Now, it's no surprise that Bruce Tinsley is using his "Mallard Fillmore" comic strip to bang the gong on this week's Conservative Talking Points (tm):
Considering how much money is being thrown around in PR efforts to attack SS and smear AARP (see NYTimes article excerpt below), the administration's practice of paying flacks in the media, and the precise timing of his strips (coordinated with other attacks) here's the Big Question:
Is Tinsley getting paid outside of his strip royalties for his flackwork? And if he's NOT getting a piece of all that action,
does that make him a Bigger or Smaller Conservative Idiot?
Grab your gun, Elmer, it's DUCK SEASON!
To help set USA Next's strategy, the group has hired Chris LaCivita, an enthusiastic former marine who advised Swift Vets and P.O.W.'s for Truth, formerly known as Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, on its media campaign and helped write its potent commercials. He earned more than $30,000 for his work, campaign finance filings show.
Officials said the group is also seeking to hire Rick Reed, a partner at Stevens Reed Curcio & Potholm, a firm that was hired by Swift Vets and was paid more than $276,000 to do media production, records show.
For public relations, USA Next has turned to Creative Response Concepts, a Virginia firm that represented both Swift Vets - the company was paid more than $165,000 - and Regnery Publishing, the publisher of "Unfit for Command," a book about Senator John Kerry's military service whose co-author was John E. O'Neill, one of the primary leaders of Swift Vets.http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/21/politics/21social.html?hp&ex=1109048400&en=31aa371bb47479ad&ei=5094&partner=homepage