole, which one member, Richard Briffault, a Columbia Law   
   School professor, recently said “makes the greatest mockery of   
   the idea that New York has campaign finance limits.” He also   
   said that of the system’s many flaws, the loophole was “the   
   easiest to fix.”   
      
   When the commission was closed down in March, the loophole   
   remained wide open.   
      
   Continued.   
      
   http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/08/nyregion/after-moreland-   
   commission-shutdown-by-gov-cuomo-loopholes-live-on-in-   
   albany.html?_r=0   
      
       
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)