Salon.com > Lee Fang

Secrets of the conservative media machine

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 16:21:00 +0000

To borrow a Sarah Palin aphorism, after their election defeat in 2008, conservatives didn’t retreat, they “reloaded.” Instead of finding new solutions to public policy problems or seriously reevaluating Bush’s failures, conservatives focused almost solely on new ways to communicate their old ideas. To do so, they looked to their natural allies in corporate marketing for inspiration -- and they looked to the Left for imitation. The result has been a recent and profound turnaround that has allowed the Right the bury Obama’s message and dominate the political debate.

Historical right-wing domination of the media

Traditionally, conservatives have almost always dominated direct mail solicitations, retained the best pollsters money could buy and paid for the most celebrated advertising makers. Message discipline is the first lesson for any Republican politician. Talk radio? unquestionably controlled by conservatives.

Pentagon contractors flock to Mrs. McKeon

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 16:33:00 +0000

Patricia McKeon, wife of a powerful committee chairman in Congress, announced her bid for California Legislature last fall by telling local Republicans that she decided to run for office because she's fed up with the plastic bag tax in Los Angeles County. "Just think how much food we could buy if we weren't forced to pay 10 cents for grocery bags," she said in announcing her campaign. Within days of her official announcement, one industry stepped up to finance her campaign -- but it wasn't the plastic bag industry. It was military defense contractors and their Beltway lobbyists.

Disclosures posted last evening at the California secretary of state's website confirm that a flood of military contractor money has flowed to Patricia McKeon, who is running for an open Assembly seat in a district that overlaps that of her husband, Republican Rep. Buck McKeon, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee.

D.C. lobbyist aids Rep. McKeon’s wife

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 20:43:00 +0000

Could an effort to lift his wife's political aspirations land the powerful chairman of the House Armed Services Committee in hot water?

Recent disclosures reveal that a federal lobbyist with ties to Rep. Howard "Buck" McKeon, R-Calif., the senior member of the committee overseeing the Pentagon, provided financial support to McKeon's wife, who is seeking a seat in the California Assembly this year. As defense industry lobbyists scramble to head off looming cuts in the Pentagon budget, they are looking for new ways to ingratiate themselves with McKeon.

Patricia McKeon, Buck's wife, surprised many when she announced her intention last September to run for an open seat that largely overlaps her husband's district. One of the first reported contributions to her campaign came from a political committee called the Fund for American Opportunity, registered to a post office box in Washington, D.C., that donated $1,000. The fund, which is financed by a number of corporations including the drug industry trade association PhRMA, is owned and operated by Mark Valente, a Beltway lobbyist.

Romney relied on corporate welfare

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 21:00:00 +0000

During the presidential campaign, Mitt Romney has lashed out at the Obama administration's taxpayer subsidized grants to clean energy start-up companies. “The U.S. government shouldn’t be playing venture capitalist,” wrote Romney in October. “The very process invites cronyism and outright corruption.” But public records show that Romney's private equity firm, Bain Capital, repeatedly persuaded the government to play venture capitalist when it came to its own portfolio of companies.

News outlets have recently focused attention on Romney’s history as a businessman at Bain, which he founded in 1984. What hasn’t been reported, or fully explained by the candidate, is how Romney often got ahead in the private sector by using government help.

Gingrich lauded “good parts” of Obama health plan

Fri, 16 Dec 2011 23:35:00 +0000

Since Newt Gingrich’s meteoric rise in the polls in the last two months, the Washington Post and New York Times have begun reporting on the Republican front-runner's dual role as a vocal critic of President Obama’s healthcare overhaul and as a paid consultant who explains the law’s benefits to corporate clients.

What hasn’t been reported yet are two conference calls in June and December 2010 in which Gingrich and his for-profit Center for Health Transformation touted "the good parts" of Obama's plan and offered advice about how clients might take advantage of a myriad of provisions of the Affordable Care Act.