As Candidates Smile, Outside Groups Attack

Candidates Let Outside Groups Attack Opponents, Though They Get Their Shots In As Well

(AP)  While Republican Mike Huckabee wishes voters Merry Christmas in a television ad, a group organized by his supporters makes automated phone calls slipping the knife into his opponents.

John Edwards, lagging behind his Democratic rivals in cash, gets more than a million dollars in help from labor unions running parallel campaigns.

And Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is locked in a tight race in Iowa, has well-organized and highly strategic assistance from labor backers and EMILY's List, the pro-abortion rights fundraising group that aims to help female candidates.

Presidential candidates are benefiting - and sometimes being attacked - by independent groups that are only now beginning to make their presence known in the early contest states of Iowa and New Hampshire. These groups can be more targeted, more negative and can coordinate their activities in ways that candidate campaigns cannot.

At the same time, the contenders themselves are operating on parallel tracks. Republican candidates in particular are stuffing mailboxes with negative messages about their rivals while airing cheery holiday greetings on television.

Mitt Romney has been especially prolific with negative mail. One piece portrays Fred Thompson as having a "do nothing record" on immigration and characterizes his other rivals - John McCain, Huckabee and Rudy Giuliani - as too lenient toward illegal immigrants.

In one brochure mailed in Iowa, Thompson criticizes the economic policies of Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor with this: "Mike Huckabee talks like a Republican but taxes like a Democrat." Clinton and Barack Obama have exchanged mail over their health care plans.

The mixed messages have their purposes. Negative television can damage both the source and the target. But negative mailings can be aimed at supporters and at voters with a specific gripe.

"Broadcast messages are seen by a broader audience," said Stephen D. Ansolabehere, a political scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an expert on political advertising. "Your attack direct mail is going to be sent to the people you want it to be sent to. It's not going to go to areas you don't want to alienate."

Outside groups often have been more likely to go on the air with negative advertising. But for the most part, they too have been targeted with their attacks, if they attack at all.

The Club for Growth, which advocates fiscal conservatism, appears to be an exception for now, running television ads against Huckabee. A conservative political action committee called RightMarch.com has spent about $330,000 in mailings and phone calls against Clinton.

The group helping Huckabee, Common Sense Issues, is conducting automated interactive phone calls in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida that provide a positive message about Huckabee or information that is critical of his opponents. It also is organizing caucus-goers for Huckabee, a significant leg up for a cash-strapped candidate who has only recently seen his campaign catch fire.

EMILY's List has spent $486,000 to identify about 20,000 Clinton-leaning women in Iowa who voted in 2006 but did not participate in the presidential caucus in 2004. Maren Hesla, who heads the group's independent expenditures, said her staff is using automated and personal phone calls, direct mail, Google ads and the Web to educate women about the caucus process.

[agnim]

Hypocrite, Hillary, smiles while she stabs in the back with here deceptive campaign manager and with her LYING CHEATING husband, Bill Clinton, who disgraced the Office of the US Presidency and became the only president to be impeached in office.

[jonesforch]

MERRY CHRISTMAS !!

[coolprophet]

MORE TROOPS AND VETERANS SUPPORT RON PAUL
On Veteran''s Day, Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul today addressed a crowd of over 5,000 enthusiastic veterans and supporters in Philadelphia. The Veteran''s Day weekend rally took place at Independence Mall. Thousands of veterans and their friends and families heard country music superstar Rockie Lynne open the event for the Texas congressman. John Holland, the founder of a leading advocacy organization for troops, veterans, and POW/MIAs, delivered an enthusiastic endorsement of Congressman Paul, before the congressman addressed the crowd. The rally coincided with the launch of the Veterans for Paul Coalition, a group composed entirely of American war veterans. "Dr. Paul''s support among veterans is extremely high," said Paul campaign spokesman Joe Seehusen. "These great patriots who have fought for our country know that only Dr. Paul''s foreign policy of peace and secure borders can guarantee true national security, and they want him fighting for our country''s freedom." Congressman Paul was himself a Captain in the Air Force who served as a flight surgeon during the "totally unnecessary and illegal" Vietnam war. He receives more campaign contributions from former and active military and military affiliates than any other 2008 presidential candidate.

[sgtrds]

While it is true that the candidates themselves have no real control o0ver many of the groups campaigning on their behalf, it''s also true that they need to be even more vocal in objections when these groups go overboard. There can not be this slimy wink and a nod that the Bushies gave to the Swift boat lairs in 2004 every time they repeated their BS by saying that they had no control over them, but at the same time refusing to repudiate them.

[coolprophet]

RON PAUL KNOWS HOW TO STOP ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION
The talk must stop. We must secure our borders now. A nation without secure borders is no nation at all. It makes no sense to fight terrorists abroad when our own front door is left unlocked. Ron Paul has a plan: (1.) Physically secure our borders and coastlines. We must do whatever it takes to control entry into our country before we undertake complicated immigration reform proposals. (2.) Enforce Visa rules. Immigration officials must track Visa holders and deport anyone who overstays their Visa or otherwise violates U.S. Law. This is especially important when we recall that a number of 9/11 terrorists had expired Visas. (3.) No amnesty. Estimates suggest that 10 to 20 million people are in our country illegally. That''s a lot of people to reward for breaking our Laws. (4.) No welfare for illegal aliens. Americans have welcomed immigrants who seek opportunity, work hard, and play by the rules, but taxpayers should not pay for illegal immigrants who use hospitals, clinics, schools, roads, and social services. (5.) End birthright citizenship. As long as illegal immigrants know their children born here will be citizens, the incentive to enter the U.S. illegally will remain strong. (6.) Pass true immigration reform. The current system, and those most other candidates propose, is incoherent and unfair, and would allow up to 60 million more immigrants into our country