>The question though is can one draw a line between the type of
>activity they are
>engaged in and a percieved direct/indirect benefit from a Dem president. That
>is I assume the pharma sector donates money to republs not simply
>because there
>are a lot of chemists who are republicans:)
Right - during the 2004 campaign, drug stocks rallied when good news for Bush came out, and sank when Kerry-friendly news hit the wire. Rationally or not, the market thought that Kerry would have imposed some sort of price controls or permitted imports from Canada. Secondarily, it's a dirty industry, and benefits from looser environmental regs.
But, given FIRE salaries, no one benefits more from personal income tax cuts than Wall Street people. So personally they had/have a lot to gain from a Rep presidency. But there are other issues - Dems run a more Wall Street-friendly international economic policy (Bush barely has one); finance mostly hates high oil prices, which the Reps often seem to bring with them; contrary to cliche, they're not big on war (wars are inflationary and can disrupt the free flow of capital); some care about fiscal probity, which the Dems have been better at since 1981. And there's the inverse of the What's The Matter With Kansas question; some Wall Streeters aren't comfortable with bible thumpers.
Doug