Our Emporer is sure doing a lot of whining about 527 ads, isn't he?

[Skidmore]

The replay of yesterday's whine is on C-SPAN now and, if I understand correctly, he's going to do another full whine later today about them. Yup, he love's freedom of speech, our Georgie.

I repeat, he and the Rs totally underestimated the interest in the workers of America in the integrity and honor of our country. They thought they could schmooze through on terror, the war, and pay for it all with a handful of rich donors. They structured the finance laws to benefit themselves. All of those donations to 527s represent single votes, not a handful of votes. This has been an eye-opening event. He's whining about billionaires writing checks. I don't know any Dems who are billionaires personally. I know a whole bunch of dems who chip in when they can--and who are ordinary workers like myself.

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

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[botchan]

2. It wants to make it seem

as if it was his idea to denounce soft money ads. Problem is, most of the 527s on the Dem side are related to his administrations "real" record and the current state of our country and we know what the Repugs ads are... Let's sling and see what sticks!!!

The billionaire is Soros. I guess the one big contributor really upsets them.

There needs to be some regulation to these ads though. The FEC should be removing any ad that contains outright lies. They should also be releasing public service announcements telling the public that the ad was false. Problem is, once you tell a repug a lie they like to repeat it until it is truth to them...

Example: Hey! Clinton's a killer, storm the whitehouse! Hang'em in the front lawn!

[opihimoimoi]

4. Good one, there should be a return to the real ethics of Fairness in ads

[Triana]

3. he's also detracting attention from what the REAL problem is..

...and the real problem is not 527s. It's George Bu$h's lies and the lies and smears of his operatives (SBVT), and the largely Republican-owned and operated MEDIA, which so willingly spouts, touts, and repeats them ad-hoc.

THAT is the problem, not 527s. Just because George says it's the 527s, doesn't mean it's true. Quite the contrary.

[Gman]

5. They're only trying to redirect fire to MoveOn.org

and others while feeling no remorse for the SB ads.

[blondeatlast]

6. He needs to be pinned down on THAT ad.

He needs to be backed into a corner on the SBVL ad, and the sooner, the better.

The ties between the campaign and the SBVLs are there for the whole world to see.

If he wants to see the end of 527s, let's see him embrace the Fairness doctrine!

[Jack Rabbit]

7. It's possible that the whole Swift Boat Liar fiasco was a gambit

At least the Bushies are playing it that way. They know that they have an advantage in campaign financing, so the best way to accentuate it is to limit Kerry's use of 527s like MoveOn. Thus, Rove gets his pals in Texas to finance the Swifties and say something beyond the pale.

Bush, trying to look Presidential, praises Kerry's war record and blames the system that allows 527 organizations to say things on behalf of a candidate that are really embarrassing.

What Bush and Rove really want is a system where Republicans can buy elections by outspending Democrats by 2 or 3 to 1. Grass roots 527 organizations help level the playing field. They are part of this campaign and will be until November.

It isn't Kerry's fault if the SBV Liars embarrassed Bush. Kerry should play Bush's praise of Kerry's war record and leave it at that.

As for Bush campaign accusations about MoveOn's ad comparing Bush to Hitler, it is true that an ad submitted to MoveOn by an independent producer did that and that the ad appeared briefly on MoveOn's website. However, it was quickly pulled as inappropriate and never used in any wider context. That was the responsible thing to do.

The responsible thing for Mr. O'Niell, Mr. Thurlow and their band of liars to do now is to sit down and shut up. The responsible thing for Mr. Bush to do is tell them to sit down and shut up.

The Bush campaign has played a gambit and it proved unsound. Kerry gets to keep the pawn.

[Philostopher]

8. I think the fact that liberal 527 organizations

raised immense amounts of money, while theirs floundered for a while, pissed them off. I don't think they're at all embarrassed by the SwiftLiars fiasco -- they meant for that to happen. They didn't have the gonads to challenge Kerry on his military record because there's only a couple of them in that whole administration who have any military service record to run on at all. What to do? What to do? Oh, I know -- let's get our buddy Perry down in Texas to smear Kerry's military record with a bunch of guys who sort of have a remote shot at legitimacy -- that way, we don't have to get our hands dirty, and they can say anything they want, since 527 organizations don't necessarily have to tell the truth. Problem solved!

[Jack Rabbit]

10. You're right

The thing is that those behind the Swift Boat Liars (i.e., Perry and possibly Rove and Bush) know very well that the charges made by O'Neill and his motley crew are false. The record says they are false; eyewitnesses to the events say they are false. This is a partisan smear. It was designed to be a partisan smear.

No minds were changed by those ads, at least not toward Bush. The only people who don't admit that the charges made by O'Neill and his people are lies think that all liberals are ax murderers and were voting for Bush in the first place. The only good it does the Bush campaign is to provide a vehicle to point out the potential mischief into which a 527 organization can get and use that to argue that they should have no place in the campaign at all.

On the other hand, one could counter that 527 organizations do have a place in the campaign, but irresponsible lies, whether they come from a group of independent supporters of a given candidate or the candidate himself, do not.

[Philostopher]

11. No doubt.

If conservative 527 orgs had been pulling in big bucks, they wouldn't be pissing and moaning about them now, I think they still would have smeared Kerry. I just don't think the apple would have fallen quite so near the tree.

The 527 portion of McCain-Feingold isn't really the problem -- and if MoveOn were airing ads that contained lies and misrepresentations as blatant as the SwiftLiar ads contain, I'd be the first one to light the torch and head for the castle. Of course, liberal organizations likely won't pay that kind of money to air outright lies -- besides the fact that Bush* can disseminate the truth much faster than Kerry because he's the incumbent, it's just freakin' wrong. It doesn't matter who lies -- a lie is wrong.

Subtle spin -- like the B/C '04 radio ad I heard this morning claiming Kerry was going to raise taxes on the middle class (knowing that 'their side' considers middle class to go up to something like $500,000 income per year, where most people would chop it at somewhere around $150,000), which is somewhat disingenuous, but politics as usual, is perfectly legal. While I don't especially like hearing it, it doesn't fall in the bounds of 'smear' or 'outright lie' like the other stuff. It's ordinary stuff that Kerry can refute or not, if he chooses, and if it's really untrue, he can pin it directly on Bush*'s lapel, right under that little cloisonne American flag.

[snippy]

9. Maybe Bush should have kept his promise to veto McCain-Feingold.

Maybe the media should ask Bush why he lied when he said he would veto it.

[jacksonian]

12. Bush says we can't have free speech

because he lies. Isn't that his rationale?