Soros Sitting Out 2010 Election?

Radical philanthropist George Soros –the preeminent funder of the American left– told the New York Times he’s sitting out the current election cycle because Democrats’ prospects are nonexistent.

Instead of funding Democratic candidates and Democrat-friendly groups Soros has reportedly instead been bankrolling health care and environmentalist groups.

When asked if the likelihood that Republicans will take over one or both houses of Congress concerned him, he said: “It does, because I think they are pushing the wrong policies, but I’m not in a position to stop it. I don’t believe in standing in the way of an avalanche.”

“I made an exception getting involved in 2004,” Soros said. “And since I didn’t succeed in 2004, I remained engaged in 2006 and 2008. But I’m basically not a party man. I’d just been forced into that situation by what I considered the excesses of the Bush administration.”

That Soros is actually sitting on the sidelines for the off-year congressional elections is very hard to believe but maybe he’s telling the truth. He is a shrewd investor and maybe he reckons it’s best not to waste money on this cycle and then open the floodgates for the 2012 cycle when President Obama will be up for reelection.

In 2004 Soros spent around $26 million of his own money in a futile effort to defeat President Bush. The figure included a $5 million donation to MoveOn.org, a $10 million grant to a Democratic Party 2004 get-out-the-vote initiative called America Coming Together, and $3 million to the Center for American Progress (CAP), a think-tank headed by former Clinton chief-of-staff John Podesta.