Instead, Rodman spoke about something far more intriguing.
Today I got a robocall (!) telling me that the banksters would be in jail and unemployment ended and college would be affordable if Hillary were President. It directed me to runhillary2012.net
The site is minimal; and whois didn't tell me anything of note. The site says it's from "the 99%."
Perhaps you can find out more? For whatever reason -- and I could be very wrong -- this seems to me more like ratfucking than like a genuine Hillary campaign.
Well, here it is. The graphic looks familiar. Is this adapted from an image used on one of the right-wing pro-Hillary sites back in 2008?I can see why the Republicans would want to stir up dissent in Democratic ranks.
To be frank, the remarks about affordable college and full employment sound over-the-top to me. The real Hillary supporters -- people like Riverdaughter and Dakinkat and so forth -- don't use such unrealistic terminology. They know that a Hillary presidency would not have been a paradise on earth (although I feel certain that the past three years would have been easier had she won).
Ratfucking operations are usually pretty obvious, because the people behind them never learned the virtues of subtlety. Robocalls are expensive to engineer and annoying to receive. I find it hard to believe that a shoestring operation run by genuine Clinton fans would go down that path.
I can't trust any website which goes to such lengths to keep its proprietors hidden. Starting a political campaign is not like playing Batman: If you want to keep your identity secret, find another way to spend your time.
Internic tells us nothing about the owner except that runhillary2012.net was registered via GoDaddy on November 18, 2011. All of the extant messages on the chat boards seem to have been created within the past 24 hours; most of them are hostile to the very concept of a runhillary2012 site.
So...the whole operation looks like a fake to me. But whodunnit? That graphic may be our only clue. I feel sure that I've seen it, or something much like it, before.
Update: The image comes from Hillaryis44.org. I never really trusted that site. Are they behind the robocall effort? Where's the money coming from?
Politico has given some publicity to the pro-Hillary robocalls. Since Politico leans right -- well, make of it what you will.
Sam Stein at Huffington Post has also taken notice of the robocalls.
The PUMAs are back.Shows what you know, Sam.
A group of vocal Hillary Clinton supporters whose mantra during the 2008 election was "Party Unity My Ass" morphed into time into diehards who wanted the Secretary of State to either be elevated to vice president or consider another run for the White House...
If this is a PUMA thing, then why didn't Riverdaughter know about it? She started the damned movement. If runHillary2012 were legit, she'd have been part of it from the beginning.
Let's rephrase: If this were a PUMA thing, why didn't I know about it until just now? Granted, this site does not have the most impressive stats in the world, and I never officially joined the PUMA movement. (Or any other: To us curmudgeons, all movements are bowel movements). Even so, PUMA activists tended to frequent Cannonfire; this site is known to that community. If, during the past month, something like this had been in the wind, I would have gotten a whiff weeks ago.
If it were legit.
Of course, there were -- in a sense -- two PUMAs. One was a genuine cry of outrage from disaffected Democrats who did not appreciate being called racists simply because they knew before the rest of the world that Obama was a fake. The other PUMA -- the pseudo-PUMA movement, if you will -- was a GOP "split the enemy" operation. If you run into someone who claims to love Hillary yet who also tries to convince you that Obama is a socialist (or an enemy of Israel, a line we've been hearing with increasing frequency of late), you're dealing with a pseudo-PUMA.
The robocalls have been heard in New York, North Carolina, Florida and California. This is a genuine mystery.
38 comments:
The image of Hillary has been around since 2008. I don't remember who created it, but I believe the original was more stylized and in neutral tones, though. I recall that the stripes were like sun rays shooting out from the image of Hillary, unlike those in this picture. The stripes make the background of this current immage look like the background of the Obama logo.
I agree. Healthy skepticism is called for, here. Obamanuts are getting nervous about Hillary, and the Conservatives have never stopped being concerned about her.
It's hard to fathom how this kind of message would benefit either, but I never underestimate the ability of the Obama supporters to create a set-up situation. The Pubs are pretty good at it too.
Don't know who is behind this (and I don't really care) but it didn't take long for the race card to show up in the comments. That and the seething hatred from the obvious O-holes.
Me, I got a good laff out of it and hope the Kossholes' panties are so far up their crack it looks like a thong.
If it's a setup, I think it's a Republican setup. You're right -- the image originally had a sunburst behind Hillary.
There was a site that helped "No Quarter" circulate the "whitey" tape tale. Remember that one? Turned out to be a blind alley. At any rate, that other conservative pro-Hillary site may have been the one to use this image.
Other possibilities -- not trying to present a coherent argument:
1. Had a Conservative group produced it, the tone would have been more anti-Obama (these types can't help attacking Obama).
2. Groups within the Democratic establishment who are fed up with Obama don't necessarily want their good names attached to an attack on a leader they might need to work with in the future. It could be a trial balloon.
3. It's a pro-Obama group trying to discredit the idea of challenging Obama by making it look as if mainly Conservative groups are behind a primary challenge. In other words, it's "twelve dimensional" Obama propaganda.
4. Does it matter who produced it? Enemy of my enemy is my temporary friend.
Yes, several of these points are contradictory. Just raising them.
Okay, now I know. The graphic comes from Hilleryis44.org.
That image comes from this website:
https://contribute.hillarycampaign2008.com/store
Yup. Hillary for President website store still has a few items that are for sale and one of them is the "Sunburst Poster" for $40. or one signed for $100.
DM
Allegedly the recording asks listeners to press one if they support Hillary Clinton, at which point the front door to their home is broken down and they are taken away as enemy combatants of the U.S.
I generally agree that robo calls are obnoxious but in this instance I support the concept of reminding people whom they could have had in 2008 if not for a concerted, corrupted effort by the upper echelons of the democratic party against Hillary Clinton, as outlined below...
It's important to identify who "they" are, that supported Barack Obama in 2008. "They" are George Soros, and a possibly incredibly corrupt Nancy Pelosi who appears was profiting off of a VISA stock IPO in 2008 at the same time she let credit card legislation die in Congress and at the same time that Barack Obama was accepting anonymous pre-paid card campaign donations.
A slew of the top liberal pundits, people that I thought we could look up to back then, all supported Barack Obama's nomination well before most democratic voters had a chance to vote in the 2008 primaries.
The top liberal pundits and groups who prematurely supported Barack Obama included George Soros, Michael Moore, Keith Olbermann, Arianna Huffington, Maria Shriver, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Move on dot org, plus many top news outlets AND the "400 bloggers" who wrote positive Obama stories and negative Hillary Clinton Stories.
Even with this supportive liberal media onslaught, Obama still needed for Florida and Michigan's democratic votes to not count, for his own congressional state of Illinois to MOVE UP their democratic primary date from the end of March to the beginning of February, AND HAVE THEIR VOTES STILL COUNT, for cheating in the caucus contests in his favor by possibly Move on dot org members, and for the media to trivialize the voter surge for Hillary Clinton over the final 10 weeks of the democratic campaign, for Obama to "win" in 2008.
Hillary Clinton is either a liberal moderate, a moderate liberal, or a progressive moderate, her voting base is the most powerful of all because it is the nicest and largest, and is the best base for actually solving problems.
Obama was helped into power by wall street forces that he won't go against, even as homeowners unfairly lose their homes.
I think it's important to realize that 2008 PUMA's scattered in all directions. Proportionally speaking, whomever Hillary Clinton supporters voted for in 2008, the numbers have probably surged for anybody but Obama since Hillary Clinton supporters are pretty certain H.C. would have taken a more competent path than Obama has taken.
While you may recognize riverdaughter as the creator of the PUMA brand, there are others who also lay stake to that claim as well, such as D.K. Jamaal.
Well, I can recall the very day when the PUMA acronym appeared -- for the first time -- on riverdaughter's site. And then riverdaughter's daughter Brooke offered her own version of a PUMA logo.
So, yeah, that's where it started.
PUMA originated at The Confluence but the idea originated with a commenter named SM77. TC hasn't been actively involved with PUMA for a couple years now.
You can find current/former PUMAs at PUMAPac, Uppity Woman, John W. Smart and Hillary is 44.
You can also find us at The Crawdad Hole.
Whatever this robocall thing is I don't think it has anything to do with PUMA. I don't recognize any of the names I've seen so far.
I agree with you Joseph, it looks like a total ratfuck.
I've been suspicious of Hillary44 and quit visiting about the same time I quit visiting HillBuzz.
Hillbuzz has gone totally rightwingbatshitcrazy, Hillary44 seems to be still in the "elect Hillary" mode, which is completely unreasonable considering Hillary's often expressed "NO INTEREST" in the job.
The only thing to be gained at this point is to distract voters from the daily asshat adventures of the TP/GOP and create division (as if there was ever unity) within the Dem Party.
I don't know whether or not this is a GOP set up...But the robocalls point to "yes". It takes out the most obvious sources - i.e. - original PUMAs. I just don't see them financing robocalls on the DL.
However, I've spoken with a number of "Clinton diehards" over time (I'm one to be sure) and have discovered there is a very loose, very committed, almost below grass roots level of Clinton fan out there. They are not "legion" but they are present here and there. All it would take is one with money to do something like this. Wasn't there 1 rich guy in Chicago who bought full page ads a while back? I would not be surprised if this did come from a barely emergent Clinton group or an individual with some expendable income. The page feels naive to me. A little fantasy based.
Then again: the fantasy about what President H. Clinton would have done also feels like what the GOP thinks Clinton supporters think. Every Clinton person I know bases support for her intelligence and experience first...most know full well she would not have been perfect... Very few of the "big PUMAs'" traffic in fantasias like the Obots did.
This is not being done by republicans. We independents and disenfranchised dems genuinely want Hillary to be president (after all, she DID win the popular vote, and only lost the delegate vote when they stole her delegates from Michigan and GAVE them to Obama (which is against DNC rules, but who cares when you're cheating, right?)
As far as Riverdaughter, forget about her. She stopped calling herself a PUMA years ago, and now she has about 10 commenters a day as she whines about how there aren't enough jobs in her scientific field.
You want to know about PUMA? Go to Hillaryis44, UppityWoman, John Smart's place, crawdad hole, the best among others. We've stayed focused on working toward a country in which democracy is valued again, and towards Hillary not being cheated out of her win this time around.
I don't think she is open to challenging Obama for the nomination, but I believe she is open to being drafted by such a write in campaign, and the party elders finally getting some sense and getting Obama to stand down, spend some quality time with his own beloved mirror.
PUMA power hasn't gone anywhere. We'll all here. We're ready to go!
The sunburst image - two different variations - were on two of the Hillary 2012 posters that came from the campaign itself. They weren't done by any blog websites.
Anon 8:13 -- take it somewhere else. The sites you mention (except for Smart's) are basically Republican ratfuck operations. You don't care for Riverdaughter because she, like me, stays true to her d/Democratic instincts while not forgiving Obama for selling out the principles he had claimed to uphold.
And I note that YOU are anonymous. Just like the creeps behind runHillary2012.
I think that, in these realms, the people who hide in shadows are -- well, shady.
Well, canonfire, I don't have a google account, or an open id account, or a url. That leaves anonymous.
And if you think that Hillary is 44 and Uppity woman are republican sites, you've never visited them. I'll go let them know. They'll have a great laugh!!!!!
Actually, you've allowed the male John Smart to not be a republican - check with him. He doens't think that Uppity or Hillaryis44 are republican sites! We're all best buds, "sister sites"! Check with him, get your facts from the male, then maybe you can accept the truth lol
Back when Chris Ruddy, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, and the rest of the "ratfucking" (nice term!)R.M. Sciafe operatives were tossing astro-shit every which way but straight, in the "golden nineties" of America's final-forever period of prosperity, those RF's never did made public the Rose Law Firm/CIA/Saddam connection, did they?
She wasn't "Saint Hillary" then, nor is she now and you know it, even if her hubby's economic plan, and her possible support of its revival, was a far, far better thing than the fascist alternative that we currently have in place.
There are some real skeletons in Porky-Hil's old closet (the one she never visits nowadays because the dress sizes are all too small), and the mystery robocalls may be arriving through a time-warp of sorts, from her very interesting past.
Of course she'd make a better prez than the obamination we have now, but she'd still likely be beholden to a few of her former "clients" from those heady days back in Little Rock.
Peter Renfrew
If you truly stayed true to your dem roots, you wouldn't be voting for the corporatist Obama. Just "not forgiving" him doesn't cut it. Only votes count, and if you vote for him, you're voting for a corporatist republican, and will have to turn in your pristine ideology card.
Damn straight PUMAs remain a force. That a couple of the original members have fallen by the wayside is irrelevant, and has had little impact. The movement continues, and in some ways, has become stronger.
I agree that PUMA is not behind the calls.
freespirit
OMG. I hate to tell you, but MOST PUMAs have never even heard of your site. Today is the first day I heard of it, and I never hear anyone discussing it. Don't be so surprised that you, riverdaughter (who, ask her yourself!, stopped calling herself a PUMA years ago), and Dak aren't aware of what PUMAs are doing - you're on the periphery. Don't act like you're the center and base your logic from there! ROFL
This may be totally unrelated...but...Rachel Maddow was wondering about calla about Jeb Bush.
She found out who was behind it via a twitter from Jimmy Carter's grandson...a "bipartisan" pollling outfit called "Purple Poll."
She interviewed one of the top guys, purportedly a Democrat, who said they were just doing it get a feel how the Republicans would do if Jeb was running versus the present field. According to him, he wouldn't really be the "redeemer" of the Republican party at this point.
They also said they might poll other names in the future.
So, we have polling from a "bipartisan" group asking voters in New Hampshire how Jeb Bush would stack up, and now we see robocalls about Hillary....
MMMMM
This may be totally unrelated...but...Rachel Maddow was wondering about calla about Jeb Bush.
She found out who was behind it via a twitter from Jimmy Carter's grandson...a "bipartisan" pollling outfit called "Purple Poll."
She interviewed one of the top guys, purportedly a Democrat, who said they were just doing it get a feel how the Republicans would do if Jeb was running versus the present field. According to him, he wouldn't really be the "redeemer" of the Republican party at this point.
They also said they might poll other names in the future.
So, we have polling from a "bipartisan" group asking voters in New Hampshire how Jeb Bush would stack up, and now we see robocalls about Hillary....
MMMMM
This may be totally unrelated...but...
Rachel Maddow was "losing sleep" over who has been polling in New Hampshire about Jeb Bush.
As it turns out, she found out via a Twitter by Jimmy Carter's grandson (I think) that it's a bipartisan polling group called PurplePoll...
The guy she interviewed tonight (12/20)was supposedly from the "Democratic" side...he said that so far, Jeb Bush is not the savior for the GOP...at least this go-round.
He said they might poll with other names...just another way to get a feel for where GOP voters are.
So we have "bipartisan" polling from PurplePoll and robocalls about Hillary....
If you don't welcome "anonymous" comments, then perhaps you should use a format that requires names, which can be made up too of course. To disparage a contributor on your blog for being "anonymous" is rather juvenile. Anonymity is one of the key elements to a provocative blogosphere. In any event, you are wrong about Hillaryis44. I've been an avid follower of that site for more than 3 years and am certain that the administrator is a dedicated Clinton Democrat. On where PUMA originated, it doesn't matter. It was never a club with rules for entry, but a nebulous collective of mostly bloggers self-identified as PUMAs, some of whom still do. And that's entirely their right. Riverdaughter certainly has her perspective. Others do as well. You seem oddly obsessed with RD's little clique and kind of a bully towards everyone else. We were all Hillary supporters; some no longer are. Most of us would love to see her run. Signed, anonymous Hillary blogger.
I read the Crawdad Hole blog several times a day (your's also, BTW). It is NOT a Republican Ratfuck operation! It has always been pro-Hillary and anti-Obama.
You are flat out wrong about the PUMA groups mentioned being Republican. PUMA is not a conservative movement, nor is it Republican. Those lies were spread by a few early members of PUMA, who disassociated with the PUMA movement when they were unable to dictate to the rest of us for whom and how we should vote in 2008.
PUMA did not abandon democratic principles. We abandoned the Democratic Party when it threw us under the bus, and abandoned party principles. The concept of PUMA was and is about refusal to blindly follow the Democratic Party - or any party.
I personally don't give a damn whether people like Riverdaughter or not. PUMA is not about Riverdaughter or any other individual, but about being an individual and an independent thinker. When we continued to think and vote as individuals following Hillary's suspension of her campaign, some people took offense. Funny thing about independent thinkers - they tend to remain independent.
Regardless of what you or Riverdaughter believe, resorting to name calling, false accusations and hissy fits when people disagree with you ain't cool.
You're flat out wrong about those groups being Republican. You're also incorrect about PUMA abandoning party principles. We abandoned the Democratic Party (from under the bus) after it abandoned its principles in 2008.
Personally, I don't give a damn whether people like Riverdaughter or not. PUMA was never about Riverdaughter or any other individual. It was and is about being an individual and an independent thinker - refusing to blindly follow the Democratic Party, or any party.
Some early members of the movement did not like the fact that the rest of us refused to follow orders and vote as they suggested. I guess they didn't really want us to be independent thinkers after all. No room for disagreement with some folks.
Regardless, the accusations that we are Republican are false and irresponsible. And, hissy fits ain't cool.
Don't look now, but Meatprod just took you off his blog roll. The horror, the horror...
Don't look now, but Meatprod just took you off his blog roll. The horror, the horror...
I believe the His44 site was/is run by a Perot operative who went by the moniker of "Alex Rodriguez." It's probably a fake story to go with the fake site. It long outed itself as a ratfucking operation.
I had best respond to the "anonymous" thing. Yet again.
Most other blogs require commenters to sign in, giving names, email addresses and (if applicable) URLs. I don't do that. I simply ask folks to sign their words, and not necessarily with a birth name. Any signature will do.
Why? Because -- as a lot of blog proprietors have discovered -- an identifier tends to raise the quality of the commentary. Hit-and-run anonymous comments tend to be thoughtless and thuggish.
You don't have to "sign in" -- just sign, the way you would sign a handwritten note.
If many more people complain about that request, I may go to a system similar to that used by other blogs.
I might as well address this comment...
"I hate to tell you, but MOST PUMAs have never even heard of your site. Today is the first day I heard of it, and I never hear anyone discussing it."
Well, throughout 2008, this site was getting a lot of traffic. And a lot of hate mail, including death threats. Many other sites were linking to various anti-Obama posts published here.
I hate to talk about numbers, but there are places that keep track of such things. And I was getting more attention -- then -- than are the sites you're talking about now.
So I feel relatively confident in my statement.
That said, everyone know I was not a hugeHillary fan. Hell. Let's give the rap ONCE AGAIN (knowing that I had to say these words about 100 times a day throughout 2008)...
I never thought she would be a bad president. But I didn't like the idea of dynasty, and a wife running for president sounds too much like a cheap attempt at a third term. Also, even in late 2007, I simply thought that the Clinton name was damaged -- and she simply could not win.
So I took at that time an ABC -- Anyone But Clinton -- attitude. I even supported Obama. Granted, I knew very little about him, although he aroused my suspicion even then.
Then came the "darkened video" smear on Kos. I mounted a technical rebuttal to that smear which never was refuted -- at least not on technical grounds. But the Obama supporters nevertheless reacted with a level of outrage and vitriol that reminded me of the Free Republic crowd.
That's when I understood that a kind of madness had overtaken progressive circles. Hero worship is always to be feared.
So I switched allegiance to Edwards -- another mistake, although I still admire the things he was saying on the campaign trail. I supported Hillary only when she was the last thing standing between Obama and the nomination. At that time, her sheer resilience commanded respect.
I never properly joined PUMA because I do not join groups.
Do not count me among those whose continuing attitude toward Hillary is worshipful. There's a difference between respect and worship.
Frankly, I'm not even sure I respect Hillary these days. She has done things (perhaps has HAD to do things) as Secretary of State that I strongly dislike. I believe that she should have remained a senator.
To repeat what I have said: Hero worship is always to be feared.
Again with the exaggerated responses. Maybe there are some who support Hillary to the point of "worship", but that's not the case for most of us. She is, however, a hell of a lot more capable than Obama, or anyone else in either party.
I continue to be a strong supporter of hers because I believe she is the leader this country needs, and because the injustices perpetrated by the DNC and the Obamanuts in 2008 needs to be made right. Furthermore, it's damn time for a woman president.
Your blind loyalty to the Democratic Party, in spite of the shit they pulled, is a hell of a lot more like "worship" than is our support of Hillary.
Your party has some serious flaws, and they won't be addressed as long as people complain about issues while continuing to support it - just because it's not Republican. Maybe Donna Brazille was right. Maybe the party no longer needs the people who have formed the base from the beginning. We'll see if that's the case in 2012, when huge numbers PUMAs and their associates refuse to support Obama.
I, for one, won't vote for anyone currently running as a Pub. But, it'll be a cold day in hell before I vote for Obama, or rejoin the Democratic party, unless Hillary is on the ticket for president.
And, please, don't even tell me how damn bad it will be if Dems don't vote, and allow a Pub president to be elected. How much worse could any one of the Pubs be.
freespirit and Joseph are basically arguing the same thing regarding election results...the difference seems to be that while Joseph acknowledges had McCain won our current hardships would've tarnished the rethug brand, he himself can't bring himself to vote R. That's just a disagreement of tactics.
However. The idea that the PUMA movement isn't STINKING full of rightwingers and that only some "early" members objected to it and were driven out for trying to enforce groupthink is laughable. First..."early" members should be anything but a derogatory distinction. In fact, the rightwingers were incessantly whining and shrieking about being "forced" out while sadly never leaving and never ceasing to quote Glenn Beck and rant on and on and on about "ACORN." That's what drove all but the most stalwart true progressives out. I finally threw in the towel when PUMApac's founder and sidekick started regurgitating rightwing faux concern for women in the Occupy movement, while some rightwing ratfucker opined that all the young women in Slutwalk and Occupy seemed "overweight" ...with nary a peep from any of the Concerned Feminists.
And don't let any anon. PUMA claim s/he never heard of Cannonfire. PUMApac quoted posts here and I linked to here frequently. Maybe the rightwing Hillbuzz etc. readers never heard of you....I get those pre-PUMApac sites mixed up because they never appealed to me so I didn't frequent them, but at least one of them is run by log cabin Republicans.
Finally, don't forget NotYourSweetie as a PUMA site...she used to link to PUMApac but altho she's less vocal about it than I am, my guess is she also quit that place in disgust when the site succumbed to jealousy and rightwing rhetoric at the rise of the Occupy movement.
How would you describe a site that devotes most of its time supporting Sarah Palin?
My guess would be a "Right Wing leaning" site regardless of how often the site monitor says it ain't so.
When a site exclusively calls for her entry into the race no other conclusion can be drawn.
Talk about hitting a home run that's soaring into the Obamasphere...
"Your blind loyalty to the Democratic Party, in spite of the shit they pulled, is a hell of a lot more like "worship" than is our support of Hillary". -freespirit.
Now there/that is a wordsmith.
Beware the "Concern Trolls" who state, "Oh no, somebody is trying to remind the populace that we would better off with Hillary Clinton than Barack Obama, they must be Republicans doing the calling!"
Frankly, if I were a republican, and Hillary Clinton was running instead of Barack Obama, then republican voters win either way because Hillary Clinton will use the best ideas no matter where they come from, that's the Clinton way.
Please vote my Hillary Clinton comments up at The Most Powerful Hillary Clinton speech is one you probably never saw.
Move On Readers should be reminded how they have helped rot main street because of their questionable tactics in 2008.
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