Bill Burton, former White House deputy press secretary and head of the pro-Obama Priorities USA super PAC, is struggling to defend his latest ad that suggests Mitt Romney is responsible for the death of a steelworker’s wife. You can hardly blame Burton; fact-checkers have found that the ad is dishonest, blatantly misleading, and sleazy, so it’s no wonder he can’t defend it. But why would he run something that is indefensible in the first place? CNN’s Wolf Blitzer pushed Burton on the issue last night (starts around four minutes into the video):
Burton could not have come off looking worse. This has to be a headache for President Obama, who isn’t officially tied to the super PAC but has publicly endorsed the super PAC. Campaign and White House officials have also attended fundraising events for Priorities USA, which means the campaign is going to have a hard time arguing that it has no association with the super PAC.
But Burton’s reprehensible ad, and his inability to defend it in interviews, aren’t his only problems. While Priorities USA was intended to compete with Republican-supporting super PACs like American Crossroads, its fundraising efforts have flopped since the beginning. It has been so weak in this area that the group signed onto a joint fundraising committee with Media Matters founder and head of the American Bridge 21st Century PAC David Brock in April. Committee for Justice President Curt Levy writes:
Former White House Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton founded the Obama-approved super-PAC Priorities USA Action last April, and his track record to date has been miserable. According to Federal Election Commission, or FEC, data, Burton and company raised just $4.4 million in 2011 — a paltry figure compared with counterpart American Crossroads’ $18.4 million haul for the same year. This year isn’t going so well for Burton, either. Crossroads raised $9.7 million through the first quarter of 2012; Priorities took in just $4.6 million.
And, Bill Burton is the least of the president’s problems. Consider David Brock, founder and CEO of Media Matters and founder of the American Bridge 21st Century liberal super-PAC. Brock has been embroiled in controversy. …
According to FEC disclosures, Burton’s and Brock’s outfits established a joint fundraising committee this April, after months of private talks. There’s enough fundraising desperation in the Obama camp to override any concerns they might have had about Brock’s scandal-plagued past.
You have to imagine that interviews like the one above won’t help Burton’s dismal fundraising efforts. Obama can’t legally coordinate with Burton or stop him from running the ad. But he must be starting to regret he gave the flailing super PAC his seal of approval in the first place.
“There’s enough fundraising desperation in the Obama camp to override any concerns they might have had about Brock’s scandal-plagued past.” n nAS IF, concern over scandals and shady people figures prominently in Obama’s thinking in the first place. n
Bill BURTON IS MADE OF THE SAME STUFF THAT I SCRAPE OFF MY SHOES AFTER WALKING THRU A PIG STY. HE FITS RIGHT IN WITH THE REST OF THE LIARS AND THUGS IN THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION.THEY MAKE NIXON AND HIS CRONIES LOOK LIKE CHOIR SOYS
All caps comments make you look like a nutter. If that was your intention, mission accomplished.
If “Unemployment = Cancer”, shouldn’t Obama be held responsible for the MILLIONS of people who are unemployed because of the Obamaconomy? My own company, at the end of the Stimulus funding a year ago, laid off 1200 people directly due to the actions of the Obama Administration. Obama might argue that at least they had jobs for two years before being laid off, but Bain Capital gave the guy in the ad a job for EIGHT years before he was laid off. If Bain is being blamed despite PAYING the guy wages and health benefits for 8 years, shouldn’t Obama be blamed for laying off those 1200 people after only 2 years of work? And shouldn’t Obama be blamed for any cancers or other illnesses any of the family members of those people acquire over the next 4 years? n n
Notice that the CNN people were still giving the Obama admin cover. I find the media vile in their coverage.
This is Nazi propaganda 101. Lie, lie, lie, something always stays!
An entirely different lesson (different from the ad and also from its critics) can be learned from the sad story of former GST Steel employee Joe Soptic, who lost his own insurance when he lost his job.
Millions of American workers have put all their eggs in one basket: their employment salaries, their retirement pension, and their health care, all depend on their employer’s survival.
I admit that my wife (a public school teacher) and I (a California state university professor), each of us now retired, received salaries and health insurance while still working, and now receive pensions and health insurance from the California state government (plus Medicare). Our “eggs in one basket” decisions were because our employer-provided contributions to our future pensions and current health insurance were non-taxable income.
But long before we retired, while we still were young and healthy, we also acquired health insurance with a high deductible to cover major expenses. We also acquired life insurance on each other.
Any competent financial adviser will tell you to diversify your risks, e.g. don’t use all of your available cash to buy the stock of only one company.
The same principle applies to the rest of your life. If your employer offers “free” health insurance (likely because your employer doesn’t want you to come to work when you are sick, especially if you are contagious), take it by all means. But ALSO get your own health insurance — not for routine health care (such as annual physicals or dental cleaning that you can pay for just as you pay for groceries and gas for your car), but for major expenses (e.g. major surgery or cancer treatments).
Nevertheless, probably a majority of American adults rely almost entirely on their employer for pensions and health care, naively assuming that their employer (be it public or private) will never fail, e.g. into bankruptcy.
We do that because tax law bribes us to do so: Our employer’s contribution to our pensions and health insurance are non-taxable income. (The pensions likely will be taxable when we start receiving them, but meanwhile they will be benefiting from compound interest or re-invested capital gains).
Employer funded health care (and maybe pensions also) began during WWII, when salary price controls prevented employers from using higher wages to compete for workers. But WWII ended in 1945, 67 years ago. It’s high time — while keeping employer-provided pension and health insurance contributions fully deductible business expenses, just like salaries are — to make them taxable income to employees, but ALSO to make employee savings for personal pension contributions and for health and life insurance to be fully income-tax deductible.
Roger Folsom
Notice that the CNN people were still giving the Obama admin cover. I find the media vile in their coverage.