Sunday, June 22, 2008

Floyd Brown - 527 Flack

Floyd Brown makes his home in University Place, WA and depending on you point of view either a living or a hobby out of right wing 527 Committees. His claim to fame was involvement in the Willie Horton ad used against Michael Dukakis in 1988. Floyd is now running http://exposeobama.com/ which is a mixture of innuendo, and various partial truths backed by a blog http://2minuteview.blogspot.com/ with more speculation presented as fact.

Fred doesn't mind presenting dubious information as fact, he bald facedly states that Islam is patrilineal and that for this reason Obama is a Muslim, disregarding his Christian mother, which Islam doesn't. He says Obama was registered into a Roman Catholic school as a Muslim and whatever his current religion he'd like to know how he can be trusted if he doesn't tell the truth about the past. He misses calling Obama a liar about it by wondering about it, an old trick to avoid an actual slander or statement of untruth. It is the kind of garbage that would get an actual candidate's butt kicked when he had to answer for it, but Floyd won't be publicly questioned.

Stories on the website link to 2 Minute View blog, which opens with "Mainstream Media Love For Obama Infects News Coverage," which purports to be an analysis of media coverage. You'll be horrified to learn that the "Media" self-identify as "liberal" by a 4:1 margin which explains their failure to expose his "flaws and untruths." He uses a couple mis-statements by Obama as evidence the media isn't paying attention, ex. 57 states, and then wanders into la-la land with a question about current or recent drug use. He then uses the right wing Media Research Center, known mostly for stupidity, as an expert opinion regarding media bias. One feels compelled to ask Floyd when he quit beating his wife though it may not be fair.

In light of Floyd's favorite in this race, McCain, and his statements about the Supreme Court and Habeas Corpus - "the worst decision in history" - you might be surprised that "activist judges" are what gets Mr 527 going.


“Real activism in our country is democratic,” McCain said in his assault on judicial activism. Continuing, he clarified the difference between “real activists” with “activist lawyers and activist judges”: Activist judges, “Don’t seek to win debates on the merits of their arguments; they seek to shut down debates by order of the court.” McCain described the kinds of candidates he would nominate to the high court – ones whom he could be certain of their “ability, wisdom, and demonstrated fidelity to the Constitution.”
Apparently in his rush to pet the right wing on its head Floyd forgot to read the Constitution or just plain missed that little Habeas Corpus section. I might be inclined to say that Justices who discard it are acting rather, um, activist. Now while he doesn't have much trouble skirting logic and facts, Floyd is having some difficulties.

The difficulty is raising money. The NYT notes that despite "On Friday, Mr. Obama, at a news conference in Jacksonville, Fla., again named Mr. Brown while defending his campaign’s rejection of public financing for the general election," "The site has helped Mr. Brown raise $100,000 in a month and a half. On Friday, after Mr. Obama’s announcement, Mr. Brown received 400 contributions, more than the usual weekly figure, totaling more than $15,000." The proverbial spit in a bucket for what is needed to recreate the previous campaigns by 527s.

Some aspects of 527s have been curtailed by the FEC following the 2004 election, 527s are only allowed to advocate on issues not the election or defeat of a candidate additionally now find "advertisements which questioned a candidate’s character and fitness for office, off limits to 527s specifically." PACs are less limited in attacks but are limited to $5000 per individual where 527s have no limit, Brown is facing the problem of showing large investors that 527s can't run absolute garbage while PAC face the limit. Brown's PACs are the National Campaign Fund and the Legacy Committee while the 527 is Citizens for a Safe and Prosperous America.

It has occurred to me that there might be some ways to be annoying to Mr Brown, I'm pretty sure $1 checks with all the information about address and employer might be more expensive to process than the $1. This https://fs7.formsite.com/C4Strategies/form346100285/secure_index.html will take you to their online "card" site, $0.50 should be annoying as hell. I'm not advocating anything mind you, just speculating....kinda like Mr Brown.

2 comments:

Keeneye said...

Well shoot! It costs my business almost 25-cents to just run a credit card transaction. If someone were to authorize a donation of, say, for instance, 10-cents, they might be 15-cents in the hole.

I've always been fairly good at math.

Chuck Butcher said...

One can't forget the paper work required for the FEC.