The Inside Dope
Lefties at Work and Play
Who’s afraid of the American Legislative Exchange Council? Plus more on Obama re-election shakedowns.
Obama’s Wars
The Obama re-election
campaign is struggling to limit the damage from a five-day bender
by surrogates who contributed to what is now being termed “Obama’s
War on Women.”
“It’s times like this that make you wonder if it isn’t an effort to sabotage us from within,” quipped a Democratic National Committee media consultant. “Better to get it out of the system now, than when it really matters six months from now.”
It started last week when Democrat Party and Obama White House surrogate Hilary Rosen — she of the million-dollar annual income and full-time nanny and housekeeper — attacked the decision of wife of presumptive GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney, Ann Romney, to work full-time at home to raise the couple’s children. The comments on CNN forced virtually the entire senior staff of Obama’s re-election campaign to disavow Rosen and her comments, even though up until then, she was an active Obama surrogate, receiving daily campaign “messages of the day” and talking points.
Then members of President Obama’s Secret Service team were caught up in a prostitution scandal running up to the President’s arrival in Colombia, a country where prostitution is “legal” in some government-managed “zones,” but where impoverished young women are often forced into prostituting themselves in a life akin to sexual slavery.
Finally, over the weekend, Obama acolyte and 2008 campaign surrogate, “comedienne” Sarah Silverman posted online purported — and later debunked — pre- and post-abortion photos of herself. “Got a quickie aborsh in case R v W gets overturned,” she wrote.
Silverman famously launched the “Great Schlep” in 2008 to encourage grandchildren and great grandchildren to persuade their elders to vote for Obama. The Obama campaign embraced the comedienne. In fact, First Lady Michelle Obama recently touted Silverman efforts on fundraising stops to garner support from voters 65 and over.
Smart Alecks vs. ALEC
Look for
conservative leaders and coalitions to launch a strong defense this
week for the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which
has been under assault from the leftist organization founded by
disgraced White House environmental aide Van
Jones, Color of Change. In the past several weeks, ALEC
has lost high-profile corporate members, such as Coca-Cola, Kraft
Foods, Pepsi, and closely held Mars. But few people have bothered
to look at the organization that claims to be leading the protest,
Color of Change.
Initially the Color of Change campaign against ALEC was grounded in a PR stunt tied to the Trayvon Martin shooting in Florida, where the state’s “Stand Your Ground” law was in-part blamed for enabling the shooting death of the African-American teenager. ALEC, which boasts the largest national membership of state legislators, was tied to the Florida law because a state legislator and ALEC member introduced the legislation in the Florida legislature. After its passage, legislators from other states asked to see draft copies of the bill so that they might introduce similar bills in their states. To date, more than 20 states offer some form of a “Stand Your Ground” law, but beyond making “model” versions of the bills available to its members upon request, ALEC has no direct ties to the legislation, nor does it lobby on the state or federal level for such policies.
Now Color of Change has shifted its campaign, and is instead focusing on ALEC and its state legislator members’ support of laws requiring voters to provide some form of verifiable identification when voting.
That issue is much more in line with the semi-obscure group’s heritage under its notorious founder, Van Jones, who moved into the Obama White House as a senior policy adviser on environmental issues, and was forced to resign early in the administration when his comments and activities — as head of Color of Change, among other organizations — received broader coverage.
Among Jones’ more incendiary claims: that the U.S. government deliberately allowed 9/11 to occur. Color of Change also had ties with another Jones-founded organization, Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement (STORM), which claimed to support racial insurrection. Color of Change members also were active in supporting Pennsylvania death-row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal, who was convicted of shooting a Philadelphia police officer in 1981. Color of Change claims it took root post-Hurricane Katrina, charging the Bush Administration with racism for what it claimed was an intentional lack of response to the devastation — what’s been touted as “Katrina’s Hidden Race War.”
After Jones’ exit, the group was run by a former senior MoveOn.org staffer, but in the past two years, the organization has undergone a radical transformation, though the former MoveOn staffer, James Rucker, now serves on the Color of Change board of directors.
Today, the group is run by Rashad Robinson, a former senior administrator of the Gay, Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), who is well known in Democrat party circles for his online activism acumen, and who in the past has coordinated campaigns with the cooperation of the National Democratic Committee, as well as other Obama Administration surrogate groups in labor and “community activism.”
Color of Change has not been particularly well-funded in the past, though through its online campaigns against the likes of Glenn Beck, it has increased fundraising, and reportedly has been using its latest campaign against ALEC to seek private meetings with senior corporate executives of companies that have been members of ALEC to persuade them not only to quit the largely state-based legislator organization, but to provide funding to Color of Change programming.
“They are taking a page from Jesse Jackson,” says a former executive of Pepsi, one of the companies that dropped its ALEC membership earlier this year. “Shame a company or pressure it, and then try to get that same company to sign on to Color of Change as an underwriter or supporter.”
Other senior leadership of Color Change includes its media director, Dani McClain, who gained notoriety as a communications staffer at the radical George Soros-backed Drug Policy Alliance, and its community relations specialist, Natasha Simpson, who signed on to Color of Change after working at the Journal of Homosexuality and the Women of Color Resource Center.
One of the more prominent financial donors to Color of Change is the Media Democracy Fund, which funded Color of Change’s campaigns in support of Net Neutrality and against the AT&T-T-Mobile merger. The fund is made up of about 15 to 20 high-profile left-wing charitable foundations that pool their money via the well-known left-wing Proteus Fund.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (19) | Leave a comment
http://spectator.org/archives/2012/04/16/lefties-at-work-and-play
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Clip of the Day
H/T to National Review Online
Appleby| 4.16.12 @ 8:18AM
Ho hum, another tax-funded gang of race pimps cum lynch mobs bludgening conservatives and anybody who had white people in his family within the last ten generations, except of course the President.
By the way, if Mr. Zimmerman is described as "the son of a White father and Hispanic mother," why not describe Zero as "the son of a Black father and a White mother"?
Frekki| 4.16.12 @ 10:53AM
Because as racist as this is, "If he looks black he is, and if he looks white, how white?"
It's wrong of course, but the Left twists everything to keep from facing reality.
Good post by the way.
Tenn Slim| 4.16.12 @ 11:31AM
Outside of the obvious, this article delineates a rather Obscure Site. "Color of change"... not so obscure. LInks to OWS, SEIU, ACORN etal are on the site.
FOLKS. These type of Organizations on the NET Operate 24/7. Ignoring thier idealogical treatise is to, once again, hide heads in the Political Sand.
RECALL 2008. Shuck and jive, 3 card keno. NONE of these tactics has changed. V. Jones has never stopped spewing his ideas.
SURVIVE
Semper Fi
Richard| 4.16.12 @ 1:05PM
The Left never stops. Politics is a religion to these fanatics and they will never rest even if they make America into one big gulag
Not Special Ops Bill| 4.16.12 @ 2:03PM
Hilary Rosen of the RIIA, a recording exec? What the hell would a business person working in the recording industry during the past decade and a half know that's useful about economics?
Scott| 4.16.12 @ 3:32PM
I find it interesting that an article subtitled "Who's Afraid of the ALEC?" focuses only on the liberal reaction to that organization and offers ZERO defense for what ALEC does. Could it be that the history and details of ALEC's fast-tracking of right-wing ideology on the state level is difficult to defend? Also, last time I checked, organizing a boycott of companies supporting unpopular political action groups is about as "Free market" as one can get.
fishguy120| 4.16.12 @ 7:06PM
Nothing to defend for thinking people. Stand your ground is logical. Requiring picture ID to vote is more than logical. As the vote is more powerful than driving a car and we are required a license to show when asked. And now with Obamacare we are required to buy health insurance. Besides voter obstruction is not a prosecutable offense according to A.G. Holder.
http://www.theblaze.com/storie.....my-people/
bj| 4.17.12 @ 3:04AM
This article, while generally accurate, contains one glaring inaccuracy: Pepsi did not leave ALEC in the last few weeks; rather, it ended its participation last year. This doesn't mean Pepsico wasn't pressured previously; they probably were. This author relied on other authors, but did not check primary sources, and now credibility of the article suffers.
ice9| 4.17.12 @ 6:51AM
Where would you be without "scare" quotes? They are very helpful for us readers because it's how we can identify when you are "lying" versus when you are simply being "obnoxious" or, as one might say, pimping those "conservative" tonic-facts that keep you so joyfully enraged.
Susan Silverman is indeed a "comedienne," as in she's a female and a comedian. Perhaps the scare quotes here are to indicate that the writer thought her work unfunny. An intellectual bunch like AmSpec readers would know that "comedienne" is a word that refers not to how funny a person is on a scale of, you know, anything; it's a word that refers to a career. She is quite successful in the humor business, earning more last year than the "writer" of this piece by a factor of 10. Of course, using Frenchy words is bad enough to warrant the whiplash of anonymous, erroneous irony, so maybe that's "it."
Perhaps the Spec should revisit its style manual.
ice9
cali| 4.17.12 @ 8:35AM
Why are you side-stepping the 'real' issue regarding your idol Silvermann? Whether she's a comedienne or a trash collector - her career has no bearing on her sick joke of taking a pic 'before' and 'after' so-called pregnancy.
She has a perverted and, sick sense of a joke to come up with a 'comedy' abortion.
Unfortunatedly, there is nothing funny about abortion, especially those late term ones, where a babies brain get sucked out by drilling a hole into it's head, followed by ripping the tiny little body into pieces simply to get rid of an 'inconvenience'. The baby parts are then given to research labs to use for stem-cell reasearch, because another one of your idol considers that a right step into finding cures.
Killing a baby to be used as spare parts for research. It can't get more sick and, demented than that!
So, tell me again what a great comedian she is, because as hard as I try, I can't find nothing 'funny' about her nor a sick joke!
Big Wayne| 4.17.12 @ 3:03PM
Sarah. Sarah Silverman. Not Susan.
Or "Susan." ;-)
ice9| 4.17.12 @ 6:44PM
Susan Silverman--Spenser's hot shrink-girlfriend. Did I make that mistake? Would not put it past me.
ice
ice9| 4.17.12 @ 9:44AM
OK, I will.
1. There was no baby.
2. If there had been a baby, and Silverman had had an abortion for whatever reason she chose, that abortion would have been legal under the laws of the United States and the State of New York, as would taking a photograph of herself and distributing it.
3. I will tell you again that she's a great comedian regardless of how funny you find her. That's the point--your writer (and you) used scare quotes to question whether she's a comedian, or comedienne, because you disapprove of the content of one of her jokes. This is your right, of course, unless you subscribe to the Palin/Santorum definition of 'rights', but that would take us to Hypocrisy Land and make you sad I'm sure.
4. It's funny that you consider Silverman my idol. She's not, especially; she's just an innocent person--in this case, an actual person--being attacked and and reviled for political purposes. You choose to use your energy to protect unborn children, imaginary and real, from abortion; I choose to speak out to defend living, productive American citizens from abuse when the grounds for that abuse is trumped-up, manipulative, and offensive to the fabric of American rights.
4B. I imagine that your purpose in opposing abortion is legitimate and sincere; writing to you reminds me that I too despise abortion as damaging and wasteful. Do you imagine anything other than opportunity in my defense of Susan Silverman? She is pretty funny, though, especially when she mocks conservatives for imagining that women have abortions for casual reasons and with casual effect.
5. Whoever informed you about abortion lied to you, or you are lying to us. It's clear from the way your abortion presentation reeks of distortion and exaggeration. 1. late-term abortions are quite rare in the US 2. few of those which are done use the technique you so dramatically describe 3. virtually no late-term abortions are done for 'convenience' 4. No 'parts' are used from such an abortion (or any other abortion) for 'stem cell research', etc.--they would not be suitable for such research for reasons you are probably not interested in or would not credit anyhow 5 If someone thought stem cell research was a step toward finding cures they would be an idol, because they'd be right--factually, scientifically, I know you may not credit that as right--but the stem-cell research has 'found cures' and promises to find others (and if by idol you mean the President of the United States, you'll find that Obama is actually cool on the idea of embryonic stem-cell research, to the chagrin of left-wingers, though he has eased and eliminated some rules that restricted it (which rules were illogical and ineffective to their purpose anyway)).'
6. You link together all the motives--having a late term abortion for convenience, etc.--to suggest that Barack Obama is killing babies to use their parts in research. This is absurd. I do not favor restricting the right of citizens to vote, but if I did my key candidate for such restrictions would be people who thought this way and expressed such thoughts in public since they are either disqualifyingly stupid or unforgivably vile. Ironic isn't it that the only people in our culture who seem able to change such polluted or troubled minds are comedians such as the devout Catholic Steven Colbert or the observant jews Jon Stewart and Sara Silverman.
ice9
Stupid Thy Name Is ice9| 4.19.12 @ 4:46PM
1. 55 million innocent and defenseless American babies have been slaughtered.
2. 55 million innocent and defenseless American babies have been slaughtered 'legal' or not.
3. 55 million innocent and defenseless American babies have been slaughtered 'humorous' or not.
4. 55 million innocent and defenseless American babies have been slaughtered whether ice9 is intellectually honest or not.
4B. 55 million innocent and defenseless American babies have been slaughtered regardless of feelings.
5. 55 million innocent and defenseless American babies have been slaughtered regardless of lies.
6. 55 million innocent and defenseless American babies have been slaughtered as absurd as it is vile as it is stupid as it is unforgivable.
Ironic isn't it that the only people in our culture who support or defend the absurdly vile unforgivably stupid slaughter of 55 million innocent and defenseless American babies are pathetic and despicable depravities such as ice9 who have already been born.
ice9| 4.21.12 @ 12:35AM
That is a lot of babies, I will give you that.
Tina B| 4.18.12 @ 4:57AM
May God have mercy on your murderous soul. You are probably public school educated and therefore ignorant as pond scum. You will meet the Creator someday, and maybe you will find Him funny when He reveals your name is not found in the Book of Life, and sends your soul to the place where your like-minded friends are.
I would not laugh, but you might. You may repeat your screed there. Endlessly. You like hearing yourself rant, don't you?
ice9| 4.21.12 @ 12:48AM
What about the place where my unlike-minded friends are? We want a table together.
And...public school? Where did that come from? I was taught by Jesuits, who had a handle on the definition of 'murderous' and knew where the hyphen goes. They provided clean if rigid theology and would have disapproved of your elisions, and your sloppy subjunctive.
I am ignorant as pond-scum, which is why I read and think and consider what everyone says. I try not to judge but I also have little patience for deflection and spitty god-bothering that distracts from the issues that trouble our great nation.
So thanks for the advice re: book of life etc. I pray that one of us has consciousness enough, before or after death, to admit that the other was right--but I fear our chance of honest human communication has been wasted. I blame myself.
ice9
spike59| 4.23.12 @ 7:31AM
this is, in effect, what the ObaMao campaign is reduced to; they dare not run on the Obamessiah's miserable record and pathetic performance...so what they have is this: 'Trayvon Martin vs the 'white hispanic', 'Fluke vs Rush', 'Christians vs womyn', 'Ann Romney vs womyn'...and by they way, 'ROMNEY IS A MORMON!!!!'