The mayor actually reported a relatively quiet 6-months, with total contributions received of just $53,222.41.

For a bit of perspective, that is 30 percent less than the $76,122.80 raised by City Council Chairman Ernie Martin, who happens to represent the district that includes Kaaawa.

Mayor Carlisle only had seven contributors giving more than $1,000 in the 6-month period going into this election year, and only one gave more than $2,000.

I’m not at all sure what, if anything, should be read into this modest fundraising for the period.

You can see his top contributors here.

Martin, on the other hand, reports eight contributors who gave him the maximum $4,000 allowed by law. Joe Pickard, president of Environet Inc., company vp Vicki Gaynor, and three Pickard family members combined to give a total of $17,000. The Pickard family have been longtime powers in the Kahuku community.

Dennis Mitsunaga, president of Mitsunaga & Associates, and two others from the company combined for $12,000 to Martin’s campaign warchest.

Both Pickard and Mitsunaga have also been major campaign backers of Gov. Neil Abercrombie.

The list of Martin’s top contributors can be found here.

Governor Abercrombie did quite well for himself, taking in $1.1 million during the latter half of 2011.

I originally wrote that as “raking in” rather than “taking in”, but decided it slighted changed the meaning of the sentence in a manner I’m not sure I meant. Language is a powerful and potentially dangerous thing, as I learned a few days ago in a post that brought beaucoup comments on “speculation” and its meanings.

In any case, here’s the top of the Governor’s dance card, as reported in his contribution list for the period. I know you probably can’t read that small print, but just click on it and you’ll see a larger version.

If corporate cash is free speech, as the Supreme Court seems to believe, then the First Amendment is alive and well in our state. Unfortunately, many of Governor Abercrombie’s supporters voted for him in order to keep corporate influence at bay, not embrace it so wholeheartedly.

It wouldn’t be so bad if this were done in that old cynical Texas style, described by the late Molly Ivins.

As they say around the Texas Legislature, if you can’t drink their whiskey, screw their women, take their money, and vote against ‘em anyway, you don’t belong in office.

Instead, it appears the money flow is influencing policy in a way that is definitely giving many of the governor’s backers heartburn.

The regulars are there. The Kobayashi Group ($24,000), R M Towill Corp ($21,000), the former Campbell Estate companies (Aina Nui & the James Campbell Co. combined for at least $18,000), Blacksand Capital ($12,000), etc., etc., etc. And these figures don’t include spouses, subcontractors, attorneys, and others who bundled their contributions along with the Big Boys.

In any case, there are lots of interesting data to be pored over today.

Check the candidate reports at the Campaign Spending Commission’s web site.

A column by former Nixon attorney, John Dean, called my attention to the importance of a Monntana Supreme Court decision issued at the end of last year.

While the U.S. Supreme Court’s granting of personhood to corporations in the now infamous Citizens United v FEC case continues to reverberate, the Montana Supreme Court challenged the ruling by upholding the state’s total ban on corporate money in politics.

Since 1912, Montana has banned direct political contributions by corporations, as well as independent expenditures of corporate funds either for or against candidates. However, the state does allow political spending by corporate political action committees as long as they are funded by voluntary contributions by corporate employees, officers, or shareholders.

In an 29-page decision adopted by a 5-2 vote, the court held that the specific facts of corporate corruption in Montana history provided a compelling justification for the prohibition on corporate money. Two dissenting opinions, though, were spelled out over an additional 50 pages of detailed argument.

Dean wrote:

The MSC majority reasons as follows: “The Dissents assert that Citizens United holds unequivocally that no sufficient government interest justifies limits on political speech. We disagree. The [U.S.] Supreme Court held that laws that burden political speech are subject to strict scrutiny, which requires the government to prove that the law furthers a compelling state interest and is narrowly tailored to that interest.”

Accordingly, the MSC majority proceeded to assemble facts showing that the Montana legislature had a compelling state interest when—one hundred years ago—its members enacted the Montana law that prohibited corporations from making campaign contributions. What was that interest? It was to reverse the situation as it then stood in Montana: Corporations had, at that time, utterly corrupted the state’s government.

The state’s case in defense of the prohibition on corporate spending had several parts. First, the state argued that setting up a political action committee is simple and cannot be compared to the complexity of establishing and maintaining a PAC under the complexities of federal election law.

Second, based on depositions of the plaintiffs, the state established that the existing law had not prevented companies and industry groups from being active participants in politics.

Third, reviewing Montana state history, the state recounted the massive corporate corruption of the late 19th through the mid-20th centuries, including findings of Congressional investigations into several matters. The state’s political history is one of “naked corporation manipulation” of the government and legislature through bribery and other forms of corruption.

Fourth, the state established that Montana elections cost less than in other parts of the country, allowing smaller amounts of money to make significant impacts on election outcomes.

In any case, I would recommend reading through the decision, which is likely heading for a review by the U.S. Supreme Court.