Right-Wing Bloggers Gloriously Prove They Have No Idea How Elections Work

We all know the tea party used to go to great lengths to exaggerate the size of crowds at their events.  But even so, they were at least capable of drawing something that could legitimately be called a crowd.  That no longer seems to be the case.  Mike Flynn, a co-founder of Breitbart, ran a "campaign" for disgraced Republican Congressman Aaron Schock's vacated seat, and one of his big events was a "Flags and Fun" rally featuring Jim Hoft in the same Quincy Illinois park that had hosted several large tea party events in the past.  This time around, they couldn't even draw 50 people:

What's more, the right-wing blogosphere went all in for Flynn.  Breitbart.com, of course, wrote numerous articles attacking his primary opponent LaHood (often, unsurprisingly, without noting the conflict of interest), but that was just the tip of the iceberg.  Many (most?) rightwing bloggers billed this as an epic battle between the "grassroots" and the establishment.  And guess what?  The establishment, aka LaHood, won the primary by over 40% of the vote.  It was an absolute landslide.  It was almost as if conservative bloggers were trying to prove that they are completely beholden to the whims of the establishment GOP.  When they're not being actively propped up by Americans for Prosperity, or Fox News, or the health insurance or coal industries, they really have no ability to make much of a difference in elections, even in deep red districts like Illinois 18.

A RINO's Guide to Wooing Cranky Breitbart Editors (With Photos!)

What's that? You're a Republican politician who doesn't actually care about conservative values but likes using the government to further your business interests and personal wealth? Worried that conservative bloggers will tear you apart for pretending to be a conservative when you're actually not?

Fear not! Because here in the great state of Missouri we have the perfect example of how a GOP establishment candidate can easily win over the entire Breitbart operation just by showing them a little "affection" (if you know what I mean)!

Ann Wagner is the embodiment of the GOP establishment. She was appointed as the Ambassador to Luxembourg by President Bush. She was the chair of ultimate GOP insider Roy Blunt's successful Missouri Senate campaign where he defeated a more conservative challenger before trouncing Robin Carnahan. She was one of the finalists to run the Republican National Committee. And her husband is a registered lobbyist and Vice President of Government and Public Affairs at Enterprise, so her election would be the perfect example of the GOP establishment's favorite hobby: crony capitalism!

Not only that, but Wagner's opponent in the GOP primary is Ed Martin, a guy who was at the original St. Louis tea party rally and was on the tea party board before deciding to run against Russ Carnahan in the 2010 election. As a former Chief of Staff for Matt Blunt, Martin definitely is not a pure "outsider," but he also is not the embodiment of the national Republican Party as is Ann Wagner.

So you might think that Wagner would have a hard time wooing the "rebellious" "edgy" "unapologetic" "conservatives" who run Andrew Breitbart's sites. How wrong you'd be!

In fact, Wagner has not only charmed the Breitbart gang into avoiding attacks on her, she's actually gotten them to publish attacks on her tea party opponent! She's demonstrated that what they really care about isn't actually conservatism, but rather making sure that they get their piece of the pie.

But Adam, you're saying, it must be so incredibly hard to woo such iconoclast firebrands! No, it's really not! At least not if you are a wealthy, well-connected GOP fundraiser! Here are a few simple steps demonstrated by Ann Wagner that you can follow to ensure that the ever-so-principled "conservative bloggers" at Breitbart's sites will pretend that you represent the heart and soul of the Republican Party.

First, they really like to be taken to sporting events. See if you can arrange some VIP passes for them to make them feel special:

Andrew Breitbart and Big Government Editor Mike Flynn at a Cardinals game with Ann Wagner, Ray Wagner, and GOP operative Chip Gerdes.

Of course, a little alcohol never hurts an effort to help "grease the wheels" for some future positive coverage!

The especially red-faced & glassy-eyed Andrew Breitbart, Ann Wagner, and Mike Flynn in downtown St. Louis.

Formal events are a great place to schmooze!

Wagner with Breitbart editor Dana Loesch and "Gateway Pundit" Jim Hoft. Hoft wrote a post attacking Ed Martin on the Loesch-"edited" site Big Journalism. This was after Breitbart blogger Dan Riehl had sent a "warning shot" by attacking Martin on behalf of Wagner on Big Government.

Don't forget to introduce Breitbart editors to GOP celebrities so they can feel important!

Ann Wagner introducing New Jersey Governor Chris Christie to Big Journalism editor Dana Loesch.

And of course if you can get the manager of the radio station one of them works at to endorse you, you're as good as gold:

Ann Wagner is introduced by John Beck, the Senior VP at Loesch's home radio station KFTK, at a fundraiser hosted at Beck's home.

Are there any other secrets to wooing the Breitbart gang? Who knows? Wagner is a record-breaking fundraiser after all (and Breitbart did just raise $10 million for...something). And since Breitbart steadfastly refuses to release any information on who funds his site, Wagner can help him however much she wants without anyone being the wiser.

So, to summarize: it doesn't matter to Breitbart bloggers that Wagner is a "country club conservative" who perfectly represents the GOP establishment that the tea party fought against. It doesn't matter to Breitbart bloggers that Wagner's opponent in the primary is a guy who stood with the St. Louis Tea Party at their first rally and has been closely connected with them ever since. All that matters to the Breitbart bloggers is that Wagner promises to give them a little piece of the pie. And if you're a wealthy, well-connected GOP moderate, that's all that will matter to them about you too!

Questions About Big Government's Hit Piece On Ed Martin

After Dana Loesch criticized St. Louis Tea Party founder Bill Hennessy for attempting to defend Ed Martin against a recent Big Government post, Bill Hennessy predictably apologized to Big Government editor Mike Flynn and Loesch and pretty much everybody else. Interestingly, this is the second time in the past couple months that Hennessy had to retreat with his tail between his legs for advocating on behalf of Ed Martin. In May, after Loesch said she was "aggravated" by Hennessy writing a post saying that Martin was "the tea party candidate," Hennessy had to issue multiple clarifications saying that the post was just his opinion and didn't represent the views of the tea party.

But Hennessy's bowing to authority notwithstanding, I think there are a lot of questions that can be raised about why Big Government was used as a vehicle for a hit piece against Ed Martin. Here are a few:

Why would Big Government publish a post about a Republican primary over a year away from the actual election? I am fairly familiar with Big Government and the site is generally not used as a place for arguments about Republican primaries. In fact, a casual glance shows that out of the last 100 posts on Big Government, the hit piece on Martin is the only attempt to get involved in GOP primaries (It's probably even worse than this, but I'm not interested in spending time on it). When Big Government is used as a forum for primary arguments, it would generally be for races with clear "establishment" candidates versus more conservative or tea partyish challangers, but the Martin/Wagner race does not fit that billing.

Are Mike Flynn and/or Dan Riehl exchanging favors with Ann Wagner? Why would they avoid their site's usual protocol to get involved in a Congressional primary fight in Missouri? It's worth noting that Riehl advocated for Ann Wagner on Big Government during the race for RNC chairs as well. Editor Flynn also spoke positively about her. Is there some reason they're intervening on her behalf rather than letting Missouri voters make up their own mind?

Does Dana Loesch have a reason to root for Wagner? As mentioned above, Loesch has twice attacked Bill Hennessy after Hennessy advocated for Ed Martin. Yet, as far as I know, she never criticized Riehl for sticking his nose in the Missouri primary. In fact, she gave Riehl a #FollowFriday shout-out on Twitter today after Riehl's attacks on Martin. Wagner also used Dana Loesch's show to announce her candidacy. What are Loesch's reasons for apparently taking sides against Martin, whom she supported during the last election? By the way, for the record, Loesch has now supported the establishment candidate over the tea partier in pretty much every local election of consequence since the tea party began.

Does Ann Wagner have anything to do with the hit job on Martin? Is sure would be strange for a national blog to randomly attack Wagner's opponent without any provocation. Does Wagner's campaign have something to do with it?

Obviously, I'm no fan of Ed Martin. But I do find these recent events a little puzzling.

This Is How Their Game Works

In response to revelations that they shamelessly edited both Judy Ancel and Don Giljim's posts to make it appear that they were saying things they did not say, Breitbart hacks are demanding that people respond to their latest nonsense. Their claim is that because Ancel misquoted a guy in the film, that somehow justifies them taking a claim that she was attributing to others for the sake of class discussion and pretending she was endorsing it herself. The argument is stupid beyond words. But that's not the point. The point is that they doing what they always do, using completely nonsensically idiotic distortions of language and logic to try to take up the time of anyone who argues with them. No matter how idiotically stupid their claims are, they will demand, "why don't you respond to this! This proves we're right!" Not because they actually believe it, but because they think it makes them look better.

So, sadly succumbing to their latest mind-numbingly stupid claims, here are a few obvious points:

If they really believed the full quote was an endorsement of violence, then they could have included it in the original video. However, they waited four days and waited until they were called out before manufacturing their ridiculous excuse.

Attributing a quote to another person is not the same thing as endorsing that quote. If I say, Dana Loesch says "Breitbart walks on water," I am obviously not saying that I believe Breitbart walks on water. And let's say Dana Loesch actually said, "Breitbart walks on orange juice," but I accidentally misquoted her. It's still quite obvious that I'm not claiming I believe Breitbart walks on water. This is clear to any person who learned the meaning of the term "says" back in Kindergarten

They still have provided no explanation whatsoever for why they took words out of the middle of Don Giljim's quote in order to distort the meaning to the exact opposite of what he said. Or why they ignored Giljim saying elsewhere that he rejects the tactics.

But honestly, my saying this won't change anything, because all they'll do is try to find some other absurd abuse of the English language to claim that maliciously editing video isn't really the same thing as being dishonest.

Big Gov. "Inadvertantly" Forgets They Cut Out The Middle of Giljim's Quote

Big Government has issued the first correction of their smear campaign against Judy Ancel and Don Giljim. As I just pointed out, they falsely pretended to only have edited the beginning and end of Giljim's quote, when in fact they had cut out a section of the middle that changed the entire meaning of his quote. Now they've issued a correction saying that they "inadvertently" forgot that they had cut out the middle of Giljim's quote.


Nice try. Lots more exposure of their "inadvertent" BS to come.

Lt. Gov. Cowers Before Breitbart Bloggers: Won't Defend Tilley

Earlier this week, the St. Louis Tea Party baselessly and absurdly attacked GOP House Speaker Tilley, questioning his leadership and judgment and suggesting he was associated with the New Black Panther Party:

When Tilley had the audacity to respond to their baseless allegations, the tea party flipped out, and even enlisted the editor of Breitbart's Big Government to help threaten Tilley, Peter Kinder, and Carl Bearden:

Of course, if the St. Louis tea party had any real political power left or ability to organize, they wouldn't need to be begging Breitbart bloggers for help. But more importantly, Peter Kinder was too scared to even stand up for his supposed friend Tilley, instead deciding to grovel to Flynn and asking to be left out of it.

Considering that the tea party has been attacking Tilley for weeks, is Kinder really so gutless as to not stick up for his ally when he is being baselessly smeared by Breitbart bloggers? How far the GOP has fallen.

Tilley's "Race-Baiting" Comments Referred to Tea Party Video

As noted in my previous post, Breitbart bloggers are freaking out and threatening to "go nuclear" if Steve Tilley does not appear on Dana Loesch's radio show and "walk back" his claim that the St. Louis Tea Party was "race-baiting." Just in case anyone was tempted to suggest that Tilley was not referring to the St. Louis Tea Party, I wanted to point out that Carl Bearden specifically said that Tilley's comments were being made in reference to the St. Louis Tea Party video created by Darin Morley of Reboot Congress:

Big Gov. Editor Threatens Tilley if He Doesn't Appear On Loesch's Radio Show And "Walk Back His Comments"!

Backstory: the St. Louis Tea Party doesn't like the proposal to restore control of the St. Louis Police Department to the City of St. Louis. In fact, they dislike it so much they made a blatantly race-baiting video suggesting that the bill had something to do with the New Black Panther Party (and remember, in tea party language, New Black Panther Party = "wants to kill crackers"). In fact, the tea party even suggested that House Speaker Steve Tilley is "associated with the New Black Panther Party" because he supported the bill.

Because of this, Tilley correctly claimed that opponents of the bill were "race-baiting." The tea party, as is their standard operating procedure, idiotically claimed that their bringing up the NBBP had nothing to do with race and that somehow Tilley was injecting race into the discussion.

The tea party and Carl Bearden had been sniping at each other for weeks, but it intensified today. And that's where it gets really interesting, because today Mike Flynn, the editor of Breitbart's Big Government, threatened that Bearden and Tilley would get slammed nationally if Tilley did not agree to appear on Dana Loesch's radio show and "walk back the comment." It's a pretty clear threat:


So what happens? Does Tilley cave to the threat? Does he stand his ground? I'll guess we'll know soon enough!

Update: Had to correct the post to reflect that Tilley will be on the show so the threat is specifically about whether he "walks backs his attacks on the tea party." But of course, the threats are the really funny part! Why is Mike Flynn injecting himself on an issue he does not understand?

When Breitbart Bloggers Attack

Chip Gerdes (TookieW on Twitter) and Dana Loesch listen in awe as Andrew Breitbart explains how James O'Keefe is an innocent victim of the liberal media

Yesterday, I wrote about the pathetic attempt of right-wing hacks to attack me based on a fake Twitter account. However, that attack was actually the culmination of a series of disingenuous attacks by a group of Breitbart bloggers this weekend that revealed the moral depravity of the group. As noted yesterday, my post on John Burns' nonsense must have struck a nerve.

Anyway, after writing that post , Republican operative and Breitbart collaborator Chip Gerdes (know as @TookieW on twitter), started claiming that I was "sexist" and had a "hatred of women," apparently because I previously have written posts criticizing Dana Loesch:

I asked Gerdes, albeit in slightly more dramatic language, what my post about John Burns had to do with "attacking conservative women," but it didn't slow him down:


In fact, this was part of a pattern from Gerdes of making brazenly mean-spirited attacks:


In fact, as if accusing me of "hating women" isn't bad enough, when 25thCenturyGirl jumped into the discussion, Gerdes claimed that I "attack children:"

Having one Breitbart lackey attacking me with blatant lies wasn't really news, but what made it strange was that a large group of Breitbart minions quickly jumped in, and they apparently were familiar with things like where I work. Here's "Liberty Chick:"


Adam Sharp:


Larry O'Connor, Editor in Chief of Breitbart TV:

Dana Loesch, Editor in Chief of Big Journalism:


For the record, we didn't play dodgeball; we played kickball. And I was picked first, thankyouverymuch!

And finally, Mike Flynn, Editor in Chief at Big Government (not to be confused with St. Louis's Mike Flynn), attempted (and came very close to pulling off) a RT:


I certainly am very critical of Dana Loesch's lies and hypocrisy on this blog, just as I am critical of the lies and hypocrisy of Bill Hennessy, Jim Hoft, Jim Durbin, and John Burns. Loesch has, on many occasions, used her megaphone as a radio host to try to destroy the lives of innocent people, and I certainly am not going to sit back and allow that to happen just because a bunch of Breitbart minions will shriek about it. Anyway, since I, unlike them, am interested in honest discussion, I told them to provide some evidence for their claims:



Naturally, they passed. Gerdes just claimed "it was obvious" if you look at the blog, and Liberty Chick played stupid:

25Century Girl also called them out and asked them for evidence, and of course they ignored the request:

And Chip Gerdes revealed just how absurd (and unserious) his claim was when he told me that the reasons I'm sexist is because other people apparently said mean things about Dana Loesch in an RFT article:

That's all they got. Seriously. Anyway, after this embarrassing performance by the Breitbart roving Twitter gang, I sent them off with this:

This whole episode demonstrates just how incredibly pathetic the average right-wing blog reader has become. The fact that this group of people, including 3 editors of the Big websites, can get away with mean-spirited personal attacks based on absolutely no evidence whatsoever is a testament to the fact that their audience simply doesn't care about evidence. They can scream out vicious attacks without a shred of supporting evidence because the readers of the Big sites are indifferent to standards of good journalism or human decency. However, that just makes it that much more important that mainstream media outlets and honest conservatives call out the hatred and shoddy attacks from this group, rather than giving them a further platform for this corrosive nonsense. They are not going to police themselves because they have no incentive to do so: but members of society who actually care about truth and decency have a duty to stand against these slime attacks. Fortunately, I know how to handle their garbage, but when they pick on people who aren't used to it, as they often do, they can do some real damage. It's up to the rest of us to make sure that this doesn't happen.