DNC: DoD's Propaganda Company Founded by Major Republican Donor

[Rose Siding]

Within many of the recent news reports about the U.S. military paying for propaganda to run in Iraqi newspapers was a paragraph like this, which appeared in the L.A. Times...

The operation is designed to mask any connection with the U.S. military. The Pentagon has a contract with a small Washington-based firm called Lincoln Group, which helps translate and place the stories. The Lincoln Group's Iraqi staff, or its subcontractors, sometimes pose as freelance reporters or advertising executives when they deliver the stories to Baghdad media outlets.

In essence, the military was laundering the information through a firm to "mask any connection with the U.S. military." Sounds logical, but was that the only reason? The Project on Government Oversight has this, which makes you wonder if masking connections was the only reason...

Today, Senator John Warner (R-VA) visited the Pentagon to find out why contractor Lincoln Group has been hired to pay off media outlets to place positive news articles in Iraq. What the White House probably won't be looking into is how a tiny little-known start up named the Lincoln Group landed more than $100 million in Defense Department contracts which led, in part, to the news buys.

In August, 2004, the New York Times captured the Lincoln Group's young founder, Christian Bailey, on camera at a Republican National Convention event where he talked about the importance of cultivating the next generation of donors to the Republican Party: "These are going to be the big supporters, the big donors to the Republican Party in five years' time." Bailey was co-chair of an event for the organization known as Lead21, which claims to be an organization which promotes "political involvement for business leaders." But, from the looks of their web site, Lead21 is only interested in Republican political involvement. Government Executive notes that some of Bailey's political activities have been taken down from the web in recent months.

http://www.democrats.org/a/2005/12/propaganda_comp.php

[Supersedeas]

1. Bushism is cronyism

[tofubo]

14. many hit this before

http://billmon.org/archives/001900.html

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Iraqex

http://dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/12/4/1149/53203

[usregimechange]

2. Will McCain call for Impeachment? Wow!

[donkeyotay]

3. Our tax dollars at work. A pattern of cronyism, corruption and a system

of using our own taxes to screw us with. We pay taxes, the GOP delivers the contracts, and the corporations kick back to the GOP. Circular. Reminds me of HAVA.

"a tiny little-known start up named the Lincoln Group landed more than $100 million in Defense Department contracts..."

[usregimechange]

4. Free Press?

It seems the Bush Administration does not consider free press to be
a part of the "freedom" they wanted to achieve in Iraq via bombs and
invasion.

[Supersedeas]

16. Ah, no...paid press and a pattern of propoganda

[usregimechange]

5. KICK

[cantstandbush]

6. Save your contribution money, Repubs, put it in your own pocket, you're

going to need it in the future to pay for Bush's deficits.

[usregimechange]

7. kick

[usregimechange]

8. and nominated...

[Botany]

9. So I wonder where the money trail will lead?

What a group of crooks. Can somebody just give bush a blow job so we
can investigate him?

http://www.lincolngroup.com/

check out their web page ..... Press release they were just getting the truth
out about the hard fighting Iraqi people ..... to the Iraqis?????? :rofl:
shouldn't the Iraqis already know what was happening .... they do
live there don't they?

[Norquist Nemesis]

10. Well, at least we can be sure Mr. Bailey's not CIA

The Bushies would have outted him with lightning speed.

[Rose Siding]

11. NYT: Rumsfeld Cites Contractor in Planting of Reports in Iraqi Media

Or: Pentagon Spins Scandal by Confessing That They Have No Idea What They Bought

WASHINGTON, Dec. 5 - Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld laid blame today for the possible placement by the military of news articles in the Iraqi press on the contractor who ran the program.

...

"Some people in the military signed a contract with a private contractor, and the private contactor is alleged to have written accurate stories, but paid someone in the media in Iraq to carry the story," Mr. Rumsfeld said. "That's an allegation. I don't know if it's true yet."

He added that an important question is whether the contractor was implementing American policy properly.

But Pentagon officials admit that they do not yet have a complete understanding of the program, including whether the articles were accurate and who was responsible for omitting disclaimers that are required under Defense Department guidelines.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1967154

[EVDebs]

12. We're lucky they chose a US-based firm to privatize with, hehe

DoD could have been just as easily taken in by, say, a foreign company, in which case you would have had foreign money laundered, say though the Afgan heroin crop-foreign bank int'nl finance system, say through Swiss banks or Channel Is. or Netherlands Antilles 'dutch sandwiches' --but I digress.

Bottomline Up Front, Congress allows this and there is no oversight worth talking about.

Please read Hot Money and the Politics of Debt by R T Naylor of McGill Univ and Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade, along with Tim Weiner's Blank Check. Tell me this hasn't been going on for far too long.

Oh, BTW, go these foreign firms make political donations to favored Congressmen...through shell companies in the US ? Naw, couldn't be happening.

[usregimechange]

13. kick

[Toots]

15. What does Lincoln Group do in America

If they do this in Iraq what do they do here?

[shance]

20. Thats a great question Toots.

Probably the same thing.

[madmark]

17. Cronyism mixed with incompetence and duplicity and credibility

killing; why not just have a US Gov publication in arabic distributed in Iraq called: "Positive News About Iraq" and put all your positive stories there instead of trying to to buy credibility by using fake news fronts.

[Botany]

18. Oh look what I found ....an e mail link and help wanted @ Lincoln Group

The e mail address for the Lincoln group.

[e-mail] I am sure they would love to hear from us.

google Lincoln Group and look around their site :rofl:

And they are hiring too.

Lincoln Group is seeking an experienced Project Director to manage a variety of Information Operations and Communications Campaigns which will target foreign audiences in support of Special Operations Command (SOCOM). The work would be based primarily in the company’s offices in Washington DC, with some travel to Florida and worldwide locations.

Required:

Experience planning and managing complex media campaigns to foreign audiences
Responsibility for planning, staffing, and managing complex projects
Experience in emerging, fast-growth environments in conflict zones
Experience in integrated processes (including Subcontractor Management)
Responsiveness, productive collaboration and communication with clients, corporate headquarters, and government agencies
Familiarity with Risk Management procedures and practices
Know how of Human Resource Planning and Training (including working with expatriate personnel and local nationals)
Current Secret Clearance

The Project Director will be responsible for maintaining all schedule milestones of this contract. Additional information will be provided to short-listed candidates after execution of a non-disclosure agreement.

Desirable:

Information Operations experience
Experience planning and overseeing measures of effectiveness to ensure campaigns achieve client objectives
Experience working and managing similar projects abroad
Experience managing projects in hostile or semi-permissive environments
A network of, or ability to develop, corporate PR, communications, and public outreach capabilities with foreign business, tribal, and political leaders; media outlets; opinion leaders and decision makers


Compensation:
Salary: $80-120K base plus bonus and profit sharing
Stock Options
Benefits including medical and dental coverage

To Apply:
E-mail a resume and a summary of the most relevant experience in Word or plain text format to [e-mail]. Materials sent in PDF format or via fax are not accepted.

[madrchsod]

19. this is what we are up against

a fully funded attack on the core of the democracy. they are not going away and what do we have to match them?

[shance]

21. Our voices, our numbers, our knowledge and our tax dollars.

Put them all to use and in harmony and we can kick some.

[Soylent Green]

22. Resist

I agree- we 'libruls' have been pushing for the last year and look how far we pushed back-- all the way from junior's 2005 acceptance speech after the so-called election, "I got political capital, and I intend to spend it" puffery to one year later- a politically and morally bankrupt, deflated, deflating, "I'm MELTING!" of Nov. 2005! Who would of thunk it possible !?

[1776Forever]

23. Yet one more incident of wrong doing - how low can they go?

They not only manipulated the news but the BIG news to me is who they gave 100 million to do it for them! Where is the justice in this? What did we get for 100 million?

How many people in Iraq read this kind of stuff and how stupid do they think the people of Iraq are? Can't they "read" between the lines? They live this stuff daily. I would love to hear what an Iraqi who lives in Baghdad things about this! Why don't we hear that in our news - oh that's right the reporters can't get out of the green zone. Right! But they think that this stuff was read and believed? Right!

How many more little contracts are there out there the tax payers don't know about? We know of all the bought for militants we use there who make 10 times the amount our solders make each day! How many more little private deals have been made over and above the heads of our so-called elected officials that no one knows about? Time will tell but it may be too late.
:banghead:

[AlecBGreen]

24. Go Warner!

If VA has to have a Republican Senator, Im glad we have a guy like Warner. God knows hes not perfect but at least he has proven himself to be in posession of a working brain and backbone. Go get em!

:woohoo:
-Alec

p.s. Hes the only Republican Ive ever voted for, and looking at todays new crop of GOoPers, he's probably the last...

[leftchick]

25. Andrea Mitchel did a report on This last week!

It was a long one on the NBC nightly News and on Hardball with video of Mr. Bailey. I can't believe it took the DNC this long to come out with a statement about it. Better late than never I suppose.

[progressoid]

26. OMG, this is shocking.

BASTARDOS.

[mojowork_n]

27. Just goes to show what 100's of millions in DoD money can do

Reminds me of another "patriot", David H Brooks, CEO of DHB Industries, the company that makes those 'good' armored vests that were such a hot button issue in the 2004 campaign. Brooks has sliced himself off a couple of 100 million (that's $$ 200,000,000, with all the zeroes) in salary, bonuses, and (quite possibly) shady stock dumping.

From the CommonDreams article last week,

"... The New York Daily News estimates that the bat mitzvah Brooks threw for his daughter over the weekend cost an estimated $10 million. Virtually every musician that you might guess would appeal to a 50-something Long Island CEO was flown in by private jet: Aerosmith, Tom Petty, the Eagles' Don Henley and Joe Walsh, who performed with Fleetwood Mac's Stevie Nicks, Kenny G. As a likely concession to his daughter's tastes, Brooks also booked 50 Cent, DJ AM (Nicole Richie's fiancée) and rap diva Ciara.

According to Daily News gossip columnist Lloyd Grove, Brooks was so pumped for Aerosmith that he changed his wardrobe for their performance from a “black-leather, metal-studded suit -- accessorized with biker-chic necklace chains and diamonds from Chrome Hearts jewelers -- into a hot-pink suede version of the same lovely outfit.” The CEO then reportedly mounted the stage, clowned with Steven Tyler and insisted that his teenage nephew be permitted to sit in on drums."

Brooks/Belshezaar's contribution to the War Effort -- the highly touted 'safer' vests -- are turning out to be nothing of the kind. But for generating the sort of highly lucrative income from them that he has, he will no doubt earn a Presidential Medal of Freedom, a pat on the back, and "a heckuva job" public accolades and plaudits from our C-I-C.

Or maybe if this story starts making the rounds in print and on broadcast news, he won't!

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/1201-30.htm

If these guys are throwing that kind of money around for 13 year old's parties, and for "information campaigns", what are they doing with their Really Big, less traceable, more focused and directed spending?