When the Bats Come Home to Roost

From KARE:

WASHINGTON — Rep. Michele Bachmann, who had more than $2 million in her congressional campaign account at the end of November, is embroiled in a dispute with a former presidential campaign aide over back pay of $916.

In what had been a private matter that has now become a nasty public squabble, Peter Waldron, who served as Bachmann for President national field coordinator, contends he is among five former Iowa staffers whom Bachmann has refused to pay unless they sign a non-disclosure agreement regarding campaign activity in Iowa.

 

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Campaigning for Fun and Profit

From THE HUFFINGTON POST:

Newt Gingrich loves selling himself – both as a presidential hopeful and as a for-profit author.

As he seeks the GOP nomination, the former House speaker frequently combines traditional political campaigning with the sales job for his books and films that has earned him millions. As his rivals on Friday scheduled busy days with voters in early nominating states such as Iowa and New Hampshire, Gingrich planned a single public event: a book signing in the nation’s capital.

(Update: Gingrich’s book signing has been reportedly cancelled due to “public safety concerns.”)

Bill O’Reilly was there with an umbrella?

Gingrich, enjoying a surge in the polls just a month before the first contests are held, prides himself on his non-traditional campaign style. It isn’t clear whether it will pay off politically. But it certainly has not hurt his own income.

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Oh, Brother!

From First Read at MSNBC:

Herman Cain enthusiastically embraced the Koch brothers — saying he is their “brother from another mother” — just hours after facing a legal complaint challenging his campaign’s ties to a Koch brother affiliated non profit.

“Just so I can clarify this for the media, this may be a breaking news announcement for the media: I am the Koch brothers’ brother from another mother,” Cain said during a speech at the Americans for Prosperity gathering in Washington, D.C. “Yes. I’m their brother from another mother! And proud of it!”

What most people don’t know is that, when Herb Hermie, Dave, and Chuck used sit around and talk about how they love the John Birch Society (like dear old dad) and Ayn Rand, they were known as Larry, Darryl, and their other brother Darryl.

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Heel of Fortune

From The Boston Globe:

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is worth between $190 million and $250 million, his campaign said yesterday after filing a personal financial disclosure statement with the Federal Election Commission.

That dollar figure would likely make him the wealthiest candidate in the 2012 White House race, far and away eclipsing President Obama. His only possible GOP rival is former governor Jon Huntsman of Utah, who has yet to release his disclosure form and is among the heirs to the Huntsman Corp. fortune.

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Koch-conspirators

From Mother Jones:

The billionaire Koch brothers, Charles and David, spread their money far and wide. They fund free-market think tanks, right-leaning academic organizations, and conservative political advocacy groups, such as the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, which helped cultivate the tea party. The political action committee for the Kochs’ massive conglomerate, Koch Industries, has also given generously to big-name conservative politicians throughout the country at both the federal and state level. But when it comes to the 2012 presidential race, the Kochs have been more selective with their giving, with only one presidential candidate so far benefiting from their largesse: Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.).

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A Run For the Money

From The CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR:

Newt Gingrich on Thursday announced that he’s going to explore running for president. He has set up a website, NewtExplore2012.com, where donors can give him money to fund this effort.

“We will try very methodically to lay out the framework for what we do next,” said Mr. Gingrich, speaking to reporters at the Georgia state Capitol.

Allow me to translate: This is yet another scam to sucker money out of idiots who can still be convinced that I could beat Barack Obama (or anyone else, for that matter).

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Lati-NO!

From The Guardian:

One of the fiercest races in next month’s midterm elections has turned ugly, with the Nevada senator Harry Reid accusing his Republican challenger, Sharron Angle, of encouraging a TV advert that tries to persuade Hispanics not to vote.

The Spanish-language ad was pulled from TV stations yesterday following an outcry. It said: “Don’t vote this November. This is the only way to send them a clear message – you can no longer take us for granted.”

Angle’s camp denied any connection to the ad, saying she encouraged as many Nevadans as possible to vote. The ad was placed by Robert de Posoda, president of Latinos for Reform.

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Maverick? Who’s a Maverick?

From Newsweek:

Late last month, at a dusty fairground outside Tucson, John McCain stood behind the person who is, at least for the next few years, surely his most important legacy to American politics. And speaking to the adoring mob, Sarah Palin stood behind John McCain, repaying his inestimable gift to her in the most compelling possible fashion: by helping him to survive.

…snip…

Many, many years ago she’d competed in a beauty pageant, Palin declared, as women howled (and a few men growled) approvingly. McCain would surely win the talent and debate portions of any such contest, she went on, but no way would the Washington elite and “pundints” and “lame-stream media” ever crown him “Miss Congeniality”! “He’s never been a company man, he’s never been one to just ‘go with the flow,’?” she crowed. For there was at least one thing she’d learned in her years of commercial fishing in Alaska: only dead fish do that.

…snip…

Much as the crowd ate up her every word, Palin had apparently missed the real message this electoral season in Arizona: for his three decades in Congress, McCain hadn’t gone with the flow enough, at least not enough to satisfy many Arizona Republicans. Why else would his rival, former congressman J.D. Hayworth, be billing himself as “the consistent conservative”? Many of the GOP’s most faithful, the kind who vote in primaries despite 115-degree heat, tired long ago of McCain the Maverick, the man who had crossed the aisle to work with Democrats on issues like immigration reform, global warming, and restricting campaign contributions. “Maverick” is a mantle McCain no longer claims; in fact, he now denies he ever was one. “I never considered myself a maverick,” he told me. “I consider myself a person who serves the people of Arizona to the best of his abilities.” Yet here was Palin, urging her fans four times in 15 minutes to send McCain the Maverick back to Washington.

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