Tag Archives: elections

Up in Cheese Country, Routergate Limps Toward the Finish Line

by Gregory2612 Posted on February 20, 2014

Mother Jones

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First there was Bridgegate. Now we have another gate. But what to call it? Routergate? Emailgate?

Let’s go with Routergate for now. After all, when was the last time a secretly installed router got a scandal named after it? In this case, the secret router belonged to Scott Walker’s office staff back when he was Milwaukee County executive. This secret router was used to host a secret email system that his staff used to run his 2010 campaign for governor, which is something of a no-no since public employees aren’t supposed to be running the boss’s campaign during business hours.

Up to now, Walker has managed to keep his fingerprints away from all this, refusing to even say whether he knew the secret email system existed. Today, however, a huge cache of emails from the system was released, and this was one of them:

“Consider yourself now in the ‘inner circle,'” Walker’s administration director, Cynthia Archer, wrote to Walker aide Kelly Rindfleisch just after the two exchanged a test message. “I use this private account quite a bit to communicate with SKW and Nardelli.“

SKW would be Scott Kevin Walker, who apparently received “quite a bit” of campaign email from these secret accounts. Does this mean he knew about the secret router? Does it mean he knew it was being used to conduct campaign business during working hours? No it doesn’t. But it sure points in that direction. From the Washington Post:

Walker has characterized the activities as wayward behavior of low-level aides. But the e-mails show that he knew county officials were working closely with campaign officials. Walker, for instance, directed his county staff members and campaign aides to hold a daily conference call to coordinate strategy, the documents show.

He routinely used a campaign e-mail account to communicate with county staff members, who also used private accounts, the documents show. Prosecutors have said the approach was used to shield political business from public scrutiny.

That sounds familiar, doesn’t it? In any case, a bunch of those low-level aides have already been convicted of campaign misconduct, but not Walker. He’s managed to maintain plausible deniability, and that’s unlikely to change. But for what it’s worth, Charles Pierce think that Walker’s shenanigans are eventually going to catch up to him:

If you like the grandiose and unfolding corruption in New Jersey under Chris Christie, you’re going to love the penny-ante thievery in Wisconsin under Scott Walker.

His entire political career has been marked by one laughably cheap scam or another. His first campaign has an impressive body count; former aides went to jail for using his office as Milwaukee County Executive to campaign for him for governor. He also has a absolute gift for surrounding himself with people who have interesting notions of public service. My favorite is still Ken Kavanaugh, who was convicted for literally robbing money from widows and orphans, and for pillaging a fund dedicated to taking the children of American soldiers killed in action to the zoo….And now there’s a special prosecutor looking into possible illegalities in the campaign through which Walker fought off a recall effort.

Walker is running for reelection this year, and you can be sure that Democrats will be doing their best to make hay with the latest investigation, which involves allegations that Walker illegally coordinated his 2012 anti-recall campaign with “independent” conservative groups.

None of this is likely to damage Walker very badly. Campaign misconduct just doesn’t bother people much. Still, you have to figure that where there’s smoke, there’s fire. If Walker is the kind of guy to do all this stuff, he might also be the kind of guy to go a step or two further someday and forget to cover his tracks. Stay tuned.

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Up in Cheese Country, Routergate Limps Toward the Finish Line

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Potential 2016 Contender Martin O’Malley Supports New Bill to Wean Politicians Off Big Money

by ImogeneSchafer Posted on February 12, 2014

Mother Jones

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While Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic nominee in the 2016 presidential contest, has made headlines lately for the big-money-fueled super-PACs lining up in her corner, another potential Democratic contender, Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, is embracing the other end of the political money spectrum.

O’Malley, who would likely run to the left of Clinton in 2016, says he supports the Government By The People Act, a new bill recently introduced by Maryland Congressman John Sarbanes intended to increase the number of small-dollar donors in congressional elections and nudge federal candidates to court those $50 and $100 givers instead of wealthier people who can easily cut $2,500 checks. The nuts and bolts of the Government By The People Act are nothing new: To encourage political giving, Americans get a $25 tax credit for the primary season and another $25 credit for the general election. And on the candidate side, every dollar of donations up to $150 will be matched with six dollars of public money, in effect “supersizing” small donations. (Participating candidates must agree to a $1,000 cap on all contributions to get that 6-to-1 match.) In other words, the Sarbanes bill wants federal campaigns funded by more people giving smaller amounts instead of fewer people maxing out.

What makes the Sarbanes bill stand out is breadth of support it enjoys. The bill has 130 cosponsors—all Democrats with the exception of Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.)—including Sarbanes and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) And practically every progressive group under the sun has stumped for the Government By The People Act, including the Communication Workers of America, the Teamsters, Sierra Club, NAACP, Working Families, Friends of Democracy super-PAC, and more. Through efforts like the Democracy Initiative and the Fund for the Republic, progressives are mobilizing around the issue of money in politics, and their championing of Sarbanes’ bill is a case in point.

But O’Malley is the first 2016 hopeful to stump for the reforms outlined in the Government By The People Act. “We need more action and smarter solutions to improve our nation’s campaign finance system, and I commend Congressmen John Sarbanes and Chris Van Hollen for their leadership on this important issue,” O’Malley said in a statement. “Elections are the foundation of a successful democracy and these ideas will put us one step closer toward a better, more representative system that reflects the American values we share.”

No other Democratic headliners, including Clinton, have taken a position on the Sarbanes bill. (New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo did include a statewide public financing program in his latest budget proposal. And Clinton, as a senator, cosponsored the Kerry-Wellstone Clean Elections Act.) Yet with nearly every major liberal group rallying around the money-in-politics issue, any Democrat angling for the White House in 2016 will need to speak up on how he or she will reform today’s big-money political system.

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Potential 2016 Contender Martin O’Malley Supports New Bill to Wean Politicians Off Big Money

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How Conservative Brits Tried to Use the Beatles to Win Elections

by mlodyseo7 Posted on February 7, 2014

Mother Jones

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February 9 marks the 50th anniversary of The Beatles‘ historic performance on The Ed Sullivan Show on CBS. It was one of the opening salvos of the British Invasion of the mid-1960s, and the broadcast drew 73 million viewers. It is consistently hailed as one of the most influential and biggest (if not the biggest ever) televised moments for rock n’ roll and popular music.

“The Beatles are delightful,” Sullivan said shortly after the performance. “They are the nicest boys I’ve ever met.”

You can watch their 1964 Ed Sullivan performance of “I Want to Hold Your Hand” (along with some other gigs) below, via Rolling Stone:

Many tributes and commemorative packages have been prepared for the anniversary. On Sunday, CBS will air a special all-star salute, featuring Stevie Wonder, Gary Clark, Jr., Katy Perry, and ex-Beatles Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, among others. The Ed Sullivan appearance was just one of many indicators of The Beatles’ immense popularity and influence. Concert promoters, cultural observers, and screaming teenage girls weren’t the only ones who understood this—British politicians did, too, and they weren’t shy about trying to exploit Beatlemania for electoral gain.

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How Conservative Brits Tried to Use the Beatles to Win Elections

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Rick Santorum is Still the Same Creepy Guy He Was in 2012

by JosefHueber Posted on February 7, 2014

Mother Jones

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A quick note on the Republican presidential field. In the course of making the case for Paul Ryan as the front runner a few days ago, I failed to mention Rick Santorum as a possible challenger. That was a mistake. He’s going to run, and he belongs on the list.

That said, come on. Is anyone taking him seriously? Yes, he won a few primaries in 2012, but only as the last man standing in the Anyone But Romney marathon. That doesn’t demonstrate an ability to win, it just demonstrates an unusual level of pigheadedness. Santorum was willing to stay in the race for months even though he never polled more than a few percent and was obviously widely disliked. Only when everyone else was gone did conservative voters reluctantly turn to him as their final, forlorn hope of stopping the Romney juggernaut.

So sure, Santorum is going to run. He might do better this time around because his name recognition is higher. But he’s still the same creepy dude he was last time and he still has the charisma of a sea slug. Even the Christian Right obviously finds him a little too self-righteous and a little too shudder inducing. I wouldn’t put him even in the top five of possible 2016 contenders.

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Rick Santorum is Still the Same Creepy Guy He Was in 2012

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Paul Ryan is the Odds-On Favorite to Win the Republican Nomination in 2016

by siteforme Posted on February 6, 2014

Mother Jones

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There’s been a lot of blathering about who the front runner for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination is, and so far I’ve resisted taking part. But I guess I’m kind of curious: Is there much of a case to be made for anyone other than Paul Ryan?

On the substantive side, Ryan sure seems like he’s setting himself up for a run. There’s his steady series of “unheralded” anti-poverty outreach trips that always manage to be just heralded enough to get sympathetic press coverage. He brokered a budget deal with Patty Murray that was businesslike and low-drama but didn’t alienate the tea party crowd too badly. Today, in a hearing about the CBO’s report on Obamacare, he acknowledged that the report didn’t say that employers would be cutting jobs—points for intellectual honesty!—while also calling Obamacare a “poverty trap”—points for demagoguery! This is all stuff that seems very delicately calculated to stay in the good graces of the tea party base while building up plenty of policy substance cred that will keep him attractive to moderate voters.

On the flip side, who are his big competitors? Chris Christie is toast. Marco Rubio is inexperienced to begin with, and then muffed his chance for statesmanlike glory when he staked his reputation on immigration reform and came up empty. Jeb Bush can’t even get his mother’s endorsement. Scott Walker is getting buzz, but he strikes me as having too much baggage. Rand Paul and Ted Cruz are novelty candidates, not to be taken seriously. And although I used to think Bobby Jindal might have a chance, he’s had a rough past couple of years.

Maybe I’m dismissing all these guys a little too glibly. Walker and Bush are certainly serious possibilities. And I admit that Ryan doesn’t always give off a vibe that says he’s running for president. And of course, we’re still a couple of years away from 2016, anything can happen, blah blah blah.

Still, ol’ blue eyes sure looks like the favorite to me right now. Anyone want to make a case for one of the others?

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Paul Ryan is the Odds-On Favorite to Win the Republican Nomination in 2016

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The Koch Brothers Left a Confidential Document at Their Last Donor Conference—Read It Here

by mklabs1234 Posted on February 5, 2014

Mother Jones

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There’s one main rule at the conservative donor conclaves held twice a year by Charles and David Koch at luxury resorts: What happens there stays there.

The billionaire industrialists and their political operatives strive to ensure the anonymity of the wealthy conservatives who fund their sprawling political operation—which funneled more than $400 million into the 2012 elections—and to keep their plans private. Attendees of these summits are warned that the seminars, where the Kochs and their allies hatch strategies for electing Republicans and advancing conservative initiatives on the state and national levels, are strictly confidential; they are cautioned to keep a close eye on their meeting notes and materials. But last week, following the Kochs’ first donor gathering of 2014, one attendee left behind a sensitive document at the Renaissance Esmeralda resort outside of Palm Springs, California, where the Kochs and their comrades had spent three days focused on winning the 2014 midterm elections and more. The document lists VIP donors—including John Schnatter, the founder of the Papa John’s pizza chain—who were scheduled for one-on-one meetings with representatives of the political, corporate, and philanthropic wings of Kochworld. The one-page document, provided to Mother Jones by a hotel guest who discovered it, offers a fascinating glimpse into the Kochs’ political machine and shows how closely intertwined it is with Koch Industries, their $115 billion conglomerate.

The more than 40 donors courted by the Kochs include hedge fund and private-equity billionaires, real estate tycoons, and executives of top corporations, including Jockey International and TRT Holdings, owner of Omni Hotels and Gold’s Gym. A number of them have never been identified as members of the Koch donor network, including Schnatter, one of the more prominent names on the list. An outspoken opponent of the Affordable Care Act, he is a longtime Republican donor who hosted a fundraiser for Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign. The document notes that the pizza mogul was scheduled to meet with Ryan Stowers, the director of higher education at the Charles G. Koch Foundation. (Schnatter did not respond to requests for comment.)

Another top conservative contributor on the list is TRT Holdings’ cofounder Robert Rowling, whose net worth is estimated at $4.9 billion. During the 2012 election, Rowling directed $3.5 million to American Crossroads, the super-PAC spearheaded by Karl Rove, and he cut a $100,000 check to the pro-Romney super-PAC Restore Our Future. According to the document, Rowling was scheduled to sit down with Charles Koch at the “Koch residence”—presumably a reference to the Wichita businessman’s vacation home at the Vintage Club, a short drive from the resort where the donor conference was held. Top Koch operatives were expected to participate in this session, including Kevin Gentry, the Koch brothers’ fundraising guru; Daniel Garza, the director of the Libre Initiative, a Koch-funded organization dedicated to Latino outreach; and Marc Short, who runs Freedom Partners, the centerpiece of the Kochs’ political network, which distributes donor funds to a large web of conservative nonprofit groups. (Rowling did not respond to requests for comment.)

Other heavy hitters slated for meetings with the Koch brothers or their representatives included Carl Berg, a Silicon Valley real estate tycoon worth $1.1 billion; Ken Griffin, who founded the hedge fund Citadel and clocks in at No. 103 on the Forbes 400 (net worth, $4.4 billion); John W. Childs, a top private-equity investor; and Fred Klipsch, the chairman of the headphone and speaker company Klipsch Group.

The meeting list illustrates the interwoven nature of the Koch brothers’ corporate, political, and philanthropic activities. The donor meetings featured various senior Koch Industries executives, including the company’s chief financial officer, Steve Feilmeier. He was scheduled to join Charles Koch for a sit down with Berg. Charles Koch’s 36-year-old son, Chase, the president of Koch Fertilizer, was also scheduled to take part in a meeting with a donor named George Gibbs. (Koch Industries spokesman Rob Tappan would not comment on the conference document, only confirming that company employees attend the donor summits. Freedom Partners spokesman James Davis said he was “uncertain” about the document and did not respond to further questions.)

At least half of the one-on-one sessions involved representatives of Americans for Prosperity, the political advocacy group founded by the Koch brothers and their top political adviser and strategist, Richard Fink, a Koch Industries executive vice president and board member. The AFP officials called to duty for these discussions included AFP’s president Tim Phillips, chief operating officer Luke Hilgemann, vice president for state operations Teresa Oelke, and vice president for development Chris Fink (Richard Fink’s son). The state directors for AFP’s Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Florida chapters were also slated for tête-à-têtes during the Koch summit. (AFP spokesman Levi Russell declined to comment on the meeting document.)

In the past, Koch Industries has distanced itself from AFP and its political activities. The company has said the group is just one of “hundreds of organizations” that receive funding from the Kochs and that it operates “independently” of Koch Industries. But the document suggests a close collaboration between officials of Koch Industries, AFP, and Freedom Partners, whose staff and board are stacked with numerous current and former Koch Industries employees. Michael Lanzara and Jeff Noble, who transitioned over to Freedom Partners from Koch Companies Public Sector—the company’s legal, lobbying, and public affairs branch—were scheduled to meet with donors alongside AFP staffers. The Koch brothers and Richard Fink were also listed as taking part in some of these sessions. (Fink, a man of many hats within the Koch firmament, is also an AFP board member; David Koch chairs the board of the Americans for Prosperity Foundation.)

Heading into the midterm elections, AFP has emerged as one of the right’s most active and well-financed political outfits. In recent months, it has spent more than $20 million on ads clobbering congressional Democrats for supporting Obamacare. And the group is merely one piece of the Kochs’ massive political operation, which in size, scope, and fundraising prowess has come to resemble a political party in its own right. During the 2012 election cycle, in fact, the Koch network managed to raise as much as the Republican National Committee itself.

After the brothers and their allies failed to win the Senate or unseat Obama in 2012, David Koch told Forbes that this setback would do little to deter them: “We’re going to fight the battle as long as we breathe.” At the Palm Springs conference, as the left-behind-list of VIP meetings shows, the Kochs are lining up serious financial firepower for the political fights of 2014 and beyond.

Read the meeting list, along with a guide to the participants in them, below.

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Koch Donor Conference Meetings (PDF)

Koch Donor Conference Meetings (Text)

DONORS

Carl Berg: Ranking No. 308 on the Forbes 400, Berg is a Silicon Valley real estate titan with an estimated fortune of $1.1 billion.

Ronnie Cameron: He runs agribusiness giant Mountaire Corporation. During a meeting of the Kochs’ donor network in 2011, Charles Koch recognized Cameron (and other donors) for donating at least $1 million to their cause.

Charles Chandler: Based in the Kochs’ hometown of Wichita, Kansas, Chandler is the CEO of Intrust Bank.

John Childs: He runs the Boston-based private equity firm J.W. Childs & Associates.

Jamie Coulter: Haling from Wichita, Coulter is the former CEO of the Lone Star Steakhouse and Saloon restaurant chain.

Bob and Steve Fettig: The Fettigs run the metal fabrication company Tankcraft, based in Darien, Wisconsin. Steve is the company’s CFO; Bob is CEO.

Richard and Leslie Gilliam: Richard founded Virginia-based coal mining company Cumberland Resources Corporation, which he sold to Massey Energy for nearly a billion dollars in 2010.

Ken Griffin: A major conservative donor, the Chicago-based businessman founded the hedge fund Citadel and is worth an estimated $4.4 billion.

John Griffin: He’s the founder of Blue Ridge Capital, a New York hedge fund.

Dick Haworth: He’s the chairman emeritus of Holland, Michigan-based office furniture company Haworth.

Richard “Ric” Kayne: He’s the founder and chairman of Los Angeles-based investment firm Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors.

Dan Kirby: He’s president of Sioux Falls, South Dakota-based Kirby Financial.

Fred Klipsch: He’s the chairman of Klipsch Group, a speaker and headphone manufacturer.

Frank Kozel: He’s the principal of Pittsburgh-based Keystone Energy Oil & Gas Inc.

Francis “Franc” Lee: He’s the president and CEO of Flowood, Mississippi-based lender First Tower, LLC.

Robert “Bob” Luddy: He’s president of CativeAire Systems Inc. in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Hugh Maclellan: He’s the executive chairman of Chattanooga, Tennessee’s Maclellan Foundation, which make grants to Christian causes.

Cecil O’Brate: He’s the CEO of Garden City, Kansas-based Palmer Manufacturing & Tank.

Verl Purdy: He’s the chairman and CEO of Charlotte, North Carolina-based AGDATA Inc.

Tom Rastin: He’s a director and vice chairman of the Mount Vernon, Ohio-based Ariel Foundation, started by his wife, Karen Buchwald Wright, the CEO of Ariel Corporation. Rastin is the company’s vice president of engineering, sales, and marketing.

George Records: A member of the Hoover Institution’s board of overseers, Records is the retired chairman of Oklahoma City’s Midland Group.

Robert Rowling: Ranking No. 93 on the Forbes 400 with an estimated fortune of $4.9 billion, Rowling is the cofounder of TRT Holdings, which owns Gold’s Gym and Omni Hotels.

John Schnatter: He’s the founder and CEO of Papa John’s International.

Tina and Craig Snider: They are the children of Ed Snider, a founding contributor of the Ayn Rand Institute and chairman of Comcast Spectacor, a sports and entertainment company that owns the Philadelphia Flyers.

Dian Stai: Based in Texas, Stai cofounded Owen Healthcare Inc. with her late husband. She’s a top conservative donor who gave $125,000 to the pro-Mitt Romney super-PAC Restore Our Future during the 2012 election cycle.

Jim Stephenson: He’s the president and CEO of Georgia-based Yancey Bros. Co., “which provides Caterpillar, AGCO, and Blue Bird Bus Co. products and services throughout the state of Georgia.” Stephenson is also an Americans for Prosperity board member.

Jim Von Ehr: He’s the CEO and founder of Richardson, Texas-based Zyvex Labs.

Debra Waller: Since 2001, she’s been the chairman and CEO of Jockey International Inc.

Lew Ward: He’s the founder of Oklahoma-based Ward Petroleum Corporation.

Dick Weiss: He’s the Core Equity senior portfolio manager at Wells Capital Management.

Karen Wright: She’s the founder and CEO of the Ariel Foundation, a private philanthropy group based in Mount Vernon, Ohio. She’s also CEO of the Ariel Corporation, a natural gas compression company.

*Mother Jones was unable to confirm the identities of some donors on the list, including Steve Clark, Paul Foster, George Gibbs, George Jenkins, Jerry Hayden, Kent McCarthy, Andrew Miller, Ted Saunders, Tom Smith, Jaime Snider, and Dean Williams.

“PLAYERS”

Charles Koch: He’s the chairman and CEO of Koch Industries.

David Koch: He’s Koch Industries’ executive vice president and a board member.

Michael Lanzara: A former director for special projects at Koch Companies Public Sector, Lanzara now works for Freedom Partners.

Steve Feilmeier: He’s chief financial officer and executive vice president of Koch Industries.

Kevin Gentry: A vice president at Koch Companies Public Sector, Gentry is the Koch brothers’ top fundraiser. He also serves on the board of Freedom Partners.

Jeff Noble: A former senior development associate at Koch Companies Public Sector, Noble currently works for Freedom Partners.

Tim Phillips: He’s the president of Americans for Prosperity, the political advocacy group founded by the Koch brothers and Richard Fink.

Chris Fink: He’s Americans for Prosperity’s vice president of development and the son of Richard Fink.

Teresa Oelke: She’s Americans for Prosperity’s vice president for state operations.

David Fladeboe: He’s the state director for Americans for Prosperity-Wisconsin.

Brett Hinkey: A former senior development associate at Koch Companies Public Sector, Hinkey now works for Freedom Partners.

Daniel Garza: He’s the executive director of the Libre Initiative, a Koch-funded nonprofit focused on Hispanic outreach.

Chase Koch: He’s Charles’ son and the president of Koch Fertilizer.

Richard Fink: He’s the chairman and CEO of Koch Companies Public Sector and a board member of Koch Industries. A founder of the Mercatus Center and Americans for Prosperity, Fink is the Koch’ top strategist and political adviser.

Ryan Stowers: He’s the director for higher education at the Charles G. Koch Foundation.

Brian Hooks: He’s the executive director and chief operating officer of the Mercatus Center.

Marc Short: Short heads Freedom Partners, the centerpiece of the Koch brothers’ political operation. Short is a former chief of staff of the House Republican Conference.

Scott Hagerstrom: He’s the state director of Americans for Prosperity-Michigan.

Jennifer Stefano: She’s the state director for Americans for Prosperity-Pennsylvania.

Tommy Von der Heydt: He’s a former regional development officer for Americans for Prosperity.

Corey Lewandowski: He’s the East Coast regional director for Americans for Prosperity.

Slade O’Brien: He’s state director of Americans for Prosperity-Florida.

John Hardin: He’s a program manager at the Charles G. Koch Foundation.

Michael Palmer: He is the president of i360, which bills itself as the “leading data and technology resource for the pro-free-market political and advocacy community.” Palmer’s firm has worked closely with the Kochs’ voter microtargeting operation, Themis.

Derek Johnson: He’s a program officer for higher education at the Charles G. Koch Foundation.

Nathan Nascimento: He’s an employee of Freedom Partners.

James Davis: He’s the vice president of strategic communications at Freedom Partners.

Luke Hilgemann: He’s Americans for Prosperity’s chief operating officer.

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The Koch Brothers Left a Confidential Document at Their Last Donor Conference—Read It Here

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Meet the GOP Congressional Candidate Who Called Hillary Clinton the "Antichrist"

by GabrieleGalbrai Posted on February 4, 2014

Mother Jones

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Montana GOP congressional candidate Ryan Zinke made waves last week when, speaking at a campaign stop, he called Hillary Clinton the “Antichrist.”*

But before Zinke was in the news for equating the former secretary of state to the Great Deceiver, Mother Jones flagged Zinke for the dubious campaign finance methods surrounding his campaign for Montana’s only seat in the House of Representatives.

Zinke, 53, is a former Navy SEAL, a fact he advertised loudly in 2012 when he launched a super-PAC—a political action committee that can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money on political advertising. The super-PAC, “Special Operations for America,” (SOFA) raised nearly a quarter of a million dollars in 2012 to support the election of Mitt Romney. And although SOFA didn’t succeed in putting Romney in the White House, the election allowed it to gather a substantial list of small-dollar donors and continue raising money after the 2012 election ended. At the end of 2013, the group had $255,904 on hand.

By that point, Zinke was no longer involved with the super-PAC’s leadership—he had resigned on September 30 and announced three weeks later that he was running for Congress. Soon, the super-PAC Zinke started became his biggest cheerleader. Throughout last fall, SOFA’s website, Facebook page, and Twitter account all urged donors to give to Zinke’s congressional exploratory committee, and then, his congressional campaign. In January 2014 alone, SOFA spent almost $60,000 supporting Zinke’s campaign. (The last time the seat was up for grabs, in 2012, outside spending totaled $240,000.)

If this strategy, which is entirely legal, sounds familiar, that’s because it was pioneered by Colbert Report host Stephen Colbert in 2012. As Mother Jones noted in November:

In January 2012, Colbert summoned Daily Show host Jon Stewart and Trevor Potter, a campaign finance expert, to the Colbert Report studio for a surprise announcement: Colbert was handing control of his super-PAC to Stewart. The two comedians signed a two-page document, then held hands and locked eyes while Potter bellowed the words, “Colbert super-PAC transfer, activate!” Colbert then announced that he was forming an exploratory committee to weigh a run for “President of the United States of South Carolina.” Stewart, meanwhile, renamed Colbert’s super-PAC the Definitely Not Coordinating with Stephen Colbert Super PAC, and promised Colbert he would run ads to support Colbert’s presidential bid.

The aim of Colbert’s stunt was to show that campaign finance laws are so flimsy that it was legal, in theory, for a politician to start a super-PAC, raise unlimited heaps of cash from big-money donors for that super-PAC, quit the super-PAC, and then run for federal office supported by that super-PAC.

Zinke’s campaign, in other words, was pretty shameless before he called Clinton the “Antichrist.” And pretty well-funded, too.

*Zinke made the Antichrist comment, which was first reported by the Montana website Bigfork Eagle, after telling his audience, “We need to focus on the real enemy.” He did not reply to a request for comment from Mother Jones. When Aaron Flint of Northern Broadcasting asked Zinke about the comment, Zinke said, “I’ve already been put on the Obama campaign enemy list—and they’re just gonna attack. That’s all these people do is attack, attack, attack.”

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Meet the GOP Congressional Candidate Who Called Hillary Clinton the "Antichrist"

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Republicans Are Trying to Build a Better Primary

by KennethCovingto Posted on January 24, 2014

Mother Jones

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Jonathan Bernstein reports on Republican efforts to shorten the primary season:

If all goes according to plan, the result will be votes in the first four (“carve-out”) states — Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, South Carolina — in February, followed by votes in rapid succession in March and April, with the primary season finishing up in May. That’s a lot more compressed than the January-to-June schedule of the past few cycles.

….The 2012 cycle, the theory goes, just went on too long, with eventual nominee Mitt Romney taking too many shots from other candidates. My feeling, however, is that the hits Romney took almost certainly didn’t matter for the fall campaign. The real lesson of 2012 that Republicans should worry about is that virtually any crank, no matter how little qualified for president, can have a very good two weeks….It’s essentially the stories of Michele Bachman, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, and Rick Santorum in 2012.

By compressing the calendar, you increase the danger that a mediocre or worse candidate could get hot at just the right time and wrap up the nomination before the party has time to stop it….The March crunch could get so momentous that it overwhelms the rest of the schedule. In other words, if crunch time in March takes on the air of a de facto national primary — even one spread out over two or three weeks — it could mean trouble.

I agree that compressing the actual voting might not matter much. These days, primary campaigns start early: we’ll almost certainly have several declared candidates by early 2015 and a full field by the middle of the year. Those guys are going to be out on the trail taking shots for a very long time no matter what. Besides, primary season is almost always effectively over by March or April anyway, even if there are a few Ron Paul-esque stragglers who refuse to concede for PR reasons. It rarely lasts more than 14 or 15 weeks.

So what about Bernstein’s theory that the real problem is beefing up the invisible primary so that fringe candidates are booted out early? I’m not so sure about that either. The clown show of 2012 was truly sui generis, something that’s never really happened before. And I’m not so convinced that any of the fringe folks would have had better odds in a compressed primary season, as he suggests. Sure, they each got hot for a week or two, but they typically got hot in one or two states. I don’t think they could have replicated that performance if they’d been competing in lots of different states at once.

But I could be wrong! Generally speaking, my advice to both parties is simple: Make your primaries as similar to a general election as possible. That would mean, for example, ditching the Iowa caucuses, since the kind of retail politics that win in Iowa are irrelevant to success in November. What you want is a candidate that can raise lots of money; appeal to lots of people; and has a good media presence. That’s what wins general elections these days, and a successful primary season is one that gives the advantage to those qualities. The quaint notion that New Hampshire is a great place to start because it’s a small state and gives everyone a chance is ridiculous. No modern political party should want a process that gives everyone a chance. They should want a process that brutally winnows out the vanity candidates and narrows the field to folks who know how to win on the big stage.

It won’t happen because it would require the parties to play massive hardball with the Iowas and New Hampshires of the world, something they won’t do. But they probably should.

Link to original:  

Republicans Are Trying to Build a Better Primary

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Chris Christie is Losing the Invisible Primary

by 07ld5ksl Posted on January 21, 2014

Mother Jones

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How is Chris Christie doing in the latest presidential polling for 2016? It’s hard to care much. It’s way too early for these polls to mean anything.

However, the invisible primary for the Republican nomination will be starting in earnest within a year, and even now GOP power brokers are starting to make decisions about who to support. So it probably is worth asking how Christie is doing among Republicans. Dave Weigel answers:

Worse and worse. In the last Quinnipiac poll, 64 percent of Republicans said Christie would be a “good president.” Only 18 percent disagreed. That’s shrunk to 50 and 22 percent, respectively—a mere 4-point increase in the hard-no number, but a 12-point move from “good president” to “ask me something else.” Conservatives, more skeptical in general of Christie, had given him a 54–26 advantage on the “good president” question. That’s down to 37–24. Again, not huge movement to “no,” just a lot of sliding toward undecided.

Since I officially think Christie never had much of a chance in 2016 to begin with, I suppose these numbers shouldn’t mean much to me. But Bridgegate really does seem to be moving Christie from the “slim chance” column to the “no chance” column. You need to have a good reason to gamble on someone with Christie’s obvious downsides, and that good reason has always been his appeal to blue-collar America as an honest guy who doesn’t pull his punches. When that morphs into a reputation as a guy with control issues who revels in petty reprisals against his political foes, the jig is up. He’s got nothing left. The folks with money who are looking for a winner are going to start looking elsewhere.

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Chris Christie is Losing the Invisible Primary

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Judge Strikes Down Pennsylvania Voter ID Law

by Melissa Robin Posted on January 17, 2014

Mother Jones

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In a victory for access to the polls, a state judge struck down Pennsylvania’s voter ID law today. Rick Hasen tells us what it means:

This is a clear victory for opponents of voter id laws, with a finding that:

the implementation of the voter id law violated the law’s own promise of liberal access to voter id
the implementation exceeded the agency’s authority to administer the program
the voter education efforts were woefully inadequate
as a whole the Pa. voter id program violated the Pa. constitutional’s fundamental right to vote.

In this regard, it is important to note that the court rejected Pa’s argument that the law was aimed at preventing voter fraud. The judge found that the state presented no evidence the law was necessary either to prevent fraud or to keep public confidence in the fairness of the election process.

(Reformatting mine.) You should read the whole thing, including Hasen’s big caveat: the judge didn’t rule that voter ID was a violation of equal protection and did rule that the law wasn’t motivated by an attempt to disenfranchise minorities or Democratic voters. Because of this, it’s not clear if the Pennsylvania Supreme Court will affirm this decision.

Read the article: 

Judge Strikes Down Pennsylvania Voter ID Law

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