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Sheldon Adelson, the multi-billionaire casino mogul who already spent at least $5 million to help keep Republicans in control of the House next year, reportedly pledged $500,000 to just one House candidate, New Jersey Republican candidate Rabbi Shmuley Boteach.
While half-a-million dollars sure sounds like a lot of money, it is chump change to Mr. Adelson. The casino czar’s net worth is just shy of $25 billion, or more than the gross domestic product of nearly two dozen nations put together. Indeed, Adelson is so rich that if he decided to give half a million dollars to every single Republican nominee for every House and Senate seat in the country, and to do so every single election cycle until his vast fortune ran out, he would have enough money to fund the GOP’s election machine for the next 186 years:
Rabbi Boteach, for his part, lavished praise on Adelson and on the Supreme Court that’s been so solicitous of right-wing efforts to buy and sell elections: “I think that Sheldon Adelson will bring democracy to the ninth district of New Jersey. What Citizens United has allowed is a challenger like me to be a real contender against [Rep. Bill] Pascrell.”
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