The roots of any corruption lies in unmitigated priviledge.

Don't tell me for one minute that money doesn't yield uncontrolled power. I know differently. Campaign Reform Laws are necessary in order to have fair and equitable elections.

Lord Ashcroft carried nothing but 'clout.' It facilitated an empire of power that has resulted in the mute status of the minority lead government in Belize. A sovereign country should never have less power than its private business entities.

Never.

Conservative party leader David Cameron speaks to delegates at the Conservative Party Spring Conference on Feb. 27, 2010, in Brighton, England. The party's lead over Labour has shrunk to 2 percent in recent polls. (Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

Scandal threatens Britain's conservatives (click title to entry - thank you)

With elections approaching, Labour signals it will take advantage of questions about Lord Ashcroft's tax status.

By Matthew Hart — Special to GlobalPost

Published: March 10, 2010 06:31 ET

LONDON, United Kingdom — With a general election expected to be called within weeks, Britain's opposition Conservative Party has watched its wafer-thin polling lead obliterated by a scandal about the tax status of its largest donor and important backroom operative — Lord Ashcroft.

Now in a dead heat with the Conservatives, the reigning Labour Party signaled Sunday that it meant to take full advantage of the scandal, when the business secretary, Lord Mandelson, mocked the Conservative leader as "too weak" to discipline the powerful Ashcroft in the wake of the tax disclosures.

After a decade of questioning about his tax status, and repeated assurances from Conservative Party leaders that he was in fact a resident for tax purposes, Ashcroft admitted last week that his vast offshore income was sheltered from the British taxman under the controversial non-domicile rule. As a “non-dom,” to use the British shorthand, Ashcroft would pay tax only on income received inside the United Kingdom.

Ashcroft is a billionaire businessman whose corporate empire is run from Belize, the central American country previously known as British Honduras. The Conservative Party’s deputy chairman, and one of its master tacticians, Ashcroft maintains a lavish beachfront mansion in Belize City, a 150-foot yacht and a luxurious Dassault Falcon EX 900 private jet, nicknamed the Flying Lion. Ashcroft’s exotic life in his tropical hideaway has led the British press to dub him “Blofeld,” after the James Bond villain with a similar taste in palm trees and sparkling waters....