11/28/2012
K.Rove: "Who cares about Romney? I made $45 Million!"
It is no consolation to us at VDARE.com that the Romney debacle seems to have permitted a number of our House themes to enter MSM discourse — importing a new people of course, the possibility of secession and VDARE.com Peter Brimelow’s pet peeve for several years, the iniquity of GOP campaign consultants.
Richard Viguerie raised this standard before the election and Red State was fast on the draw right afterwards. Now venerable GOP war horse Morton Blackwell has charged into battle with The GOP’s consultant problem The Daily Caller 11/26/2012.
This is a very valuable piece because as a long-time Inside the Beltway creature Blackwell has credibility. So his statement
Most consultants take a 15% commission (over and above client-paid production costs and his retainer) from media vendors for all placements.
may be taken as confirmation of Steve Sailer’s suggestion in Heckuva job, Rove-ie! — Karl’s $300 Million Fiasco
The traditional advertising agency commission was 15%, but I don’t know what applies in the Super PAC business, other than that it sounds like a nice business to be in.
Karl Rove looks likely to have made $45 million out of helping Romney lose.
Blackwell is also useful because he lays out clearly the utterly destructive dynamic of these parasites:
The consultant knows he gets no commission for campaign funds spent on people-intensive activity, such as:
? precinct organization
? voter ID phone banks
? voter registration drives
? youth effort
? the Election Day process to get out the vote… In defense of his practices, the consultant develops an outspoken contempt for any proposal for significant campaign expenditures except for paid media.
Even in the closing days of a re-election campaign in which an incumbent is virtually unopposed, the consultant has a strong incentive to urge his incumbent to raise more and more money.
Never mind that candidates from the incumbent’s party might win close contests nearby but for the incumbent’s having vacuumed up money from available donors. After all, for every $100,000 spent on broadcast media, the consultant pockets a cool $15,000 — plus his fees for creating new commercials
There were clear signs that the Romney campaign was being plundered like this, at Steve Sailer noted in Stop The Presses! Latino Ad Consultants Say Romney And Obama Should Spend More On Latino Ads and I suggested in Does Romney Direct Mail Prodigality Prove Campaign Consultants In Control?
Blackwell concludes
This growing problem with consultants has many bad effects:
? The unnecessary losses of many good candidates each year
? The looting of millions of dollars misspent on media
? The suckering of many rich candidates who are falsely led by consultants to believe they can win
(Think Meg Whitman!).
Unfortunately this corruption is directly detrimental to the cause of Patriotic Immigration Reform. VDARE.com is aware of several candidates discouraged from raising immigration as an issue by consultants, unquestionably because there are all too many Cheap Labor Lobby plutocrats off whom it is easier for a needy consultant to get rich.
Winning elections is strictly secondary. Saving the nation does not count at all.
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