Continuing my series on the excellent book written by David Horowitz and Richard Poe entitled "The Shadow Party: How George Soros, Hillary Clinton, and Sixties Radicals Seized Control of the Democratic Party" in which I excerpt key portions to highlight the danger America faces from the new left.
In the first post I posted about the overview the authors gave of The Shadow Party, the second post was about the first of Seven Sisters comprising the Shadow Party, MoveOn.org and then onto Hillary’s thinktank – the Center for American Progress in this post. The third sister, America Votes, was highlighted in this post, the fourth – America Coming Together in this post, the fifth – Joint Victory Campaign 2004 in this post, and now onto the sixth sister of the Shadow Party, The Media Fund:
While Malcom, Glantz and Rosenthal were cobbling together the coalition of labor unions, pro-abortion activists and environmentalists which would later emerge as the Shadow Party’s ground war operation, America Votes, Ickes sought to organize a message arm to conduct the campaign air war. He first informally called it a "presidential media fund" – a 527 committee that would raise money for campaign advertising for the anti-Bush presidential campaign. Unable to think of a catchy name, Ickes finally just settled on The Media Fun, launching it on 5 November 2003.
The Media Fund functions as an in-house campaign advertising agency for the Shadow Party. The Fund conceptualizes, produces and places political ads on television, and in print media and on the Internet. "The Media Fund is the largest media buying organization supporting a progressive message," says its website. Ickes explained to New York Magazine in a 28 June 2004 interview, "The goal of the Media Fund is to create, test, and then air ads that raise issues that we think are important in this election…[However,] we are not in the business of electing or defeating candidates." Ickes had to add that last sentence for legal purposes. Such paper-thin disclaimers form the Shadow Party’s only bulwark against federal prosecution under the McCain-Feingold Act. Ickes’ denial notwithstanding, electing and defeating candidates is of course The Media Fund’s sole purpose.
The Media Fund was extremely active in creating and airing attack ads against President Bush in battleground states. It largely defined the message of the Kerry campaign. Drawing on top talent from Madison Avenue advertising firms, The Media Fund sought to convince Americans that President Bush was pursuing what its website called a "radical agenda," which has "given us a country less secure, a foreign policy in disarray, record job losses, deficits that mortgage our children’s future, environmental policies that abandon common sense and attacks on civil liberties that undermine the very premise of our democracy."
The Media Fund received over $51.5 million in donations during the 2004 election cycle. Much of the money is hard to trace, however, since it was first laundered through Joint Victor Campaign 2004. Soros’ money has doubtless found its way into the mis. Soros poured millions into Joint Victory Campaign 2004, as did close Soros associates Peter B. Lewis and Stephen Bing.
At one point the Bush campaign filed a complaint with the FCC about this group:
The Bush-Cheney re-election campaign plans to file a complaint Wednesday with the Federal Election Commission, charging that a $5.1 million anti-Bush ad campaign in key battleground states violates the new campaign finance reform law, spokesman Terry Holt said.
The complaint alleges that the group running the ads, the Media Fund, is using so-called "soft" money contributions from deep-pocketed donors to pay for the ads, which is illegal under the new law because the ads seek to influence a race for federal office.
The Bush campaign is demanding that the FEC take "rapid action" and impose "severe sanctions" against the group, which was created by former Clinton adviser Harold Ickes and aided by Jim Jordan, the former campaign manager of the presumptive Democratic nominee, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts.
Which didn’t do a whole lot of good, as you can tell. The Shadow Party is alive and well today.
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