AFP’s Bag Of Dirty Tricks

Americans For Prosperity, the Koch Bros.-group supported by Nashville moneybags Lee Beaman which is bankrolling the anti-AMP movement, has been caught perpetrating a voter suppression campaign in North Carolina.

Showing it’s nothing more than a Lee Atwater-style band of dirty tricksters, AFP was busted sending confusing, error-riddled “official” voter application forms to hundreds of North Carolina voters … and a cat. They were busted when complaints started flooding into the State Board of Elections:

The form includes incorrect or conflicting information, as outlined below, according to the State Board of Elections.

• At the top, the form states voter registrations are due 30 days before an election to the State Board of Elections’ office. Below, in smaller type, it states the deadline is 25 days before the election.

The deadline to register to vote is actually 25 days before the general election, but people should send information to their county elections board, not the state board, Lawson said. If voters do send their information to the state board, it will be forwarded to the appropriate county board, Lawson said.

• The first page also states people should return the registration to the N.C. Secretary of State’s office, though the envelope is addressed to the State Board of Elections.

• It states the Secretary of State’s office has an elections division and can answer questions about registration.

The Secretary of State’s office does not handle elections, Lawson said, though other states do house their elections division within their secretary of state’s office. The form also gives the wrong phone number for the Secretary of State’s office – the number is actually for the State Board of Elections.

• The form states that after voters mail in their information, they will be notified of their precinct by their local county clerk.

“There’s no county clerk that would do these things,” said Lawson. “It would come from the county board of elections or the elections director, under their signature.”

• The registration form also includes the wrong ZIP code for the State Board of Elections. The ZIP code associated with the board’s post office box is 27611, and the board’s office ZIP code is 27603.

Alison Beal of Wake Forest received one of the forms at her home, but it was addressed to her brother-in-law, who lives in Caldwell County. Beal is not a member of Americans for Prosperity and says her brother-in-law would not be a member either.

Beal said she quickly noticed the inaccuracies because she has been involved in past voter registration drives. She knew there was no elections division within the Secretary of State’s office, Beal said.

“I went to the Board of Elections website so I could make sure about what my suspicions were,” she said. “I’ve always been a big proponent of voting. I was like, ‘You know, this is really irritating.’ ”

Honest mistakes? Doubtful. Seems like this was sent to likely Democrats, for one thing. The idea being to spread confusion and misinformation, so people are given the idea that it’s just easier not to bother to vote.

It’s a neat trick. It’s a felony to deliberately misinform voters. AFP has plausible deniability here, “oh our woopsies, sorry!” Meanwhile, they’ve confused hundreds of people in left-leaning Raleigh. Nice try, assholes. Does anyone think this works?

Here’s where groups like Americans For Prosperity always stumble. They assume voters are stupid. They assume people don’t know better. They assume people aren’t interested and don’t care. In other words, they believe their own bullshit. What they miss is that the more you try to prevent people from voting, the more those same people are going to go the extra mile to vote, just to prove you wrong.

And these are the dishonest players who Lee Beaman has brought to Nashville to fight against mass transit and take over our school board. Watch your mailboxes, Nashville. If they’re playing dirty in North Carolina you can be damn sure they’re going to play dirty here.

Things Don’t Go Better With Koch

You know what I always say: nothing screams “small government” like a national corporate astroturf group getting your state legislature to crush a municipal transit project.

This won’t mean anything to anyone outside of Nashville, but the Amp has been a hotly debated, very controversial bus project proposed for our city, which sorely needs to improve its craptacular mass transit. I have some good friends in the “Stop-Amp” crowd and some good friends in the “Amp-Yes!” crowd and I’ve been on the fence until now.

The best argument the Stop-Amp folks had was that while the project is a good idea, the route was all wrong. But they pretty much ditched that argument when they got the state Senate to basically ban all mass transit projects in the city. How’s that small government workin’ for ya, folks? The fact that the major funder behind this nonsense is the awful Lee Beaman, who owns several major car dealerships in the city, might strike one as rather self-serving, as well.

So now we have the Kochs stinking up our capitol, and be careful who you align yourselves with, folks. Because having turned the state of Wisconsin into what Charlie Pierce calls “a wholly-owned subsidiary of Koch Industries,” it looks like Tennessee is next:

AFP pushes for low taxes, less government spending, more accountability and better schools, Ogles said. The Amp wasn’t the only excitement last week for the group, which has three employees but plans to double its staff soon.

AFP hailed a Senate committee’s passage of school voucher legislation, though it wasn’t as broad as the proposal the organization lobbied for, and the General Assembly’s approval of a measure requiring Gov. Bill Haslam to get legislative approval before expanding TennCare.

Not bad for an outfit that got started here just nine months ago with a budget that Ogles calls “sizable” but won’t disclose. Ogles, one of two registered lobbyists on the staff, said Americans for Prosperity-Tennessee doesn’t endorse or contribute to political campaigns. But he said it saw a political gold mine — and a national launching pad — in Republican-dominated Tennessee.

“With supermajorities in both houses,” he said, “Tennessee is a great state to pass model legislation that can be leveraged in other states.”

Umm … how about some accountability by revealing your budget and donors? No? Gee, I wonder why not.

Is Tennessee ready to be a Mid-South subsidiary of Koch Industries? It’s worked so well for Wisconsin, which has continued to bleed jobs since the Kochs installed Scott Walker in the governor’s office.

Still Boycotting Lee Beaman

Republican moneybags Lee Beaman has donated to numerous horrible political efforts over the years — the Swift Boat Veterans For Truth and the racist English-Only effort come to mind. He’s also shockingly anti-gay, leading the charge against Nashville’s anti-discrimination ordinance, which is surprising considering some rumors I heard about some parties a few years ago. Rumors, hey, they can be wrong. Or not. Let’s just leave it at that.

So it’s no shocker to read that he’s contributing to the Koch Bros.’ Americans For Prosperity.

No, I’m not shocked, but I am outraged. Thank goodness I don’t own my Toyota anymore. But when I did, I found I enjoyed the service at Franklin’s Alexander Toyota much more. I don’t know what Dane Alexander’s politics are — he’s probably a Republican, aren’t they all? I really don’t care. As long as he’s not funneling millions of dollars to poisonous right wing extremists like the Swift Boat Veterans, English Only, and Americans For Prosperity, I could care less.

Boycott Lea Beaman. I’ve been doing it for years. Starve the beast.

The Unbearable Intellectual Lightness Of Being A Tea Bagger

Via a Nashville City Paper commentary by Stephen George, I learn that Nashville car dealer Lee Beaman has donated land he owns out by Hickory Hollow Mall to serve as a temporary “Tent City” for the homeless. It replaces the one down by the river that got washed away in the flood.

Lee Beaman is someone I’ve picked on a lot here, so this is probably the only time you will ever see me write something nice about him, but props to Beaman for at least giving the homeless a place to live. I don’t know for how long, and I don’t know why: maybe it’s a fuck you to the Chevrolet dealer across the street from the site . Maybe it’s because he really cares. Who knows. It’s only temporary, and the location is not ideal because it’s so very far away from downtown services, but at least it’s something.

But Beaman’s action, while temporary, has sparked the usual NIMBYism, including this:

But all is not well in Hickory Hollow. As word leaked out early Wednesday that a new Tent City had emerged near the Target on Bell Road, some neighbors took to mass emails with their complaints. A tea party-affiliated group appeared ready to mobilize against the landowner who donated the plot (no word as of press time on the lasting effects of the cognitive dissonance in self-proclaimed libertarians telling a private landowner what to do with his property). Worries of increased crime and concerns about safety swirled.

That’s so priceless. A Tea Party-affiliated group going after Lee Beaman, the Tennessee GOP’s big moneybags? Oh, my. And it gets better. From WSMV:

Councilman Sam Coleman said he has gotten so many calls about this issue that he plans to hold a town hall meeting next Thursday.

So just to recap: a Tea Party group objects to what a private property owner is doing on his own property and they are calling on the help of the government? Wait a minute. I thought you people hated the government? I thought you wanted the government off the backs of private property owners?

I am literally rolling on the floor laughing my ass off at this point.

Accountability, It’s Such A Lovely Word

I’m glad that GOP moneybags Lee Beaman’s extremist political views are finally getting some attention. Some of us have been on Beaman’s tail for years. I can’t tell you how many progressives in Nashville I’ve urged not to buy their new hybrids from Beaman. Seems the wealthy wackadoodle profiting handsomely from hybrid-loving liberals is the Tennessee’s GOPs best kept secret.

Anyway, I thought I’d take this opportunity to remind folks of another favorite Beaman cause: fighting Governor Bredesen’s “bunker” project.

Beaman has bankrolled a group, Tennesseans for Accountability in Government (TAG), that was created to battle the project, and it has held press conferences and blitzed the media with releases castigating the Bredesens, who insist the 13,000-square-foot entertainment annex, called Conservation Hall, is needed to host parties and other large gatherings.

According to the City Paper, in fact, Beaman sank $30-$40,000 into that lost cause. And that doesn’t include the additional $18,000 he paid donated to organizations and politicians who coincidentally attacked the project immediately after.

Yet another losing cause Lee Beaman sank his money into. Far be it from me to give fiscal advice to anyone, but the adage “a fool and his money are soon parted” seems appropriate here.

Anyway, now that Republicans are in charge of state government, I wonder if we’ll be hearing much from TAG. I’m thinking …. not.

Yet Another Reason To Hate Lee Beaman

I’ve been boycotting Nashville auto magnate Lee Beaman for years, ever since I learned he gave a few thousand dollars to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Now every time I see a Toyota Prius with that little “Beaman” emblem I cringe.

I just can’t imagine giving one penny to a man who so freely opens his ample wallet to such heinous wingnut causes as the Presidential Coalition LLC (organized to Swift Boat Hillary Clinton), the Swift Boat Veterans smearmongers, and now, surprise surprise, passing English Only:

Nashville English First raised $89,722.76 for its campaign, according to campaign financial disclosures released today.

Of that, ProEnglish of Arlington, Va., contributed $82,500. A second donor, Nashville businessman Lee Beaman, gave $6,000, meaning two donors funded more than 98 percent of Nashville English First’s campaign.

Way to go Lee Beaman! Now you’ve joined forces with a group identified as a hate group.


By the way, this certainly reaffirms my belief that English Only was supported by the local Republican Party merely as a way to generate a mailing list of registered wingnut voters in Davidson County and get an outside group to pay for it.

You know, I’ve been a loyal Toyota customer for about 20 years, but I bought my last car from Alexander in Franklin. I have no idea what that guy’s politics is down there, frankly I don’t care. But I do know he isn’t financing divisive political battles on the local and national stage.

Lee Beaman: bad for Nashville.

Swift Boat Smearmonger Won’t Pay Up

Of course he won’t! That election is over! The lies served their purpose, and now it’s time to move on, folks! I mean my God, we all knew it wasn’t true! That’s the point of these smear campaigns–they don’t have to be true!

Via ABC News.com:

A Vegas gambling expert counts himself among those questioning Texas billionaire T. Boone Pickens’ refusal to pay $1 million to Swift boat veterans who claim they won Pickens’ challenge to disprove political claims he made in 2004.

[…]

Pickens’ wager originated when he offered $1 million to anyone who could find falsities in the claims made by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group he had financially supported during the 2004 presidential election. He issued the challenge during a November 2007 dinner for the American Spectator magazine.

But whether Pickens had offered the monetary reward for falsities found in the campaign as a whole or just in the televised ads came into question when Kerry himself answered the call, offering to meet Pickens and provide him with information that Kerry said would debunk the allegations.

Pickens refused to meet with the Massachusetts senator because, as his spokesperson Jay Rosser told ABCNews.com, “none of the material Kerry or the crewmen provided was germane to the ads.”

Wow, is this like how the White House refused to open the EPA’s e-mail so it could claim no knowledge that greenhouse gases are pollutants? Is “la-la-la-I-can’t-hear-you” the best the conservative movement can offer? How … how … sad. But back to our story:

But when Pickens was sent a letter and photocopies of evidence supporting Kerry’s military record by veterans last week, it was yet again not enough to seal the deal.

“[Pickens] sent us a brief letter back saying the same thing [that he said to Kerry],” Del Sanudsky, a Swift boat veteran who served alongside Kerry in Vietnam, told ABCNews.com. 

In the June 25 letter sent from Pickens to Sanudsky, Pickens thanks the veterans for their research but still denies any obligation to pay them the $1 million.

[…]

“We have 11 different falsehoods that the [Swift Boat Veterans for Truth] came out with in 2004. We have documents, videos, editorials and depositions not just by my boat crew but other eyewitnesses who were involved in the operations.”

Sanudsky added that while his group has come up with “everything Pickens asked Kerry for in November,” it has all been for nothing.

Quit yer complainin’! That was last election, I tell you! There’s a new Swift Boat smear coming out targeting Barack Obama, this one has something to do with bizarre kerning on a Hawaiian birth certificate or some such. Which is strange, since John McCain is the guy who wasn’t born in the United States.

Of course there’s no more substance to this bizarre smear than there was to the Kerry attacks. But that won’t stop partisan moneybags like Nashville’s own Lee Beaman from ponying up for this sleazeball campaign, too. Just like they did the Swift Boat smearmongers. Hey, ends justify the means! It doesn’t matter which gutter they have to swim in, as long as we can keep Republicans in power.

As good a reason to boycott Beaman Automotive as any, in my book. I know I bought my Toyota hybrid elsewhere. Suck on it, Lee Beaman.