No cell phones for you at Obama fundraisers.
Via BuzzFeed Politics:
In the latest attempt to crack down on potentially embarrassing digital leaks from presidential fundraisers, President Barack Obama’s campaign has begun asking donors attending small fundraisers with the president to turn over their cell phones before entering.
Pool reporter David Nakamura of the Washington Post reported that at a $35,800 a head fundraiser at the home of Blackstone COO Hamilton “Tony” James in New York City Monday night, the 60 attendees were asked to place their phones in plastic bags by the door.
An Obama aide called the move it “standard operating procedure,” but veterans of a range of other campaigns said they’d never heard of the practice, which is common in secure White House spaces where there are concerns of espionage, but unknown in contexts in which only political secrets are discussed. The new prevalence of sophisticated audio and recording capacities in mobile devices owned by virtually anyone wealthy enough to write a check to a political campaign, however, has put a new pressure on campaigns concerned with staying on a public message.
The fundraising sessions are one of the last vestige of privacy for the president outside of the White House, and a rare opportunity for top donors to hear relatively unscripted remarks by the most powerful man in the world, and to ask him questions. Obama’s prepared remarks at the events are open press and covered by a small group of reporters, but the “press pool” is escorted out of the room before the Q&A period.
At Romney fundraisers, attendees are greeted to signs of “Please, no audio or video recording,” and like Obama events, larger fundraisers are open to reporters; a Romney spokesperson, however, told BuzzFeed that their campaign allows donors to keep their phones during fundraisers.
Former aides to presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, Rick Perry, and Jon Huntsman all expressed surprise at the practice, and they’ve never seen an instance where a campaign asked donors to surrender their cell phones.
I wonder why Obama is so paranoid about cell phones at campaign fundraisers.
It’s not like he would say something in private that he would not say in public which might contradict the image he seeks to project:
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Comments
I’ve mentioned this before but please, if you haven’t ever seen the movie, Dave, go out and rent it.
When you hear the stories of how Obama delays making decisions and then makes them “in private”, how he hasn’t had a really tough interview in over 4 years, how he has scripted news conferences and uses a teleprompter everywhere, and now doesn’t want any recording devices around, ask yourself .. “Do we have President Dave ?”
This is almost hilarious. Obama makes so many politically charged gaffes that he now worries more of them might be recorded? You know … like his daddy served in WWII, his uncle freed Auschwitz, and his mommy was on food stamps, etc. etc. None are true, but according to Snopes they are “true, but false” and stories about the gaffes are “false” in the evaluation, even if true. Obama is just trying lighten Snopes’ parsing load, you know.
When you play a tough schedule during the regular season, and you’ve succeeded, you’re ready for the playoffs.
O’s never played a tough schedule. Every one of his elections has witnessed all sorts of double-dealing or other unethical behavior. In other words, he’s always stacked the deck, including using the race card (which he played against McCain, and Mc was more than happy to cede any advantage to O (think Jer. Wright) just to let us know how “honorable” Mc was; Mc wasn’t even a warmup). And the media ran interference for O that’s beyond description.
His presidency has been similar. He’s stacked the deck. Teleprompters, unbelievably favorable, extremely tame interviews, virtually no press conferences, and certainly never, ever any tough questions. And his actions and policies are soooooooooo anti-American. And the liberal media continues the interference,
All of which makes him really vulnerable. He will be making a lot of amateurish mistakes that a battle-tested candidate would not make; he and his team simply don’t know the play patterns. Mitt’s better positioned, not only because he has the better arguments and approaches to government, and because he can point to O’s countless failures, but also because he’s been grilled before, in the recent primary fight for sure, but also in 1994, 2002, and 2008. Now add to the mix an active Tea Party, plus lots and lots of other groups which have vetted O in a way he’s never experienced, and a liberal media that’s seen for what it actually and cravenly is and an alternative media that is genuinely interested in getting at the truth.
[…] BuzzFeed, Zeke Miller reporting, we learn [tip of the fedora to William Jacobson]: In the latest attempt to crack down on potentially embarrassing digital leaks from presidential […]
Were I ever to donate $38.5K to a political fundraiser event, my polite answer would be ‘no’, or ask for a refund.
The bammy machine must be terrified, because it sure is acting like it.
Two words…
Burner. Phone.
Pity someone doesn’t sneak in a microcassette recorder for giggles and record him without TOTUS
I suppose most readers have seen the latest Voter Fraud Video from Project Veritas recorded in North Carolina? It’s pretty jaw-dropping to see and hear election officials knowingly approving of voter fraud.
http://www.theprojectveritas.org/
With every release of a voter fraud video from state to state, I send Project Veritas a donation. If we all chipped in, James O’Keefe could attend one of Obama’s high-dollar fund raisers, hand over a cell phone, yet still video the event.
Here’s the address for those who want to support O’keefe’s work.
Project Veritas
2100 M St NW, Suite 170-241,
Washington, D.C. 20037-1233
OMG! And the lefties, paying $35,800 cover charge per head, the kinda cool, urban, hip-cats who fancy themselves speakers-of-truth-to-power types, dutifully surrendered their cell phones?
Good grief!! We pay a lot less than that for our daughter’s ballet lessons.
But during the performance, where a ringing phone might throw a little girl off, we’re not asked (nor would I, if asked … I’m not a child, and I can turn my phone off) to place our phones in a plastic bag by the door.
Most open, transparent administration evah, eh??
Requiring people attending Obama’s speaches to give up their cell phones is just his attempt at an attack on the Constitution, namely the First Ammendment. No one is allowed to have freedom of speach except him.
This is advance damage control on the part of the Obama Campaign. It’s for a REASON:
The donors are getting nervous about Obama’s motives given his horrendous failure as an executive over the past 3+ years. They thought they were electing a Liberal Radical (which they did, just not as Liberal or as Radical as they thought). They wanted “single payor” and they got “Obamacare;” they wanted Wall St. torn down and they got “Dodd-Frank;” They wanted the Banks and Credit Card Companies forced to do business without profit, and they (barely) got the “Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.”
Obama gives his canned, prepared speech, then answers in a much more Liberal manner during the Q&A sessions, likely detailing more thoroughly exactly what he actually thinks. With the donations being as high as they are, if you don’t have a chance of actually catching it on a recording, there really isn’t any reason to go. You can report on the answers, but the doubting Thomas’ in the public won’t believe it until they hear it with their own ears and see it with their own eyes.
Of course, if you choose not to surrender your phone after coughing up $35,000, you will be accomodated … with special accomodations …
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/03/27/reporter-confined-storage-closet-fundraiser-biden-newspaper-claims/
“religion or antipathy towards people who aren’t like them”
Would that be why Obama joined a church notorious for its anti-white, anti-American vitriol? 😉