Fellow Dean supporters, have you seen this yet?

[Fleshdancer]

forgive me if this is a dupe...it's new to me and I'm pissed.

www.dailykos.com

Fast forward to the days before IA: Trippi's "cell phone rings. It's his pollster, Paul Maslin, who not only has bleak news out of Iowa -- but bleak news out of New Hampshire. Trippi hangs up and stares out the window. His phone rings again. "WHAT? Aw, fuck. I hate this business. This fucking sucks. Okay, thanks." He hangs up. "They're robocalling our ones," he moans. "He has just gotten a report from the field that Dean "ones" are getting bombarded with computer-generated phone calls telling them to make sure to caucus for Dean-then giving them the wrong address." Who would do such a thing? "Kerry," Trippi snaps. "They're the only asshole snake campaign that would do it. Every frickin' day now, I'm reminded of why I got out of this in the first place."

The Dean campaign keeps fingering the Kerry camp, and it's hard to see who else might be responsible.

The calls were targeted at Dean in Iowa and NH -- the two states that were must-wins for both Dean and Kerry. Gephardt might've been behind a robo-calling effort in Iowa, but he'd have no reason to do the same in NH.

__________________________________________

I'm not prepared to jump to the conclusions that Trippi did, but is there a way to find out who is behind the robocalls?

[cthrumatrix]

1. well if there were a way...i guess they would have gone after that..

the 'attack' between the calls the Osama Bin Laden TV ad and the other 'stuff' ...is disgusting....only amplified by the media to this day

[NashVegas]

13. I Think Feb. 1 Is the Date

We'll be able to find out who was behind the Osama ad.

[bhunt70]

2. Hopefully it's not true

Not saying I hope it was the fault of someone on the Dean Team but I'd hate for something dirty like this to go down. Makes everyone look bad.

[POed_Ex_Repub]

3. If there were robocalls.... it smells like GOP

Sounds very "Rovian" to me.

[Fleshdancer]

4. how would the GOP have the list of all of Dean's "1's"?

eom

[RetroLounge]

6. Exactly. But Kerry would have this...

eom

[POed_Ex_Repub]

10. How?... Lie, cheat, and steal...

This is the same party that snooped on Dems computers to get the skinny on how they would try to block Neocon judges. Wouldn't surprise me if they had a mole or two.

[benddem]

25. They can get the 1's the same way the Dean people did

Making phone calls etc. People in Iowa were being deluged with phone calls.

[Cheswick2.0]

47. They walked into the office and took them

I had some republicans try to pull the same trick during Rendell's campaign for Governor. Sleazy political operatives are very good at what they do.

[slinkerwink]

7. kerry campaign was caught pushpolling on tape

[Fleshdancer]

9. whoa...what?

I've been sick lately and am obviously out of the loop on this one. How were they caught pushpolling?

[slinkerwink]

14. a young kerry staffer called a dean supporter's house

and told her how dean was an abortionist, and how his wife was a Jew, etc. It was caught on tape because there happened to be a documentary team at the same moment.

[Fleshdancer]

18. WTF???

Are you serious? Okay. anger boiling. Let me slooow down and make sure I got this right. People who were filming a documentary actually filmed the Kerry supporter pushpolling?

Am I really reading this correctly?

[slinkerwink]

20. yes, you're reading this right.

[Eloriel]

21. Yup -- LINK

KERRY PUSH POLLING
Stealth Negativity?
Recording Reveals Kerry Operative Dissing Dean in Campaign Call
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/Politics/ThisWeek/Kerry_Dean_calls_040117-1.html

[juajen]

41. With all due respect, slinkerwink

The article mentioned nothing about Dean being an abortionist or Judy being Jewish. Also, the Kerry campaign denied their involvement and fired the young person who they said made the "mistake". Now, I am not naive, so I realize some of this certainly could have happened; however, I would like to see a link where the Dean campaign has proof that Kerry operatives used abortion and being Jewish against the Deans. That simply seems "over the top" to me.

BTW, I am not a Kerry supporter.

[Meldread]

11. Well Kerry has got a lot in common...

with Bush. I mean after all they are both members of Skull and Bones, he supported most of Bush's major bills... In all honesty I don't know how he got a more liberal record than Ted Kennedy.

But it's stuff like this -- the actions of the Kerry campaign and their supporters that I won't vote for Kerry in the General Election if he gets it. I refuse to do it.

Here is a guy who has to flip flop on most of all the issues he has, and then has to turn around and steal most of my candidates platform which you know he isn't going to implement once he gets into the White House. Why? Because he's already whored himself off to Special Interests.

Wanna know why Bush is so bad? It isn't because he's a Republican or an Evangelistic Christian it's because he's a Special Interest Whore. He has reason to work for Halliburton. He has reason to work with Enron. Kerry will do the same, just with different companies.

[juajen]

42. OK folks, I think this criticism is "over the top"

Yes,evidently Kerry was in Skull and Bones; that said, no true member of Skull and Bones would be instrumental in taking down the BCCI. Give the man some credit. I also don't think many Skull and Bones members served in Vietnam and he certainly served well.

[blm]

17. Classic GOP operation. Get two candidates at the same time.

The scripts on those calls are RNC dirty tricks.

Weren't they also reporting that the script said Dean was Skull and Bones? Wouldn't that be a way to make it a topic to turn against Kerry?


btw...Kerry's camp already knew their numbers were on the rise. They wouldn't have risked the lead they knew they had through their internal polls with dirty tricks like that.. Especially anti-semitic slurs.

There was only one camp that knew they were on the slide.

But, the best guess is that it was Rove.

[RetroLounge]

5. I would believe Trippi on this...

eom

[ibegurpard]

8. I have no problem believing this.

And I'd really, really, really like to see some proof and shove it down the Kerry campaign's throat.

[killbotfactory]

12. I heard about this right after Iowa...

People on the ground were encountering former Dean supporters who had been robo-called three or four times and were quite pissed about it. I had no idea why we would make such a stupid move, but it turns out it wasn't us. A Kerry staffer got caught push-polling in Iowa as well, and then I heard reports in NH where Kerry supporters pretended to be Dean supporters and took phone lists and robo-called all the 1's on the list.

I'm pretty damn sure it's Kerry.

[Fleshdancer]

15. how did the Kerry staffer get caught pushpolling?

I've read this before, but I'm curious as to how someone actually gets caught doing it.

[NashVegas]

16. A Film Crew Was There

One of those serendipitous kinda things.

[Fleshdancer]

19. Slinkerwink just told me.

WTF???? Unf*cking believable.

[slinkerwink]

22. look at post #21 for the abcnews story

[Eloriel]

23. LINK

KERRY PUSH POLLING
Stealth Negativity?
Recording Reveals Kerry Operative Dissing Dean in Campaign Call
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/Politics/ThisWeek/Kerry_Dean_calls_040117-1.html

Also Daily Kos but I don't have the link now.

[mrdmk]

24. I am sure this is the reason for the change in Dean's

Campaign Manager

The Dean camp will find out who is doing this and how to stop it. These types of campaign tricks have been used time and again. It is a part of politics and always will be.

[Fleshdancer]

26. you think?

I really want to find out who's responsible, but I can't think of how anyone could get proof. Then again, I don't really know what goes in to creating robocalls...do you go through a sleazy ad agency to do this sort of thing? :shrug:

[mrdmk]

35. Robo calls are easy

These machines can be purchase by any consumer and programmed to call numbers within a prefix or individual phone numbers. I am sure they are completely digital just like their answering machine counterparts. All you need to do is record a message, hook the machine to a phone line, program the telephone numbers you want called and tell the machine what time to start calling. Bingo mass harassment.

[ibegurpard]

27. You know what I find completely ironic?

People that were so quick to jump on the rumor just a few hours ago that Trippi had mismanaged and bilked a portion of $40 million from the Dean campaign can simply not believe that the Kerry campaign could be capable of something like this.

[Fleshdancer]

28. lol, good point. n/t

[frustrated_lefty]

29. And there is befuddlement, people asking

why Deanies can't just "get over it" and get behind Kerry.

"Meet the new boss,
same as the old boss."

[ibegurpard]

30. kick

:kick:

[fabius]

33. I'd be really curious as to who did this.

If it's GOP then it's same old, same old.

If it's Kerry, and if he expects to win the nomination I hope he saves some of his dirty tricks for Bushco.

[rpf113]

31. Even though I'm not a Dean supporter,

I think that is pathetic. If it really was Kerry's campaign he should be ashamed of himself.

[slinkerwink]

32. exactly. it was caught on tape---here's the story

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/Politics/ThisWeek/Kerry_Dean_calls_040117-1.html

[John_H]

37. Does Dean know where all HIS 19 year olds are tonight?

Are you suggesting that campaigns can keep track of what each of their volunteers tell people? Or are you intentionally insulting everyone's intelligence by equating a teenage volunteer armed with a call sheet with a robo campaign giving out the wrong address to a caucus or a push poll?

[w13rd0]

34. Hey, I can't find a thread to say this...

...but your guys question on "his blaming Bush for 9/11" TOTALLY ROCKED. I'm watching the debates now. Just had to say it somewhere... ;)

Oh yeah, dirty tricks aplenty. Color me not surprised. I heard about this stuff as it happened. Of course, who are the quickest to dismiss. Those that also say Bush/Cheney weren't "intentionally misleading", and who defend his having used 9/11 as a political tool to advance his agenda. Why, because they are running on fear as well...

Anyway. Carry on, we always knew this was going to be a tough battle. The wealthy special interests aren't going to give up the keys to the kingdom to the "little people" without some kind of fight.

[John_H]

36. Hmmmmmm. Are we knee jerking a little here.

The article consists of direct quotes. Thus there was a reporter in the room.

Unless the reporter was invisible, Trippi knew the reporter was in the room.

Would a savvy political operator ever dare to create a little bit of theatre for a reporter?

Just a little food for thought.

And, BTW, do you have any reason not to believe Clark's team when they said Dean was push polling them in NH? Really? Oh.

[virtualobserver]

38. Maybe the push polling of both Dean and Clark.....

came from the same source.

[mb7588a]

39. One smiley for ya!

:tinfoilhat:

[GreenArrow]

40. No proof it was Kerry--could just as easily be the other candidate

who has made the biggest gains in the last two weeks. Or it could be the GOP.

[kayob1]

43. Thanks for posting

[WilliamPitt]

44. I was all over the Kerry headquarters in NH

If they had a robocalling rig there, they hid it pretty well. They did have every warm body on a phone, though, reading from a script and checking called numbers off the lists. Looked pretty standard to me, but who the hell knows?

[hobbes159]

45. If you think about it, HQ would be the LAST place they'd have a rig

A box of electronics would be pretty easy to stash in a closet or just about anywhere -- all it really needs is access to phone lines and an AC outlet

IF a campaign were to pull such a dirty trick AND they were smart enough to collect the right data to make it worthwhile, why would they be dumb enough to put something like that in plain sight? Even more, why would they have it calling from numbers that would be traceable back to the campaign if someone had caller ID? It would make more sense to stash it in a hotel room or office or something, where it would be more difficult to discover...

[Cheswick2.0]

46. Kerry's campaign manager is scum

This does not surprise me at all.