Posted on 12/20/2015 3:09:43 PM PST by jimbo123
-snip-
To many of the billionaires it felt like a mugging.
-snip-
Rove's 2012 crash is having profound effects on the 2016 Republican primary. To begin with, George W. Bush's Brain is no longer considered much of a brain. "I gave Rove $500,000. What did I get for it?
Nothing!" Langone told me. Two of Rove's most generous 2012 funders, Texas billionaires Bob Perry and Harold Simmons, have since passed away, and their heirs have turned off the cash spigot. "Everyone is still shocked Romney lost," says Simmons's widow, Annette. "I haven't committed at all." So far this year, Crossroads has raised just $784,000, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Rove insists he's still a player. "We'll be involved in the Senate races," he told me. "Depending on who the presidential nominee is, we may be involved in that, but that's a long way off." What Rove is not is anywhere near the center of the Republican Party. "But for his perch on Fox News, Karl would be in political Siberia," says a top Republican strategist. "The going joke is that he must have a picture of Roger Ailes in his underwear to keep his contract."
It's not just that Rove is personally marginalized. Donors have awakened to the realization that topflight consultants can earn millions from campaigns regardless of whether they win. "It bothers a lot of people that politics has become a cottage industry. Everyone is taking a piece of this and a slice of that," says California winemaker John Jordan, a former Rove donor. "Crossroads treated me like a child with these investor conference calls where they wouldn't tell you what was really going on. They offered platitudes and a newsletter."
(Excerpt) Read more at nymag.com ...
And Ted Cruz is the one going after this Washington Cartel, hammer and tongs.
Awwwaaaaah!
Bush’s fault.
Influence buying moved to another level now that Hillary’s in the game.500K is chump-change,gotta get to 7 figures now to be in the game.
Working under the assumption that they can support a campaign better themselves, donors are building their own organizations, staffed by operatives who report to them. “A lot of people who felt betrayed in 2012 set out to build political structures,” says Kellyanne Conway, president of the pro-Ted Cruz super-pac Keep the Promise I, which is backed by hedge-fund billionaire Robert Mercer. Mercer is a prime example of the new breed of activist donor. This presidential cycle, he has donated more than $30 million to a quartet of pro-Cruz super-pacs. A computer scientist by training, Mercer is also part owner of a political data firm called Cambridge Analytica, which boasts on its website that it employs “psychographic profiling” to recruit voters. As a result, Mercer’s pacs have shunned the traditional strategy of saturation TV coverage. Instead, Mercer is focused on targeted radio buys, digital outreach, and field organizing.
The savviest GOP candidates have capitalized on this shift. In fact, Cruz’s campaign fund-raising apparatus seems designed to let donors roll up their sleeves. Cruz contributors can specify how they want their money spent, much in the way universities allow benefactors to earmark their donations for a new science wing or aquatics center. “If you’re a donor, you can say, ‘I want to see this money used for Iowa,’” one strategist told me. “It’s a way to entice donors. They look at it like fantasy football.”
$30 million. I’d say he is determined to buy a President.
Karl makes for a perfect old lady.
He’s a snide, vicious gossip and little more.
I think they will be just as happy with Hillary as Jeb. After all “what difference does it make?”
Nice to see the voter thinking outside the box.
Very few articles have been so satisfying to read as this one.
To discover Karl Rove has lost his once highly-placed seat in Republican circles warms me. He richly deserves it, and has been responsible for an attitude that permeated the right for too long.
He doesn’t give a damn about conservative thought, ideas or policy. He is a promoter. That is all.
Nice to see the voter thinking outside the box.
The voter, or the donor?
The voter didn’t donate $30MILLION, the donor did.
Was pleasantly surprised to see Kellyanne defending Cruz on Ted Baxter’s show the other night. She did well against some puke claiming to be Ted’s best friend while simultaneously trying to destroy him.
I knew Bob Perry, he was a self made man.
I know Kenneth Langone, he is a hoot!
The going joke is that he (Rove) must have a picture of Roger Ailes in his underwear to keep his contract..
I wonder if Sheppy is, by chance, in - or has a copy of - that pic. I cannot figure out how he keeps renewing his contract.
Not true -- they can succeed if they fund actual Republican candidates. Thanks jimbo123.
If you think one individual donating 30million to one politician is nice and thinking outside the box, you might should rethink. No matter how rich you are, 30million is for something other than a pretty face.
Tokyo Rove their point girl and their bought puppets are losing. LoL.
She should be defending Cruz, she more or less works for him.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.