NPR "All Things Considered" Notes Clinton Connection to Robocall Scandal
<blockquote>Will Evans of the Center for Investigative Reporting , who collaborated in reporting this story, found some Obama backers among the Women's Voices leadership, but the group mostly has ties to Clinton and her campaign. Gardner worked on former President Bill Clinton's 1992 campaign. Board member John Podesta was President Clinton's chief-of-staff. Maggie Williams, Hillary Clinton's campaign manager, used to be on the Women's Voices leadership team and did consulting work for the group. </blockquote>
-snip-
<blockquote>The Institute for Southern Studies began investigating after receiving complaints about the robocalls. The institute traced the calls to Women's Voices, which has acknowledged responsibility.
The Institute turned up other complaints about the group as well, in Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Ohio, Virginia and Wisconsin. A "Lamont Williams" robocall similar to North Carolina's ran in Ohio last fall. In Virginia, robocalls days before the February primary caused voters to flood the board of elections with phone calls, in turn triggering an investigation by the state police.
Kromm says this shows at least five months of a "deceptive tactic, illegal in many states." He notes, "Each time this group is criticized for this activity, they apologize for the confusion."
The North Carolina attorney general says the robocalls are illegal. State law requires that automated phone calls identify the sponsoring group and give the recipient a phone number or other means of contacting the group. The Lamont Williams call did neither. </blockquote>
You can see the entire article here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90114863
Sometimes the blockquotes work, sometimes they don't. I haven't a clue why.
May 1, 2008 10:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
You're not typing in when creating a blog post are you?
Good catch on the NPR story. Not sure why they mention Ohio, since it indicates the registration mailers were sent months ago to Ohio voters, well before the primary. But the whole Lamont Williams thing and not identifying the source of the call as far back as November does indicate a long habit of disregard for election laws.
May 1, 2008 10:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Weird... the software ate the word " b l o c k q u o t e " when I spelled it normally, even spacing the arrows out beyond the beginning and end, .
May 1, 2008 10:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sheesh... the software ate my second example too. Apparently it does not like invalidly parsed code using _" to enclose text.
May 1, 2008 10:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
I give up trying to use the greater-than and less-than symbols in a post... cripes.
May 1, 2008 10:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
To enter a less-than sign reliably, use <.
To enter a greater-than sign reliably, use >.
To enter <, use &lt;.
The more you know!
May 1, 2008 11:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
K, test: <
May 1, 2008 11:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
< Apologies for high-jacking your blog, Astral. Feel free to post this again if you'd prefer a clean start. I promise to stop experimenting with TPM in your blog. > ;-)
May 1, 2008 11:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
No problem Gman. I'm obviously just learning a lot of this, so it helps. Although having just read Genghis' latest post, I hope we don't get reprimanded.
May 1, 2008 11:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks Ben. Love the big avatar you were just sporting.
May 1, 2008 11:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, I'm typing in the "blog now" window, plus cut-n-paste for the quotes. I've had the blockquote work before, maybe it's the paragraph breaks?
May 1, 2008 10:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
The blockquote tag is only valid in comments. In blog posts you have to highlight the text you want in the quote and click the blockquote button. BUT, you need to already have some other text below what you want to quote in order to effectively isolate the actual text that is supposed to appear in the blockquote. The software has a way of swallowing subsequent normal text in with the blockquote. :-/
May 1, 2008 10:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
Right on. Thanks for the help! Is that a falcon with a hood on in your avatar?
May 1, 2008 10:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's Peter Gabriel on stage with Genesis in 1973 in costume. He was into the whole performance art thang back then. From a .
May 1, 2008 11:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
... a live album cover.
May 1, 2008 11:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Peter Gabriel's a fave. Maybe I should repost later, since we just made a big old mess here with our experiments. Thanks again.
May 1, 2008 11:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
From the same article:
May 1, 2008 10:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Five members of the "Leadership Team" run companies that received millions in contracts from the organization. The Leadership Team is packed with close Clinton friends and associates:
Page S. Gardner, Founder and President, WVWV (Clinton Associate)
Joe Goode, Executive Director, WVWV (Clinton Associate)
Ruth Ferguson, Chief Finance Officer, WVWV
Nancy McDonald, Resource Development Director, WVWV
Hal Malchow, President, MSHC Partners (Clinton Associate)
Pat Griffin, Griffin Williams Critical Point Management (a lobbyist with close ties to Hillary)
Maggie Williams, Griffin Williams Critical Point Management (Clinton Associate)
May 1, 2008 11:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
OK when are the networks going to notice this?
May 1, 2008 11:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
The day after the NC primary, I presume. :-)
May 1, 2008 11:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Seems to be part of the pattern with WVWV. Better to ask forgiveness AFTER the primary than follow the laws before.
May 2, 2008 12:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
goatlife, I wish I could have you eat all of the messing around we did up above, what a mess.
May 2, 2008 12:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
I commented in an earlier thread that there's nothing that can stop WVWV in a given state before it kicks off its robocalls. It would be prior restraint of protected speech to estop their activities. It's only after they make the calls (failing to identify the source of the call) that they violate the state election laws. And how many calls can get out through an auto-dialer and 48 phone lines before they are tracked down and someone files for a temporary restraining order? A new low if this is genuinely an intentional vote suppression tactic by Clinton supporters.
May 2, 2008 12:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
Rather than repost this, I think that tomorrow I'll try to work up a piece that addresses this and the Blumenthal story. It's interesting to me that the various Clinton psy-ops are beginning to be outed.
May 2, 2008 12:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes yes yes. PLEASE continue your efforts in outing the Clinton psy-ops. This information needs to get out BEFORE Tuesday's primaries.
May 2, 2008 3:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Being blogged on the Economist as well now
http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2008/04/clinton_nixon_nixon_clinton.cfm
Clinton, Nixon; Nixon, Clinton
"SIX days ahead of the North Carolina primary comes a story of real sleaze—not Jeremiah Wright-style buffoonery, but Nixon-style illegality designed to dupe and disenfranchise voters—that should surprise precisely nobody who has been following and covering this campaign. A group called Women's Voices Women's Vote (WVWV), which claims to have been "created to activate unmarried Americans in their government and in our democracy" has been placing robocalls to voters across North Carolina that seem designed to fool them into thinking they have not yet registered to vote. Many of the voters who received those calls are black. Voters in 11 states have complained about similarly deceptive calls and mailings that have been traced back to WVWV this primary season."
May 2, 2008 9:36 PM | Reply | Permalink