Wealthy financier is mysterious funder of ads attacking DeFazio

[stevedeshazer]

http://blog.oregonlive.com/mapesonpolitics/2010/10/wealthy_financier_is_mysteriou.html

<snip>

Robert Mercer, the co-CEO of one of the world's largest hedge funds, is the mysterious donor who has been paying for $300,000 of attack ads aimed at Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore.

The attack ads, which also praise DeFazio's opponent, Republican Art Robinson, have been attracting national attention for weeks because the group running them has refused to say where their funding comes from.

However, new federal disclosure reports that have just been filed show that the money for Concerned Taxpayers of America comes from Robert Mercer, who heads Renaissance Technologies of Setauket, N.Y.along with Peter Brown.

Mercer and Brown took over the firm this year from James Simons, a "secretive mathematician and Cold War code breaker," according to The Wall Street Journal. Simons pioneered the use of mathematical formulas and computers to conduct financial trades.

The Journal described Mercer as a political conservative and National Rifle Association member who tends to avoid contact with the firm's employees outside of official meetings.

more @ link

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Just more evidence of the corrupting influence of unlimited cash-for-politicians policy.

[aquart]

1. "mathematical formulas and computers to conduct financial trades."

Is this someone who should be in jail?