Not much, really. Republicans in red states like Iowa, Kansas and Texas know that. Red is best but there's nothing wrong with pink slime. Both are all about money. Just money, not health, not (of course!) anything like public interest.
The maker of lean beef trimmings — on whose behalf Gov. Terry Branstad crusaded last week — donated more than $500,000 to Iowa Republican candidates over the past decade and was the top agricultural contributor to the governor’s latest re-election bid, records show.
Beef Products Inc. claims to be the largest producer of beef trimmings in the world. A social media campaign in recent weeks has derided the company’s lean, finely textured beef as “pink slime,” and some fast-food chains, supermarkets and school cafeterias are dropping its use.
The company’s top executives and employees have contributed at least $546,500 to candidates for state office in Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, South Dakota and Texas, where it has plants or other operations.
Republican governors or lieutenant governors from the five states traveled last week to South Sioux City, Neb., to tour the company’s plant there. Branstad organized the event, which was followed on Thursday by a news conference where he and others touted the health and nutritional benefits of the hamburger filler marketed as lean, finely textured beef.
BPI owners Eldon and Regina Roth and their employees also contributed an additional $274,250 since 2008 to presidential and congressional candidates, according federal campaign finance data reviewed by the Register.
Of the more than $820,000 in combined state and federal contributions, only $28,400 — less than 3.5 percent — went to Democrats. There were no donations to former Iowa Democratic governors Tom Vilsack, now U.S. secretary of agriculture, or Chet Culver. ...Des Moines Register
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Pink slime isn't the only thing we in Texas associate with Rick Perry. We're furious at the governor for taking money from schools and health care and tossing it into his own campaign. Three million and growing.
Gov. Rick Perry’s presidential odyssey ended in January, but the bills for the security force that protected him on the campaign trail keep pouring in, boosting the pricetag to almost $3 million so far.
The Department of Public Safety released new figures Friday for the travel expenditures incurred by his security detail. The department added more than $900,000 to the amounts it had previously released, accounting for travel vouchers that were submitted since the last report about three months ago. ...The amount is likely to grow as more bills come in and get processed.
Critics have called on Perry to reimburse the money from donated campaign funds. Perry and his aides have said repeatedly that DPS is charged with protecting him and his family and have dismissed calls to reimburse the state for the expenses. ...Texas Tribune
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