No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

Back on Thursday, Hark wrote about a New York Post story which detailled how various left-wing pressure groups had been funded by large, rich left-wing foundations and had created an illusion of "campaign finance reform" as a widepread hot-button issue amongst the public.

Leaving aside the general veracity of those accusations, I was upset to discover one organisation that was listed, the Center for Public Integrity, as ""supposedly independent pro [campaign finance] reform group." I have always had great respect for the CPI and was horrified to think I may have been hoodwinked.

Today, the Center issued a detailled rebuttal against this and other articles, pointing out that in every case the journalists making the charges have quoted the Center as a non-partisan authority when it suited them to do so.

The Center, of course, has never advocated any position on campaign finance reform, or on any other issue, for that matter. We have also never written, published, or broadcast anything at the direction of a third party. We jealously guard our independence and our nonpartisanship.

Over the years, the Post has seen fit to use Center reports on then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush lodging his political supporters and some big donors in the Texas gubernatorial mansion; that a donor to Rudy Giuliani's campaigns had ties to the Russian mob; that Wesley Clark was still an active lobbyist when he announced his presidential campaign; and that a lobbying firm that employed John Kerry's brother was the presidential hopeful's top lifetime campaign contributor.

Either these sorts of things are worthy of public attention or not. But if they are not, then why did the Post see fit to write about so many of them? And were we aptly named when they used us to comment on Theresa Heinz's tax returns during the 2004 campaign? If so, at what point did we become inaptly named? The Post doesn't say; but we expect it may have something to do with what amounts to a clever advertising campaign that plays fast and loose with the truth.

Read the rest here.

The meat of the story? The various journalists attacking the Center and like-minded organisatiuons have been using a report "prepared by a for-profit competitor of some of the non-profit groups that track campaign finance issues. PoliticalMoneyLine, run by a couple of former FEC employees, makes its money by charging for data that groups like the Center for Public Integrity, the Center for Responsive Politics, the Campaign Finance Institute, and others give away for free."

PoliticalMoneyLine, unlike the Center, refuses to name it's sources of finance, or whether it undertakes work on behalf of any special-interest groups.

Hmmm....so it's a turf war and the guys who want to make money where the competition does it for free are using the old tactic of throwing shit around and knowing that for some the stink will never wash off.