The Sad Spectacle of Obama's Super PAC (reblog)

Robert Reich: The Sad Spectacle of Obama's Super PAC

This post from Robert Reich is well worth a read. Campaign financing is going to be crazy this election, and no candidate has the high ground when it comes to the Super PAC issue, no matter how much President Obama may have tried to claim it early on.

-M

robertreich:

It has been said there is no high ground in American politics since any politician who claims it is likely to be gunned down by those firing from the trenches. That’s how the Obama team justifies its decision to endorse a super PAC that can raise and spend unlimited sums for his campaign.

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Source: robertreich

BarackObama can pretend the Super PAC flip is necessary, but I'm not buying it

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My newest reblog/response is to ryking on the issue of Super PACs.

Unfortunately the moral high ground for the Obama campaign on Super PACs has been nullified by their decision to support Priorities USA. Politifact has given him a “Full Flop” on this issue. I know his campaign is saying it’s so they won’t fall behind in funding, but for a campaign that was able to raise over $650 million on it’s own before aid kicked in from the DNC and the new laws were in place, I find that very difficult, borderline impossible, to believe. The reality is the Obama campaign will likely be able to out raise their Republican opponent regardless of whether they give their blessing to a Super PAC or not, but like the Republicans the Super PAC will allow some of their key donors to donate huge amounts relatively secretly, and that’s what they want. The reality is the candidates, especially the President, love to claim to hate these Super PACs, but they really love that it can keep their biggest contributors and potential sources of influence secret. 

-M

barackobama:

If you’re wondering why this donkey looks so outnumbered: here’s everything you need to know about Republican Super PACs and this year’s election.

(via ryking)

Source: barackobama

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No Newt, Positive Campaigns Don't Work

As much as I liked the idea of a "positive campaign" from any presidential candidate, I knew from the start that there was no hope it would actually work. People like positive messages, but they remember negative ones. Any when you're the candidate with the most political and personal history for your opponents to pick apart, you can't afford to sit back and send out happy thoughts while you're being pummeled with negative ads. Newt Gingrich certainly learned this the hard way in Iowa and has now been forced to defend himself and go after the others to knock them down a notch too. The latest such attacks are against Mitt Romney and how he led Bain Capital. For whatever reason people are now upset for him questioning the ethics of how Romney made his money at Bain (they seemed less upset when people questioned his ethics of working at Freddie Mac or Santorum's career in D.C., but logic doesn't play a big role in this process), and he has to pretend to be nice again. . What I'm better though is the SuperPAC supporting him won't.


The PAC almost certainly will spend a ton of money flinging mud. It's more than a little amusing this is the same thing he got frustrated with Romney for doing in Iowa, but it definitely worked for Mitt there, so I guess it's his turn. The bottom line is he just shouldn't have attempted to play the high ground/victim card in Iowa, because it's making it hard for him to stay consistent now.