Big Money Can Influence How You Vote
COSTELLO: It is just about 30 minutes past the hour. Good morning to you. I'm Carol Costello. Stories we're watching right now in</s>THE NEWSROOM: Opening bell on Wall Street. Stocks set for a higher start today following an announcement from Spain that it's getting its fiscal house in order. Ringing the bell this morning, you see them there, MRC Global, which is celebrating its recent IPO. CNN has learned that a mix of pathogens caused a mystery illness that killed 64 children in Cambodia. Doctors say an inappropriate use of steroids made the illness worse in most patients. Our doctor, Sanjay Gupta, will have the latest from Cambodia. We'll bring that to you in the next 30 minutes, I'd say. Today, House Republicans will have their say on repealing the so-called Obamacare. It is the first vote since the Supreme Court upheld the sweeping health care reforms two weeks ago. But even if passed by the GOP majority in the House, the repeal is doomed in the Senate, which the Democrats control. In a perfect Democratic kind of world, you would decide who to vote for based on cold hard facts. The truth is, that's hard to do because of all the cold hard cash out there. 2012 could be the year of the $1 billion campaign. That's more than enough money to sway your opinion based on the ads alone. So the question this morning: who will buy your vote? Corporate America, unions, who? Viveca Novack is in D.C. She's the communications director if the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group. Welcome.</s>VIVECA NOVACK, COMMUNICATIONS DIR, CENTER FOR RESPONSIVE POLITICS: Good to be with you, Carol.</s>COSTELLO: Great to have you here. So, I took these numbers from your fabulous Web site, opensecrets.org. To date, Mr. Obama has raised more than $255 million and Mr. Romney more than $121 million. Those numbers don't tell the whole story, though, right?</s>NOVACK: No. I mean, if money were everything, then we'd have a President Ross Perot to be looking back on or a President Steve Forbes. Clearly money is hugely important, though, or these candidates wouldn't be spending so much time raising it.</s>COSTELLO: So we here like last month Mitt Romney outraised President Obama, but those figures show Obama is up in total take by $100 million. Why is that?</s>NOVACK: Well, yes. That doesn't mean, though, that he has an extra $100 million. You have to remember these candidates raise the money, and they spend the money. And every month, it's almost like starting from zero again.</s>COSTELLO: If you look at who's donating to whom, I thought this was really interesting, Obama's top five donors, Microsoft, the University of California, Google, et cetera. It's interesting that employees of these entities are donating to Obama. What do they have in common?</s>NOVACK: Well, you're correct that Obama seems to be getting a lot of his money from law firms, lawyers at law firms, from universities, academics and other employees of universities seem to like Obama. And tech companies very much like Obama. On the other hand, as I'm sure you'll show in just a second, Romney seems to be very popular with banks and investment firms.</s>COSTELLO: Let's go down the top five. You can see them. Goldman Sachs. JPMorgan Chase. Morgan Stanley. Bank of America. All of them are big banks.</s>NOVACK: Right. And this is not surprising in a way, in part because Mitt Romney is from that world. He knows these people. He is of their mindset. And the other thing is that they don't like Obama so much anymore because they have been blamed in part for the financial crisis, in some cases perhaps with good reason. And in are the cases, there have been various misdeeds that people have looked askance at, and it has led to more regulation, AKA, the Dodd-Frank bill that has been very, very unpopular in the financial community.</s>COSTELLO: So, you know, we hear this a lot. Mitt Romney is getting these huge do nations from people with a lot of money, and we can see that he is. So does that necessarily mean that these big banks and big corporations will decide our election?</s>NOVACK: Well, you know, it's very hard to draw a straight line there because there's a lot more going on. I mean, they may be helping our election, but of course money is not everything. You have to have, you know, the basics in place. You have to be a -- you know, intelligent individual who is able to make a good case for you taking over the presidency of the arguably most important country in the world. So it's not everything. But, again, the number of fundraisers that these candidates are having is hugely important. It's indicative of what they think they need to win. And the people who are giving the money definitely have better access than the average American.</s>COSTELLO: You've got that right. Thank you so much for joining us this morning. Opensecrets.org if you want more on the numbers. They are fascinating. Let me tell you. Thank you so much, Viveca.</s>NOVACK: Thank you.</s>COSTELLO: Is mixing Justin Bieber and the paparazzi a disaster in the making? His people seem to think so. And now they have issued a warning.</s>JOSE GOMEZ-MARQUEZ: I want to create the equivalent of what Lego is today for toys, I want to have not just the predicate if but the movement of democratized health care. My name is Jose Gomez-Marquez, and I use toys to make affordable medical devices.