Super PAC plans to attack Obama’s ties to Rev. Jeremiah Wright

A conservative super PAC is considering an advertising plan to attack President Obama's ties to Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., his controversial former spiritual advisor, and "do what what John McCain would not let us do" during the 2008 presidential campaign.

Chicago Cubs billionaire owner Joe Ricketts commissioned the $10 million plan, know as "The Defeat of Barack Hussein Obama: The Ricketts Plan to End His Spending for Good." The strategy is one of several being considered by the Ending Spending Action Fund super PAC.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/s...132518668.html

You can judge a man by the company he keeps....

I was just wondering if siriuslyWrong posted this thread cause he agrees with the approach?
LMFAO.


Fred Davis, Joe Ricketts Disavow Rev. Wright Proposal


Fred Davis, the Republican ad man whose firm was responsible for the plan to attack President Obama by emphasizing his connection to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, sent the following statement to TPM from his firm Strategic Perception:

The document referred to in today’s New York Times story was one proposal prepared and submitted by Strategic Perception Inc. The Ricketts family never approved it, and nothing has happened on it since the presentation. The vendors listed were as proposed, and had nothing to do with this proposal.

Brian Baker, president of the super PAC Ending Spending Action Fund, released the following statement on behalf of Joe Ricketts, the founder of TD Ameritrade who commissioned the proposal:

Via Politico:

Joe Ricketts is a registered independent, a fiscal conservative, and an outspoken critic of the Obama Administration, but he is neither the author nor the funder of the so-called “Ricketts Plan” to defeat Mr. Obama that The New York Times wrote about this morning. Not only was this plan merely a proposal – one of several submitted to the Ending Spending Action Fund by third-party vendors – but it reflects an approach to politics that Mr. Ricketts rejects and it was never a plan to be accepted but only a suggestion for a direction to take. Mr. Ricketts intends to work hard to help elect a President this fall who shares his commitment to economic responsibility, but his efforts are and will continue to be focused entirely on questions of fiscal policy, not attacks that seek to divide us socially or culturally.

Ben Abrahamse · Top Commenter · Belmont, Massachusetts


"Turn on the light, and watch the cockroaches scurry."

Mitt Romney may have come off sounding like a robot, but in his most recent response to this morning's report about Joe Ricketts' plan to inject Jeremiah Wright into the 2012 campaign, he finally repudiated the Republican billionaire's plan:

"I repudiate the effort by that PAC to promote an ad strategy of the nature they've described. [...] I think what we've seen so far from the Obama campaign is a campaign of character assassination. [...] I hope that isn't the course of this campaign. So in regards to that PAC, I repudiate what they're thinking about"

Sure, Romney couldn't say it without whining about perceived character attacks from Obama's campaign, but he deserves some credit for eventually getting around to taking the high road, right? Well, maybe so ... but not until he repudiates (rather than Etch A Sketches) his own words, delivered in February when he went on the Sean Hannity radio show:

"I think again that the president takes his philosophical leanings in this regard, not from those who are ardent believers in various faiths but instead from those who would like America to be more secular. And I’m not sure which is worse, him listening to Reverend Wright or him saying that we must be a less than Christian nation."

Apparently there are two Mitt Romneys: the one who thinks Jeremiah Wright should be off limits ... and the other one who thinks Jeremiah Wright is fair game. And it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out which Mitt Romney guys like Joe Ricketts will ultimately listen to.
Oh, and by the way, President Obama never said America should be less than Christian. And if Mitt Romney really thinks the best way to learn about President Obama's views about America is to listen to what Jeremiah Wright says ... well, then he should just ask Osama bin Laden.


http://www.dailykos.com/

Kudos to Romney and Rickett's for choosing against it. True leaders!!!

So you published it because you were shocked and opposed to its tactic? lol


The guy who calls Soros and President Obama "socialists" and implies they are Marxists.
Pardon me if i dont quite sense your "kudos" are legitimate.


"True leaders" The man who sticks his finger in the wind and has been on EVERY side
of EVERY issue? I know you want him to beat President Obama but please....
I quess you didnt hear Romney's first response to the matter?
He only said something after the Democrats started to denounce him. If you think he is
a "true leader" i have a great idea for a thread on that subject. I think you are
going to be embarrassed by that title you place on him.

The Obama campaign countered by saying Romney’s rejection of Ricketts’ strategy was not forceful enough.

“This morning’s story revealed the appalling lengths to which Republican operatives and super PACs apparently are willing to go to tear down the president and elect Mitt Romney,” Obama campaign manager Jim Messina said in a statement. “The blueprint for a hate-filled, divisive campaign of character assassination speaks for itself. It also reflects how far the party has drifted in four short years since John McCain rejected these very tactics. Once again, Governor Romney has fallen short of the standard that John McCain set, reacting tepidly in a moment that required moral leadership in standing up to the very extreme wing of his own party.”

SiriuslyWrong calls this true leadership. Oh my god.


Bonus Quote of the Day
"I'm not familiar precisely with exactly what I said, but I stand by what I said, whatever it was."

-- Mitt Romney, at a press conference in Florida, defending previous statements he's made about President Obama and his relationship with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

See more.

Talkingpointsmemo.com



THU MAY 17, 2012 AT 12:30 PM PDT
Mitt Romney: I don't know what I said, but I stand by it, whatever it was
byJed Lewison
Mitt Romney, asked this afternoon whether he stands by his use of Jeremiah Wright to attack President Obama on Sean Hannity's radio show in February:


Romney:
"Uh, I'm actually going to to, I'm not familiar precisely with exactly what I said, but I stand by what I said, whatever it was. And with regards to, uh, I'll go back and take at what was said there."

Yes, the the same Mitt Romney who earlier today said he "repudiates" the use of Jeremiah Wright to attack President Obama ... now says he stands by his use of Jeremiah Wright to attack President Obama. Even though he doesn't know what his attack was. Or so he says.
12:32 PM PT: As several commenters have pointed out, in Mitt Romney's defense, it can be hard keeping track of what you say when you're lying all the time.

TPM2012
How The Jeremiah Wright Trial Balloon Crashed And Burned


PEMA LEVY MAY 17, 2012, 3:23 PM 1755
Some Republicans still believe that if John McCain had wielded the incendiary Rev. Jeremiah Wright against Barack Obama in 2008, he might have been elected president. But a fierce backlash Thursday after the New York Times revealed a GOP super PAC was revisiting the possibility of using Wright in anti-Obama ads may have been the final nail in the coffin for that line of attack.

The Times detailed how a Republican billionaire and a group of strategists were mulling a multimillion-dollar ad campaign connecting Obama to the controversial reverend to be unleashed just before the Democratic National Convention. The Times report quickly had the Republican establishment running scared, denouncing the plan and insisting it was never being seriously considered, all before the West Coast had even woken up.

According to the report, conservative billionaire Joe Ricketts, founder of TD Ameritrade, was reviewing a proposal to attack president Obama by playing up his connection to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, whose controversial statements Obama disavowed on the campaign trail in 2008.

“The world is about to see Jeremiah Wright and understand his influence on Barack Obama for the first time in a big, attention-arresting way,” read the proposal, which included hiring an “extremely literate conservative African-American” as a spokesman and intended to paint Obama as a “metrosexual, black Abe Lincoln.” The $10 million plan — called “The Defeat of Barack Hussein Obama: The Ricketts Plan to End His Spending for Good” — would be financed by Ricketts, through the super PAC Ending Spending Action Fund.

The idea, the plan stated, was to do “exactly what John McCain would not let us do” in 2008. But the Romney campaign said it didn’t want to go that route, either.

Early Thursday, Mitt Romney’s evasive comments on the report seemed to suggest Romney would not rule out future attacks involving Wright. Asked about the Times story, by the Los Angeles Times’s Maeve Reston, Romney said only that he hadn’t “read the papers yet.”

Romney’s campaign manager, Matt Rhoades, had read the paper, and moved to quash the growing uproar and turn the tables on Obama. “It’s clear President Obama’s team is running a campaign of character assassination,” he said. “We repudiate any efforts on our side to do so.” Soon, the Obama campaign had released a statement decrying Romney’s tepid response during a “moment that required moral leadership.”

Romney clarified soon after, to the conservative site Townhall, that he too “repudiate[d]” efforts like the one outlined in the Ricketts proposal. “I repudiate the effort by that PAC to promote an ad strategy of the nature they’ve described.”

Other Republicans stepped forward to denounce the plan.

“Senator McCain is very proud of the campaign he ran in 2008. He stands by the decisions he made during that race and would make them again today if he had it to do over,” a spokesman for the Arizona senator said.

Ohio Sen. Rob Portman, a top VP contender, echoed Romney, saying that both the campaign and super PACs should avoid Wright and focus on the economy instead.

By noon Thursday, the very people considering the “Ricketts Plan” had sworn it off and downplayed the episode.

The super PAC funded by Ricketts issued a statement on his behalf, saying the plan was off the table:

Joe Ricketts is a registered independent, a fiscal conservative, and an outspoken critic of the Obama Administration, but he is neither the author nor the funder of the so-called “Ricketts Plan” to defeat Mr. Obama that The New York Times wrote about this morning. Not only was this plan merely a proposal - one of several submitted to the Ending Spending Action Fund by third-party vendors - but it reflects an approach to politics that Mr. Ricketts rejects and it was never a plan to be accepted but only a suggestion for a direction to take.
Ricketts, the statement said, will focus his political efforts “entirely on questions of fiscal policy, not attacks that seek to divide us socially or culturally.”

Fred Davis, the famous Republican adman who’s firm, Strategic Perception Inc., was behind the proposal, also said the plan was never in the works in a statement to TPM. The “Ricketts family never approved it, and nothing has happened on it since the presentation,” Davis said.

So what does it mean that the Wright trial balloon came crashing down so quickly? The Republican establishment might have learned that personal attacks on Obama, who is well-liked, might be more trouble than they’re worth.

Mark Salter, an adviser to McCain in 2008, told ABC News Thursday that the “Ricketts Plan” would backfire. “I suspect this was leaked by someone who wants to stop it from happening,” Salter said. Any day not spent on Obama’s economic record, Salter said, is a day wasted.


http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/20...ref=fpnewsfeed

A "true leader" as SiriuslyWrong says or something else?



Joe Ricketts rejects plan to attack Obama with Jeremiah Wright, but gave some kind of green light
byMeteor Blades

Who do you think you're kidding, Joe?
The $10 million attack-Obama proposal put forth by the advertising firm Strategic Perception and exposed by the New York Times Thursday is catching a lot of heat. So much so that the "Ending Spending" Super PAC of Chicago billionaire Joe Ricketts that would be funding the attack felt compelled to issue a statement renouncing the proposal:
Joe Ricketts is a registered independent, a fiscal conservative, and an outspoken critic of the Obama Administration, but he is neither the author nor the funder of the so-called “Ricketts Plan” to defeat Mr. Obama that The New York Times wrote about this morning. Not only was this plan merely a proposal—one of several submitted to the Ending Spending Action Fund by third-party vendors—but it reflects an approach to politics that Mr. Ricketts rejects and it was never a plan to be accepted but only a suggestion for a direction to take. Mr. Ricketts intends to work hard to help elect a President this fall who shares his commitment to economic responsibility, but his efforts are and will continue to be focused entirely on questions of fiscal policy, not attacks that seek to divide us socially or culturally.
That's all warm and fuzzy and implicitly civic-minded. But it collides with what the proposal itself says about using the words of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright to taint Barack Obama and reduce his chances in the November election. An attack along those lines failed in 2008. But only, the proposal's authors suggest, because its full force wasn't unleashed since John McCain was too weak.
The trouble with Ricketts's denial is contained in the proposal itself. On page 3, Ricketts is quoted as saying about a Wright-Obama slam that McCain rejected: "If the nation had seen that ad, they'd never have elected Barack Obama."

And on page 46 of the 54-page proposal, the authors state:

With your [Ricketts's] preliminary approval at the New York meeting, we have discussed this plan in highly confidential terms with the following proposed team members. All are ready to jump into action upon plan approval.
Team Lead:
Strategic Perception Inc., Fred Davis

Strategy and Grassroots:
Strate ic Perce tion Inc., Bill Ken on

Earned Media:
Strategic Perception Inc., Brian Nick

Polling:
North Star Opinion Research, Whit Ayres

Social Media/Web:
Campaign Solutions, Becki Donatelli

Media Buyer:
Smart Media Group, Kyle Roberts

External Spokesman:
Larry Elder

So, what are we to assume about that New York meeting? That Ricketts gave preliminary approval to a mere "suggestion," some skeletal proposal that made no mention of Jeremiah Wright but was something totally different than the polished, budget-detailed plan revealed by the Times? Puhleez. We may have fallen off a turnip truck. But it wasn't yesterday.
Given all the recycled lies in the proposal, Davis's operation ought to be renamed Strategic Deception. If somebody hadn't leaked the firm's rancid plan, quite possibly in hopes of killing it, there's every likelihood we would be seeing it laid out as planned during the Democratic Convention. We still may. And if we don't, with all the right-wing billionaire dollars floating around, there's plenty of reason to believe we'll see something just as bad or worse.