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David Brock Tag

Posted by William A. Jacobson on February 07, 2016 41 Comments
It's pretty clear what the most talked-about segment of the GOP New Hampshire debate was. When Chris Christie treated Marco Rubio like an accused murderer on the witness stand, alternatively badgering and mocking the witness's alibi for where he was the night of the crime. The witness, though, would not be shaken from his story. It's his story, and he's sticking to it. Needless to say, Chris Christie is trying to portray this as a game changer in the trial known as the Republican primaries:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on February 01, 2016 63 Comments
Logically, Donald Trump should be the worst candidate against the Hillary machine. He has a colorful history that would be an oppo-researcher's dream.  Like taking candy from a baby. And his negatives are in the stratosphere. Gallup just released a survey showing that Trump's negatives not only are high, they are of a historic nature:
At this point (two-week average through Jan. 27), 33% of Americans view Trump favorably and 60% unfavorably. It's that 60% unfavorable figure that I can focus on here. Hillary Clinton currently has a 52% unfavorable rating among all Americans, while Jeb Bush is at 45%, Chris Christie 38%, Ted Cruz 37%, Marco Rubio 33%, Bernie Sanders 31% and Ben Carson 30%. Trump's 60% is clearly well above all of these. Putting his favorable and unfavorable ratings together yields a net favorable of -27 for Trump, far above the -10 for Clinton and for Bush, the next lowest among the major candidates.... Looking across all of these candidates' unfavorable ratings outside of election years yields this conclusion: Only one of them, George W. Bush, ever had an unfavorable rating of 60% or higher. For Bush, his unpopularity crested in his final lame-duck year in office, with an unfavorable rating that hit 66% in April 2008.
In the RCP average Trump trails Hillary by 2.7% in a head-to-head match up, while Rubio is up 2.5% and Cruz is up 1.3%. Yet, it seems that notwithstanding the Dem spin that they fear Rubio the most, the Clinton War Room is preparing for Trump, and is confounded. Politico reports, How Clinton is plotting to go after Trump:

Posted by Mike LaChance on January 29, 2016 18 Comments
Bernie Sanders has done plenty of favors for Hillary in this election cycle but instead of having his good will returned, he's coming up against the Clinton smear machine. A rumor is circulating that Sanders supporters are planning to win the Iowa caucus by flooding it with college students from out of state. The rumor is nothing more than a delivery system for the smear which would give Clinton supporters an opportunity to taint a Sanders win in the state. Chuck Ross reported at The Daily Caller:
Sanders Is Furious At David Brock, Hillary’s Loyal Servant And Spin Master Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders ripped into David Brock, the head of the pro-Hillary Clinton super PAC, Correct the Record, after being asked about rumors on Thursday that his campaign was planning to bus out-of-state students into Iowa to take part in Monday’s caucuses.

Posted by Mike LaChance on January 17, 2016 18 Comments
Hillary Clinton advocate David Brock of Media Matters thinks he's found a clever way to take Bernie Sanders down a notch. He wants Bernie to release his medical records. Hillary's official campaign has already distanced themselves from Brock's demand. Annie Karni reports at Politico:
Clinton surrogate to demand Sanders release medical records A top surrogate for Hillary Clinton is prepping a new attack in an intensifying and increasingly personal war against rival Bernie Sanders — calling on the 74-year-old to release his medical records before the Iowa caucuses on Feb. 1. Clinton defender David Brock — founder of the Correct the Record PAC, which coordinates directly with Clinton’s campaign — is expected to hit the airwaves this weekend from Charleston, the scene of the third Democratic debate on Sunday night, and challenge Sanders to cough up a clean bill of health and doctor’s note in the next 16 days, according to a Democrat familiar with his thinking who was not authorized to preview any strategy.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on September 16, 2015 14 Comments
Jeremy Corbyn is the radical leftist anti-Israel British politican with very shady associations who recently was elected leader of the Labour Party. The Conservative Party, which last spring won a resounding victory, was celebrating because Corbyn is deemed unelectable at the top of the Labour Party ticket in a General Election. Corbyn's associations are so toxic that Clinton operatives have been trying to portray Bernie Sanders as the American equivalent of Corbyn. The Free Beacon reports, Pro-Clinton Super PAC Goes Negative, Compares Sanders to Corbyn:
Liberals on social media criticized attacks against Bernie Sanders by a pro-Hillary Clinton Super PAC that compared the Clinton competitor to notorious anti-American socialists in Europe and South America. “David Brock is a cheap fucking mercenary, all he did was switch sides,” said progressive writer Adam Johnson on Monday in response to a Huffington Post report on the new attacks from the Brock-run Super PAC Correct the Record. The group sent an email to supporters on Monday comparing Sanders to Jeremy Corbyn, the new UK Labour Party leader, who has compared U.S. actions in Iraq to those of the self-proclaimed Islamic State, among other anti-American comments.

Posted by Mike LaChance on September 15, 2015 22 Comments
David Brock, the founder of the far left Media Matters for America, has taken on the unenviable role of Hillary Clinton defender in this election cycle. Yesterday, he appeared on MSNBC's Morning Joe program and proved that he's in deep denial over Hillary Clinton's scandals and the way they're being perceived by the American people. David Rutz of the Washington Free Beacon:
Brock Gets Hammered by Morning Joe Trying to Spin Clinton’s Email Conduct Media Matters founder and Hillary Clinton flack David Brock struggled to defend the conduct of his boss under aggressive questioning from MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough Monday. Brock, the former self-described “right-wing hitman” who underwent a massive political transformation in the late 1990s and became one of the Clintons’ most rabid defenders, appeared on Morning Joe to promote his new book blasting the New York Times and other “perceived enemies” he insists are out to destroy the Clintons. The hot topic, of course, was Clinton’s private email server, another “phony scandal” as Brock put it, that has sunk Clinton’s numbers on honesty and trustworthiness. “Are all the scandals involving the Clintons, quote, ‘fake scandals’”? Scarborough asked.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on September 10, 2015 14 Comments
Team Hillary has a sad because the New York Times published articles that were critical of the embattled former Secretary of State. Clinton's response? Declare war on the NYT and any other publication that publishes content portraying Mrs. Clinton in a negative light, naturally. Heaven forbid a newspaper do their one and only job. Never mind that the NYT endorsed Hillary over Barack in 2008, or that they've largely danced around the whole FBI investigation thing. WAR. The best part? That while Team Hillary is launching mortars at "hostile" press, Mrs. Clinton is publicly declaring she's infinitely and sincerely transparent. Tuesday, the Weekly Standard noted how the NYT recent editorial shakeup followed complaints from the Hillary Clinton Fan Club.
Ever since the start of the campaign, Hillary Clinton boosters have been complaining about coverage of their candidate in the New York Times. And today the paper announced that Washington bureau chief Carolyn Ryan is being demoted -- or shifting roles! -- at the paper. As the Huffington Post outlines, "The New York Times announced Tuesday that Elisabeth Bumiller, a veteran reporter and current Washington editor, will take over as Washington bureau chief -- one of the paper’s most prestigious posts. Carolyn Ryan, who was named bureau chief in late 2013, will transition to a new role as senior editor for politics." Hillary boosters are publicly connecting what they see as bad coverage with Ryan's new role at the paper.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 16, 2015 19 Comments
Long ago and far away I predicted that the effect on Hillary's presidential campaign of the multiple scandals would be cumulative. Since a large portion of the electorate, the younger generation, didn't know the real Hillary of the 1990s, Hillary's vulnerability was that the manufactured "nice grandma" and glass-ceiling breaker image of her would be supplanted by the controlling, paranoid figure of the 1990s. There is increasing evidence that the scandals, particularly the email scandal, is having an effect. You can see from the HuffPo Pollster chart that Hillary has been on a horrible favorability trajectory for the past two years: http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/hillary-clinton-favorable-rating There is more evidence today, in an AP-Gfk Poll that shows Hillary's favorability dropping to 39% among all voters, and even dropped among Democrats (though still high):

Posted by Jay Caruso on May 28, 2015 9 Comments
Fact: Bill and Hillary Clinton aren't going to give up information voluntarily. When the media did its job back in April, the Clinton Foundation was forced to refile multiple tax returns after it was discovered that the Foundation failed to disclose donations from foreign governments. Still, gathering new information about the Foundation remains a monumental undertaking, even for mainstream media outlets. The latest information to come out is the news that long time political confidant Sid Blumenthal was paid $10,000 per month by the Clinton Foundation while he was offering up unsolicited foreign policy advice to Hillary Clinton on Libya. From Politico:
Sidney Blumenthal, a longtime confidant of Bill and Hillary Clinton, earned about $10,000 a month as a full-time employee of the Clinton Foundation while he was providing unsolicited intelligence on Libya to then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, according to multiple sources familiar with the arrangement. Blumenthal was added to the payroll of the Clintons’ global philanthropy in 2009 — not long after advising Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign — at the behest of former president Bill Clinton, for whom he had worked in the White House, say the sources. While Blumenthal’s foundation job focused on highlighting the legacy of Clinton’s presidency, some officials at the charity questioned his value and grumbled that his hiring was a favor from the Clintons, according to people familiar with the foundation. They say that, during a 2013 reform push, Blumenthal was moved to a consulting contract that came with a similar pay rate but without benefits — an arrangement that endured until March.
If this was the only money Blumenthal was earning, it may not have been too eye-opening; but Blumenthal was also being paid by two organizations run by David Brock:

Posted by Mike LaChance on April 24, 2015 21 Comments
Wow. First David Brock and now Howard Dean. Is there something in the water at MSNBC? Dean is the former chair of the DNC, a role now filled by our favorite Democrat Debbie Wasserman Schultz. As a long time party loyalist, Dean appeared on Morning Joe yesterday and attempted to downplay new scandalous revelations regarding the Clintons. Hosts Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough could barely contain their skepticism. David Rutz of the Washington Free Beacon:
Mika Tires of Howard Dean’s ‘Jihad’ for Clintons: ‘The Facts Are The Facts’ The New York Times reported Thursday that the Clinton Global Initiative accepted millions of dollars from a Russian oil company when the State Department, then headed by Hillary Clinton, was approving a deal that would give Russians control of the company Uranium One and bring Vladimir Putin “closer to his goal of controlling much of the global uranium supply chain.” The charges are part of Peter Schweizer’s book Clinton Cash.

Posted by Mike LaChance on April 22, 2015 25 Comments
David Brock of Media Matters appeared on MSNBC's Morning Joe program yesterday and attempted to defend Hillary Clinton from claims made in the new book Clinton Cash. Even the reliably liberal Mika Brzezinski wasn't buying Brock's hollow defense. Alyssa Canobbio of the Washington Free Beacon:
Mika Brzezinski Corrects the Record on David Brock’s Laughable Defense of Hillary Clinton Brock defended Clinton’s comments that when a person runs for president that they come under scrutiny and Brock asked people to look at Clinton’s record. Host Mika Brzezinski said no one could look at Clinton’s record because Clinton scrubbed the personal server she used during her time as secretary of state. Brock continued, arguing that the 55,000 pages of email that Clinton has turned over was enough to show her record. Brock said that the actions Clinton took after leaving the State Department all fell under regulations. “No, actually, David, you don’t have to give me a lesson on the regulations of the State Department,” Brzezinski said. “She scrubbed emails because she felt like it and that went against regulations.”
Watch the video:

Posted by Mike LaChance on March 15, 2015 38 Comments
James Carville has returned to his role of defender of all things Clinton. Appearing on ABC's this week, hosted by his former fellow Clinton staffer George Stephanopoulos, Carville sought to dismiss the email scandal as a non-story. His defense was more revealing than he intended. Daniel Halper of the Weekly Standard:
Carville: I 'Suspect' Hillary Used Private Email to Avoid Congressional Oversight "What this is, is the latest in a continuation, and if you take it all and put it together, and you subtract 3.1415 from pi, you're left with not very much. And that's -- at the end of the day, so the Republicans can't pass a budget, alright, we got another investigation, just like we had the Whitewater, just like you go through the filegate, you go through travelgate, you go through seven or eight different congressional committees. And you wonder why the public is not following this? Because they know what it is. "It was something she did. It was legal. I suspect she didn't want [Republican congressman] Louie Gohmert rifling through her emails, which seems to me to be a kind of reasonable position for someone to take. It amounts to -- just like everything else before it, it amounts to nothing but a bunch of people flapping their jaws about nothing." The comment about Gohmert going through emails suggests Carville thinks Hillary Clinton set up the private email server to avoid congressional oversight.
Here's the video:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on March 04, 2015 27 Comments
Hillary Clinton's email scandal gets worse by the day. First, the NY Times broke the story of Hillary's exclusive use of personal email account, raising serious security issues in addition to record keeping issues.  Then WaPo broke that Hillary set up her own email domain. The White House appears ready to abandon her on the issue: AP reports that Hillary had her own email server in her house:
The email practices of Hillary Rodham Clinton, who used a private account exclusively for official business when she was secretary of state, grew more intriguing with the disclosure Wednesday that the computer server she used traced back to her family's New York home, according to Internet records reviewed by The Associated Press.

Posted by Amy Miller on February 10, 2015 17 Comments
Welcome to Team Hillary vs. Itself, Round 2! (3? 4? I lost track.) Yesterday, operative and scourge-of-the-right-wing David Brock resigned in protest from pro-Clinton super PAC Priorities USA Action. In his message to the board, he accused his colleagues of orchestrating a "hit job" against his other project organizations, American Bridge and Media Matters. More from Politico:
Those groups — along with another pro-Clinton group, the super PAC Ready for Hillary — had their fundraising practices called into question last week by a New York Times report. It pointed out that veteran Democratic fundraiser Mary Pat Bonner got a 12.5 percent commission on funds she raised for Brock’s groups and a smaller percentage commission on cash she raised for Ready for Hillary. In his letter to the co-chairs of Priorities’ board — former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm and former Obama campaign manager Jim Messina — Brock alleged that “current and former Priorities officials were behind this specious and malicious attack on the integrity of these critical organizations.” The letter — and Brock’s resignation — offer a rare glimpse into a network of groups upon which Democrats are relying to keep the White House and stave off increasingly robust big-money efforts on the right. The public airing of dirty laundry comes as sources say Priorities is struggling to live up to the hopes of some Clinton allies, who had argued it should aim to raise as much as $500 million to eviscerate prospective Clinton rivals in the primary and general elections.
It's not just the groups that Democrats are relying on to keep the White House---it's the optics of the thing.

Posted by Amy Miller on December 13, 2014 2 Comments
Progressives have long decried the existence of the American Legislative Exchange Counsel (ALEC) as nothing more than a private outlet for corporate interests, and attacked its members with all the fervor of a dog on a particularly puzzling bone. As a staffer in the Texas Legislature, I fielded countless calls from liberal groups demanding to know whether or not my boss was a member of the organization, and saw e-mail and phone campaigns attacking ALEC-model legislation fall flat against the reality of solid legislative drafting and conservative policy making. Progressive advocates have started the State Innovation Exchange, or "SIX," as a sort of answer to the the influence ALEC member-legislators have over how bills are crafted in their respective states. The group appears to have a particular commitment to four separate policy areas---criminal justice reform, energy and the environment, campaign finance reform, and income inequality---and is promoting its already-existing "library of legislation" it hopes will eventually counter conservative efforts to implement ALEC model legislation. The real mission of SIX, however, doesn't seem to have anything to do with promoting legislation; instead, organizers seem rather excited about using guerrilla-media tactics to tank conservative legislation based on the slip-ups of any Republican candidate they can catch on camera. From the Washington Examiner:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on October 24, 2014 7 Comments
David Brock is the founder of Media Matters for America, who's goal was to destroy Fox News and Rush Limbaugh by any means necessary. Brock also is the person behind American Bridge, the entity formed to hire trackers to follow Republicans. One tracker caught David Perdue, the Republican candidate for Senate in George, at a rally, and posted a video purporting to show Perdue signing his name on a woman's hip. The video was spread far and wide including at mainstream media publications such as The Washington Post as Perdue signing the woman's body. But, as Buzzfeed reports, which originally reported it as "David Perdue Signs Woman" (based on the url), the video was misleading, CORRECTED: Dems Miss Insulin Pump In Video Of Perdue Signing Young Woman (large print in original):
David Perdue, the Republican nominee for Senate in Georgia, appeared to sign a young woman’s torso at a campaign rally on Thursday in a video distributed by a Democratic opposition research group — but further video showed that the footage was misleading. “No pictures on this,” Perdue joked before autographing something on the hip of a young woman, while campaign staffers tried to block the scene from being filmed. The footage was captured by a Democratic tracker with the firm American Bridge at a Perdue campaign rally in Jonesboro, Georgia.

Correction: The American Bridge tracker footage did not capture the whole scene, according to the Perdue campaign.

“David was asked to sign an individual’s diabetic pump to help raise awareness for juvenile diabetes,” said Megan Whittemore, a Perdue spokesperson. “This was a Georgia family who shared their personal story of their struggle with ObamaCare and the rising health care costs associated with their daughter’s treatment which is not being covered by their insurance.”

Another angle on the video, not captured by Republicans or Perdue allies, appears to show the young woman is holding something on her body for Perdue to sign.

The pump is featured in the enhanced image from the Perdue campaign, via the Buzzfeed post. It appears the original video has been taken down, but here's the other angle referred to by Buzzfeed:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 13, 2013 55 Comments

The years' long Media Matters War on Fox News was intended to destroy Fox News, as expressed by David Brock in 2011: The liberal group Media Matters has quietly transformed itself in preparation for what its founder, David Brock, described in an interview as an all-out...

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