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Monday, October 25, 2010

What Are These 'Outside Groups' Outside Of?

The New York Times has an article out where they continuously mention "outside groups", such as American Action Network, American Future Fund, American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS to name just a couple.

What are these outside groups actually outside of?

Does this refer to the fact that they are not part of the DNC or the RNC? If so, with all the talk of get out the vote and voter participation, isn't it a good thing that groups, American groups, made up of citizens of the United States of America are participating, helping the candidates they want to win?

The Politico reports that Democrats have preemptively come out with their "excuse" of how they could lose big numbers in the House of Representatives in the midterms, just a week away.

That excuse? "Outside groups killed us."

Really?

I do not see Democrats bemoaning the fact that the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, (Union) an "outside group" is the "biggest outside spender of the 2010 elections," and their support is for Democrats.

What exactly have these so-called outside groups done?

NYT:

A vivid picture of how outside groups are helping Republicans across the country can be found here in central Florida. The incumbent Democrat, Representative Suzanne M. Kosmas, had a nearly four-to-one fund-raising advantage over her Republican challenger, State Representative Sandy Adams, at the end of September.

Ms. Adams, low on cash, has not run a single campaign commercial. But a host of outside groups have swept in to swamp Ms. Kosmas with attack ads, helping establish Ms. Adams as the favorite without her having to spend on television.


So, these outside groups have leveled the financial playing field and Democrats whine?

Heh

Must read for today, "It's the Voters, Stupid"

Teaser:

What Democrats are doing now would be like a man who was about to get stung 100 times after whacking a hornets' nest with a broom handle thinking of why it isn't his fault. If his wife had bought the bug spray... If his son had cleaned the eaves while cleaning the gutters... Global warming has lengthened nest-building season... If only the hornets were really butterflies... and so on.

The Obama Democrats were the ones who swung the broom at the nest and now, as the stings approach, they are eager for it not to be a result of their political judgment and their policies. It's understandable because admitting failures on the former would mean ceding ground in the ideological war with the right and admitting failures on the latter would mean ceding ground back to moderates in their own party.

But it doesn't change the fact that independent voters have swung some 20 points away from Democrats after the party's huge success with the all-important segment of the electorate in 2008. It can unavoidably be attributed to a candidate who offered cool centrism on the trail but governed from the left.

All of the underlying reasons for the hornet stings may be true (midterms usually hurt the party in power) or false (Obama gave dozens of speeches touting his health care agenda), but it doesn't change the fact that somebody decided to whack the nest.

Dems can spin it any way they want, but they are the ones that passed legislation against the wishes of the majority of Americans and other than liberals using that spin for talking points to excuse and justify potential losses, that spin is useless against the fact that voters are opposed to how Washington has been run.