Jim Hightower

The Lone Ranger was a masked man who was out to bring bad guys to justice. Ed Conard is a masked man who is out to bring bad guys to power.

A multimillionaire financier who was a top henchman in Bain Capital, Mitt Romney's old outfit of corporate plunderers, Conard is currently riding with the small but fearsome Citizens United Gang, which has taken over presidential politics. Unlike the James Gang and other robbers of yore who who stole from banks and railroads, these thieves are bankers and high-rolling railroaders. Thanks to the Supreme Court's edict in the infamous Citizens United case, they are now able to use unlimited amounts of their corporate wealth to create SuperPACs that are proving to be devastating weapons against democracy.

Conard is one of a handful of financial elites who've put a million dollars or more into Romney's SuperPAC, enabling it to whack his opponents and take the GOP nomination with an unprecedented barrage of venomously-negative advertising. Conard is known as a masked robber because he tried to disguise his million-dollar involvement by using the fake name of "W Spann." Incredibly, that's not illegal – but it was so glaringly odd that Romney's campaign had to fess up to Conard's real name.

Speaking of names, the Romney SuperPAC is called "Restore Our Future." Whose future does it mean? The mega-donors', of course. This was candidly confessed by another member of The Citizens United Gang, hedge fund hustler Ken Griffin who says he's in Romney's SuperPAC because, "I think [the ultra-wealthy] actually have insufficient influence [in Washington]."

So they're using their millions to purchase a presidency that promises to extend the un-regulated, tax-subsidized system that enriches them at the expense of the rest of us. It's legalized thievery by the rich.