FiredUp claims that Americans for Prosperity is an astroturf organization. That's because FiredUp itself is an astroturfed blog, run and managed by the Carnahan family as an adjunct to their glowing media assistance.
"Astroturf" is a fake grassroots campaign. To be astroturf, you have to be one organization or set of individuals pretending to be another group. PatientsUnitedNow is clearly a project of Americans for Prosperity, which proudly claims it in the footer of the website.
This is not the same thing as creating a fake blog without identifying who you are and who you work for, then scrubbing the site a few weeks later (like Laura, and Jeff and Julie did). If FiredUp thinks Americans for Prosperity is astroturf, it's because everything FiredUp supports is paid for by shadowy figures who create coalitions staffed by ACORN, Missouri Pro-Vote, SEIU, and other paid, political staffers taking advantage of the revolving door between left-wing organizations funded by liberal billionaires and state offices.
Can you really argue with a straight face that a group of people that gave us Laura Egerdal, Jeff Mazur, and Julie Terbrock with Missourians for Fair Elections has any clue what a real grassroots organization looks like?
This is Jeff Mazur posting at FiredUp about Missourians for Fair Elections.
This is Jeff Mazur getting credit after the fact
This is Robin Carnahan running a press conference using union organizers and pretending they're just random people off the street.
And then there's Mindy Mazur, formerly chief of staff for Carnahan, currently running her Senate Campaign, and of course, married to Jeff Mazur.
Sean, I know you were a political hack in DC kissing ass to get jobs and using in-law connections to get ahead, but your post is but another example of projection. People who get paychecks from the Carnahan family can't exactly complain about advocacy groups that actually buck their party.
Until FiredUp opens up its books to show where the money is coming from to pay Sean Suendker Nicholson full-time, we should treat them for what they are, a public relations firm for the Democratic party that won a press exemption with slick lawyers.
omg! That is just too funny. How totally uninformed these people are....and imagine connections to SEIU and ACORN!
AFP was founded by a Washington outsider, David Koch who is an avowed libertarian. Let me see I think he hails from Kansas and runs a privately owned company, Koch Industries.
He provided the start up for AFP but beyond that AFP is grassroots. We have been building on that theme by using word of mouth to grow our membership. No government funds go to the organization, it is all private donations. I am a member of AFP in Kansas. Trust me we are all grassroots.
Posted by: navyvet48 | 07/06/2009 at 04:52 PM