Best Supporters Money Can Buy

[sandnsea]

So what does everybody think of this controversy. I'm going to withhold comment because the post is on my/our blog, although I didn't post it. I will say I think the Armstrong Williams situation is completely different because it's government propaganda. And I'll also say I'd like to run a race against the Republicans with intact feet, if you know what I mean. :)



The Best Supporters Money Can Buy
15 January 2005
Ron Chusid

Looking back to the days when we backed Kerry early on in the primaries, despite considerable opposition from some of the major blogs such as Daily Kos, things are now looking much clearer, thanks to this confession from Zephyr Teachout. This also helps explain why the blogs gave an exaggerated impression of Dean's success, and provides warnings of such potential misuse of the blogosphere in the future.

On Dean's campaign, we paid Markos and Jerome Armstrong as consultants, largely in order to ensure that they said positive things about Dean. We paid them over twice as much as we paid two staffers of similar backgrounds, and they had several other clients.

While they ended up also providing useful advice, the initial reason for our outreach was explicitly to buy their airtime. To be very clear, they never committed to supporting Dean for the payment -- but it was very clearly, internally, our goal.

This is now getting routine--Simon Rosenberg hired Matt Stoller, presumably not just because he's got good ideas, but because he already has a "commentator," "spokesperson," role within the blogging media. The scale is infinitely smaller, but its odd to live in a world where we don't blink when commentators are hired as spokespeople. Imagine Howard Dean hiring Maureen Dowd!
In the interest of full disclosure, should I say that, while I never received any payment from the Kerry campaign, I did receive a big hug from Teresa Heinz Kerry when we met? A staffer from Kerry's Senate office also passed on a message to me in December expressing "the Senator's warm personal regards."
http://www.lightupthedarkness.org/blog/?view=plink&id=231

[noamnety]

1. The Dean bloggers are a non-issue

One stopped blogging during the Dean campaign to avoid a conflict of interest.

The other who took the money AND kept an active blog made a point of disclosing the payment at the time he received it.

They never compromised their credibility as journalists. Furthermore, the Dean campaign didn't use tax dollars to pay them - there was no fraud and abuse issue.

[sandnsea]

2. I had no idea

Just saying. But I will repeat, taxpayer money is government propaganda and a completely different thing. Very serious. I agree with that totally.

[noamnety]

3. Please let Ron know

If it's on your blog, could you pass it along to him? I knew him from the JK boards, he was always very fair and reasonable. He may not be aware of those details. His blog entry gives a distorted view of the situation that he might want to fix.

from kos's response (quoting the wsj):

The two men, who jointly operated a small political consulting firm, said they didn't believe the Dean campaign had been trying to buy their influence. Both men noted that they had promoted Mr. Dean's campaign long before they were hired and continued to do so after their contract with the campaign ended.

Mr. Zuniga said they were paid $3,000 a month for four months and he noted that he had posted a disclosure near the top of his daily blog that he worked for the Dean campaign doing "technical consulting." Mr. Armstrong said he shut down his site when he went to work for the campaign, then resumed posting after his contract ended.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/1/14/02014/6287

[sandnsea]

5. I'm sure he knows

Perhaps he just sees the situation differently. You're free to correct him if you want, that's what a blog is there for, after all.

[TayTay]

7. I agree

(And welcome back lwfern! :hi: )

This is an attempt by the RW to do a tit-for-tat thing. Armstrong Williams took Govt money to promote NCLB. So the RW is trying to say, well, they did it too! This is ridiculous. It's not even close to being the same thing. What a bunch of idiots.

I have my differences with Kos and his constant Kerry-bashing, but he has always been upfront about what he believes. And his blog was consistently telling Dems to work their asses off for Kerry last fall. I don't have a problem with him, or with MyDD.

[JI7]

4. imagine if this was Kerry

there would be much more outrage against it than there is now with Dean.

i do agree it's different from the Armstrong Williams thing in that it involved taxpayers money and it wasn't about campaigning anymore either. there is a difference between campaigns spending money to promote candidates as that's what campaigns do and from currently serving public officials using public funds to promote their policies the way they did with armstrong williams.

but the dailykos site was often used to post anti Kerry things and pro dean things during the primary campaign. if we had known he was getting paid to promote dean rather than a "technical consultant" it would have shown why his posts were often the way they were.

what i'm wondering is why that Zephyr Teachout person decided to reveal this just now. oddly it came out just about the day after she endorsed Dean for DNC Chair also. maybe just naive or i'm not sure. but you know how the right wing distorts things and tries to justify things by bringing up things that don't really compare. i haven't really been watching the big media so i don't know if they have used this to defend the armstrong williams thing yet.

[sandnsea]

6. I doubt the main media will

They don't tend to get into blogger stuff. I don't think they want to promote the fact that there's a whole other method of getting news!!

I do wonder about this Teachout person. Maybe she just wants to promote ethics in the blog world, I don't know.

BTW, LUTD gets NO money. :cry: lol.

[paulk]

8. I think the point Ron C. makes about the hiring of bloggers

perhaps making Dean's support seem more than it was (and thereby distorting the race somewhat) is a valid one.

The MSM is trying to draw parallels here with the William's situation, but that's bogus. Still - I don't think it's ok for bloggers to take money to support a candidate - even with a disclaimer. It's... not ethical. And I will register my disagreement by not donating to dKos for awhile.

I also don't think it's ok that Rosenberg hired Stoller.