Liberal Profs Give More to Politics than Exxon

By Rick Moran

Ed Lasky gives us a shocker to help wake us up this morning. He points to this piece in the Phi Beta Con blog at National Review by David French that highlights a study done which shows that academics give more money to political candidates than big oil and gas concerns:

The surprising thing is the sheer amount of academic political giving. Did you know that the academic community outgives even the oil and gas industry?

From the study done by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics:

Seventy-six percent of the education industry's total federal contributions for '08 has gone to Democrats, on par with the industry's partisanship in the last two election cycles. Perhaps more surprising than the industry’s party split is its sheer size: Education was the eighth-largest industry in terms of all federal campaign contributions in 2004 and the 13th largest in 2006, meaning that in the last two election cycles, college employees contributed more to politicians than the oil and gas industry, which ranked 16th in both cycles. For 2008, CRP ranks the education industry as No. 14, still ahead of big-givers such as oil and gas, general contractors, the computer and Internet industry, electric utilities and the pharmaceutical industry.

Harvard profs gave more than $266,000 to political campaigns, 81% to Democrats. The University of Chicago, home to Milton Friedman while he was alive, gave nearly $103,000 with 92% going to the left. It goes on and on.

Academics are now the 13th largest group of political contributors, in front of the 16th ranked oil and gas industry. Do you think all those Democratic candidates bashing special interests will refuse to accept money from such a powerful lobby?

Don't hold your breath.