Campaign Financing

As NewsBusters previously reported, actor Zach Galifianakis on Monday attacked the Koch brothers saying "They are creepy" and 'It’s not freedom what they are doing."

Philip Ellender, President of Government and Public Affairs, Koch Companies Public Sector, LLC, responded to this nonsense via email moments ago:

Last night (at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog) I critiqued a short Associated Press item posted earlier Monday by reporter John Hanna which seemed quite alarmed at the notion that "Conservatives in Republicans are turning against moderates in their own party."

Hanna expanded his report on Monday. Its apparently final version, time-stamped at 5:16 p.m. at the AP's national site, goes further into describing those scary conservatives who want Republicans who will act on principle instead of just going along. What follows are excerpts from material added after the initial report:

Gosh, I think John Hanna and the Associated Press need to do something about their use of eliminationist language and violent imagery.

Look at how AP headlined Hanna's late morning report on the rise of conservatism in several midwestern and southern states at the likely expense of moderate incumbents (shown in full because of its brevity and for fair use and discussion purposes).

In the kerfuffle over the initial refusal by Mitt Romney's campaign to allow reporters into a fundraising event to take place at an Israeli hotel on Monday, a position the campaign reversed late yesterday (early morning in Israel), the Associated Press's Kasie Hunt had, to say the least, an interesting take on property rights, while clearly misstating how the Obama campaign has handled press access.

Here are the first two paragraphs of her report as it existed 20 hours ago, as carried currently at Townhall:

As NewsBusters previously reported, HBO's The Newsroom has used information for its scripts from material provided to it by the far-left, George Soros-funded propaganda outlet Think Progress.

On Sunday, the show cherry-picked six seconds - yes, I said six seconds! - from a highly-edited TP video to smear conservative businessmen Charles and David Koch (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Liberal CNN host Piers Morgan thinks the Constitution "gave women no rights," and he freaked out about Bush v. Gore during a Wednesday night interview with Justice Antonin Scalia on CNN.

"Get over the possible corrupting of the American presidential system?" an incredulous Morgan gasped when Scalia told critics of Bush v. Gore to "get over it." One of the critics is CNN's own legal analyst Jeff Toobin, who ripped the decision as "a classic example of judicial activism." [Video below the break. Audio here.]

Gwen Ifill of the PBS Newshour hosted Jonathan Martin of Politico and Molly Ball of The Atlantic magazine in a left wing cuddlefest that bashed Romney over Bain, his taxes, and Solyndra on July 16.  Ms. Ifill was not the least concerned that this story is mere fodder for the Obama campaign to pivot away from its abysmal economic record, but nevertheless, started off the shooting gallery by asking Jonathan Martin to "help us explain this Bain back-and-forth."

"At the end of this weekend, was there any more clarity about when he left and if he left Bain?" Ifill asked:

Congressional Democrats failed to pass the DISCLOSE act Monday, legislation that would require non-profits to identify their donors. New York Times eporter Jonathan Weisman joined the push on Tuesday. Even the headline was regretful about the limits of liberal campaign finance "reform" to rein in a Republican group who defeated a Democratic congressman in 2010: "Tax-Exempt Group’s Election Activity Highlights Limits of Campaign Finance Rules."

Weisman used an example that sounded handpicked from a liberal activist group to make the case for DISCLOSE (not actually named that by the Times, which only used the ponderous full name for the legislation).

Workers in news organizations ranging from the New York Times to NBC News are making donations to President Obama's re-election campaign even though many companies forbid employees to do so for fear that such contributions will raise questions about the staff's impartiality.

According to an article by Alex Pappas, the Daily Caller looked for donations to Democrat Barack Obama and Republican Mitt Romney by searching the names of more than two dozen news organizations on the Federal Election Commission website.

The New York Times on Sunday published an editorial highly critical of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's (R-Ky.) position on the Disclose Act.

McConnell spoke with NewsBusters Wednesday about why he thinks the Times and other liberal media outlets are in favor of this controversial anti-free speech bill.

The Jurassic Press was in full-throated ObamaChorus mode in reporting on General Motors (GM)’s allegedly strong June sales.

Very few failed to receive the sheet music.

While President Obama is reaping millions of dollars from lavish fund-raising events hosted by popular celebrities, Gov. Mitt Romney is receiving only a tiny amount of support from Tinseltown.

In an article at Politico last Thursday, writer Dave Levinthal stated if there's any question that Hollywood loves the president, just look at the impressive group of celebrities who support Obama:

This one of the most obvious "if the shoe were on the other foot" items I've seen in some time.

If a Republican or conservative presidential candidate's campaign ever dared to suggest that supporters register their wedding, graduation, or other event so they could then ask friends and family to make donations to the candidate's election efforts in lieu of a gift, the ridicule wouldn't stop for the next year -- and, I should add, deservedly so. But the Obama Event Registry (Obama-Biden blog post here; HT Weasel Zippers), which has been out there for about 48 hours, has barely made an establishment press ripple. What follows is a graphic from the blog post, followed by its first four outraged comments, showing that the idea is not getting a warm, uh, reception.

CBS This Morning on Friday spun Mitt Romney's upcoming meeting in Utah with prominent Republicans and top fundraisers as a "secret summit." Just a week earlier, the morning newscast didn't even devote a full report to President Obama's fundraising jaunt to New York City, merely playing three soundbites on the Democrat's $40,000 per plate dinner at the home of liberal actress Sarah Jessica Parker.

Political director John Dickerson also bizarrely labeled the upcoming GOP event as "kind of a mix between a shareholders' meeting and a renewal of vows."

Freedom of speech is one of the core values of the American constitutional system. It continues to be so despite the far left's recent campaign to silence those who dared to question. Such censorship efforts have taken many forms, including selective law enforcement against advocates of the free market or traditional values, intimidation of private individuals who've donated money to politically incorrect causes, and outright attempts to use government force to compel groups of people to be silent before elections.

In a speech given last week at the American Enterprise Institute, Kentucky senator Mitch McConnell provided a summary of the recent history of the struggle to keep political speech free despite the efforts of leftists in the media and in government. He also explored why the left has become so interested in censorship of late. Please read below for the full text of McConnell's remarks:

At the top of his Tuesday MSNBC morning show The Daily Rundown, NBC chief White House correspondent and political director Chuck Todd cited the Romney campaign's refusal to release a list of top fundraising bundlers as evidence that "if he wins in November, Romney could very well be the least transparent president in a generation." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]

Todd continued to rant: "Less transparent than the two previous Republican presidential nominees, George W. Bush and John McCain, who did release their bundlers. But the Romney camp – campaign believes there is no penalty with voters and they don't care if the media criticizes them, because the conservative media outlets won't criticize them for this."

To commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the infamous 1972 break-in at the Watergate, Andrea Mitchell on Monday hosted John Dean, President Nixon’s former legal counsel. The MSNBC anchor and the conservative critic actually connected the scandal to the 2010 Citizen United Supreme Court case. 

During the interview, Dean complained that the “financial reform that came with Watergate is gone because of Supreme Court decisions.” Mitchell promptly agreed, calling it the“the nail in the coffin” for these supposed post-Watergate reforms. Mitchell continued her off-topic rant about the Citizens United ruling, complaining that if it "ends up being the law of the land for all future campaigns” it will be detrimental to the political system since, “there's no transparency as to where the money is coming from."  [Video follows page break;  MP3 audio here.]

The $82 billion auto bailout has been a Crony Socialist nightmare mess. We’re going to lose at least $30 billion on the deal.  And that’s only if the Barack Obama Administration’s math can be trusted - a dicey proposition at best.

The Administration eviscerated two hundred-plus years of bankruptcy law, throwing bond holders over the side to over-reward their United Auto Workers shock force buddies.

General Motors (GM) is cutting undisclosed deals with executives’ wives businesses.And on, and on, and on....Haven’t heard most or all of this?  Not surprising - the Jurassic Press ain’t reporting it.

The same Rachel Maddow, not incidentally, who considers what she perceives as lies from Mitt Romney to be so utterly disgraceful.

But no problemo when the deceit flows from her. After all, Maddow works amid that rarefied cadre of humanity known as MSNBC where rules of conduct governing less evolved beings don't apply. (video clip after page break)

Remarking that Wisconsin voters had "decided to leave their governor in office" on Wednesday's NBC Nightly News, anchor Brian Williams contemptuously declared that "money flowed into that state from all over the country, from people who had never been to Wisconsin, had no connection to Wisconsin. Part of the new and unlimited spending that is changing politics in a hurry." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]

After Williams credited the out-of-state money for "a huge victory for the Republicans," chief White House correspondent Chuck Todd breathlessly proclaimed: "Walker and national Republicans responded aggressively [to the recall], launching an unprecedented fundraising and TV ad campaign, outspending Barrett and his labor allies by a 3 to 1 margin on the air alone. Overall, nearly as much money was spent in this one state for one election than Mitt Romney has spent to secure the Republican presidential nomination."

Searching for an excuse to explain what went wrong for Democrats in Wisconsin, the broadcast networks blamed "a record-shattering $64 million poured into" the recall election by "conservative out-of-state groups" supporting Republican Governor Scott Walker.  

On Wednesday's CBS This Morning, correspondent Bill Plante promoted Obama campaign talking points on the major Democratic loss: "...what it called the 'massive spending gap'. Governor Walker's supporters raised $31 million to $4 million for the challenger, Tom Barrett....with most of that money coming from out of state – a huge chunk of it from the super-PACs." On Tuesday's CBS Evening News, correspondent Dean Reynolds proclaimed: "Their efforts resulted in an avalanche of ads attacking Walker's Democratic opponent..."

On May 27, going to the same theme Scott Bauer employed at the Associated Press yesterday, USA Today's Ben Jones did his level best to cast Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker as the richly funded perpetual campaigner, while portraying Walker's recall challenger, former Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, as the underfunded man of the people underdog. Of course, as was the with Bauer's bombast, there's not a word about union-driven funding, which Walker estimated in an April Newsmax interview at about $60 million. This seems like preemptive excuse-making for a Walker victory on Tuesday. Preelection polls show Walker ahead by anywhere from 2 to 10 points.

Without a whit of skepticism, Jones relayed the following dissembling quote from a Barrett spokesperson which follows the jump:

Though he hasn't been alone in his applying the campaign fundraisng double standard in Wisconsin's recall election, Scott Bauer at the Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, has a particularly odious item today about the dollars raised by each side. It's particularly odious because the word "unions" appears only once -- as the target of Walker, who has, as Bauer sees it, "rocketed to stardom after taking on public sector unions." There is no mention of the millions of union dollars which have poured into Wisconsin from all over the country, which, thankfully, someone else has quantified.

Bauer also continues to bitterly cling to the notion, concerning which yours truly has been nagging him since February of last year, that "most Wisconsin public workers lost their collective bargaining rights" as a result of Walker-supported legislation which passed in the Legislature last year -- as if they no longer have any collective bargaining rights at all. This has been and continues to be a flat-out falsehood. The first five paragraphs of Bauer's bombast follow the jump (bolds are mine throughout this post):

The New York Times on Thursday published a front page piece about a Mitt Romney supporting Super PAC that allegedly considered bringing a lot of attention to Barack Obama's America-hating Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

Conservatives George Will and Laura Ingraham both slammed the Times for this shoddy report on ABC's This Week Sunday with the former saying the truth "didn't fit their narrative" and the latter claiming it "was a shot across the bow that if you are a wealthy person in the United States, you happen to be conservative, you're going to get involved in this election, then we are going to watch everything that you do" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Conservative talk radio host Laura Ingraham gave a much-needed education to ABC's George Stephanopoulos Sunday about the tremendous double standard involving campaign contributions.

After Ingraham pointed out that Barack Obama is never held responsible for things MoveOn.org does, ABC's This Week host foolishly said, "The president's been held accountable for Bill Maher" leading the conservative talker to smartly respond, "Did he give that money back to Bill Maher?" (video follows with transcript and commentary):