Hard-Nosed Advice From Veteran Lobbyist: ‘Win Ugly or Lose Pretty’

[4bucksagallon]

Source: The NY Times

If the oil and gas industry wants to prevent its opponents from slowing its efforts to drill in more places, it must be prepared to employ tactics like digging up embarrassing tidbits about environmentalists and liberal celebrities, a veteran Washington political consultant told a room full of industry executives in a speech that was secretly recorded.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/31/us/politics/pr-executives-western-energy-alliance-speech-taped.html?_r=1

---

I've heard of Meth labs now we have Koch labs..... This guy is in the mix...
http://www.indyweek.com/flash/americans%20for%20prosperity.swf

[Kalidurga]

1. Do they really think that environmentalists and liberal celebrities

can't employ investigative tactics themselves and do a more thourough job?

[billhicks76]

2. NSA

They can have their buddies at NSA do this. It's already happening.

[redruddyred]

16. can you tell us more?

[billhicks76]

25. Do You Read?

Much of what NSA does is outsourced to private military contractors and law firms that are aligned with the corporate right wing. They also represent the oil companies.

[redruddyred]

26. no need to be so rude

thanks for the brief explanation.

[Cha]

3. Bullshite.. those sacks of shite are always ugly.. nothing new. Every GD day..

“I get up every morning and I try to figure out how to screw with the labor unions — that’s my offense,” Mr. Berman said in his speech to the Western Energy Alliance. “I am just trying to figure out how I am going to reduce their brand.”

[blackspade]

7. Typical corporate thinking...

Labor unions are a 'brand' to these assholes.

[jtuck004]

4. One could learn a lot from this. n/t

[mazzarro]

10. Yes indeed!

It is an advice and lesson that progressives and liberals better learn quickly. The idea that "progressives are better than that" need to be dispelled forthright. The RW thuggish-nuts know that creating new realities on the ground is what matters because they rarely get rolled back.

[jtuck004]

20. I'm not so sure progressives need to adopt such tactics. That's just useful in choosing between out

existing plantations. There might be better choices.

I think Bernie Sanders had it right - need to get millions of people in an org across 50 states, develop a Progressive agenda, and get them all to demand it. It will take money and people, it won't be easy, but it's certainly do-able, and perhaps the only thing that has a real chance of doing things for the working people.

It would have the added bonus of making the above largely irrelevant. The little fights would be there, but it wouldn't be about the fight any longer. It would develop from a different philosophy, that of getting people behind something they want to build, not just defeating what they don't like.

It is useful to certain philosophies, however...

[yellowcanine]

5. Well now, that is kind of an "embarrassing tidbit" about Richard Berman, isn't it?

Anyway some of his tactics sound downright sophomoric, like something James O'Keefe might dream up. I am not sure they wouldn't backfire anyway in many cases. Certainly this particular speech will backfire now that it has become public.

[blackspade]

6. I would be careful If I were a 'veteran consultant'

'Embarrassing tidbits' are not the exclusive realm of environmentalists and liberal celebrities.
I would say that the weird proclivities of corporate whores like this room full of industry executives might be 'entertaining' to say the least....

[47of74]

22. Reminds me of this

[blackspade]

23. +1000 for the B5 reference!

[bemildred]

8. And how much did they pay this fool to tell them that? nt

[Youdontwantthetruth]

9. Well a liberal celeb can be exposed doing meth and working a glory hole in a adult theater

and after rehab and the talk show apology tour, book sales, and possible bio pic if their life was trashy enough, they will still have a career in Hollywood

The CEO of Koch get exposed they will be fired and never work at that level again for the rest of their life and would become persona non grata amongst their social set.

Go for it GOP let the chips fall where they may!

[El Shaman]

11. Yup, he looks like a real 'hard ass'!!!

IMO , mostly 'A$$'!!!

[turbinetree]

12. WAR CRIMES

Well lets not play your game hypocrite. This character reminds me Nixon
This hypocrite goes to a meeting with the same corporations which were going to help liberate IRAQ from a dictator and get the oil to pay for a f***king war and liberate it people, have you looked at the news lately there buck, well guess what Berman, how does it feel to have perpetuate (oil and gas industry: you consultant) in the murdered of over 4600 Americans, wounded over 55,000, and a 3 trillion war debt set up on a f***king credit card, based on a lie? While your industry is destroying the water we need to live, the clean water to grow food, and the air we need to breath. Have you taken a look at Beijing lately, planes can't land because of the pollution, and it blows over this country and the Hawaiian Islands, causing the crap we are now experiencing in our weather.
And if you want to play "win ugly and lose pretty", you have just done both and you need to be called out for what you really are, a right wing hypocrite without a conscience to the above act of a senseless war based on a lie to spread HATE and FEAR and the destruction of this planet.

[Orsino]

13. Either way, Big Money wins. n/t

[calimary]

14. Seems like our side always wants to lose pretty.

Oh... but, but, but, we CAN'T play rough like they do! It'd make us no better than THEM!!!


FUCK THAT, okay???? JUST FUCK THAT!!!!!!! You know what? Pulling that shit makes them WIN. And I want to WIN.

Because if you lose, you get squat, and I have had it up to HERE with congratulating myself that but, but, but, at least WE fought FAIR. BULLSHIT. I don't give a crap about "fighting fair." SCREW that. If we have to fight dirty in order to win, then so be it. THAT is the game. And THAT is how it's played. Until we're in a different kind of game - where both sides freely and willingly agree to play fair, I don't think we should waste any more time playing fair. WE play fair, and THEY play dirty and win and then they say "hey, THANKS, CHUMP!!!"

Well, I think we've got people on our side who are just as smart and devious as the best they've got, and I think we oughta beat them at their own game. It does NO GOOD AT ALL to "take the high road" and then pat yourself on the back as the loser and congratulate yourself for the consolation prize of playing fair. FUCK THAT. I don't care if it's not a clean win. Just as long as it's a WIN.

Please remember, in politics, it's NOT how you play the game. It's if you WIN. And if you don't WIN, you don't govern. You don't get to set the agenda. You don't get the subpoena power. You don't get to lead. You don't get to decide what comes up for a vote. You have to cope with somebody else as committee chair and whatever agenda THEY have. All that morality stuff is for Sunday school or catechism class. It's not for the political arena. I'm just really surprised that our team hasn't learned that by now.

Hey, I wish it were different. But as long as we face the adversaries we have, we're stuck with this way. And THANK GOD for oppositional research. DON'T TURN YOUR NOSE UP AT IT because it involves digging up dirt on the bad guy. It helped save us from a mitt wrongney presidency (thank you young Mr. Carter for being well-connected enough to have friends who found that stealth-recorded 47% video!!!). And WHERE'S OUR ANSWER to that scheming sneaky little schmuck james o'keefe? WHERE are OUR mud-slingers and back-bench bomb throwers? Some people out in cockeyed voter land think that's the sign of balls and backbone. No wonder they laugh at us and all our Pollyanna teammates and other cavers and capitulators.

[steve2470]

18. +1 ! nt

[Pantagruelsmember]

15. Win with the truth

The big picture, Obama reality the obstructionist GOP won't admit:

The economy has recovered from the Bush/GOP disastrous incompetence
Obama has been at least as good as Reagan for the economy. In fact, U.S. has now had 63 straight months of job expansion, including 54 consecutive weeks of private sector growth.
Obama’s administration has created more jobs in five years than Bush managed in all eight.
The ebullient stock market reflects BO/Dem leadership.
The Federal Budget Deficit has Shrunk by 2/3 since 2009

The Obama administration is the most honest, scandal free in history. Government Spending has only gone up 1.4 percent under Obama, the lowest spending has increased since Eisenhower, “The Last Actual Republican.” Government spending increased 8.1 percent under Bush, and 8.7 percent under Reagan.
Taxes have only increased on those making $400,000 a year or more, the richest 2 percent of Americans.
For approx. 95 percent of us , taxes have actually gone down.


Bin Laden is dead.There have been no significant foreign attacks on American soil.
U.S. dependence on foreign oil is at a record low due to domestic oil production and higher fuel efficiency standards

The dollar is KING and there has been no appreciable inflation.
The U.S. under BO is the envy of the world.

Obamacare is working. Approximately 10 million Americans who didn’t have health insurance before have it now. Rates haven’t gone up across the board as predicted by GOP critics mainly because healthcare costs are now rising slower than they have at any point since 1960 and in many cases going down. The success of Obamacare has extended the projected solvency of Medicare out to 2030. Seniors have saved $Billions on prescriptions and millions of Americans have received refunds from their health insurance companies thanks to provisions of ACA.

Just the indisputable facts....

*Blogger jeff61b compiled and published many of these stats which I'm passing along and suggest you pass along too.

[Monk06]

17. If oil dips below $70 bbl nobody will be drilling anywhere. Especially deep offshore and shale.

Deep offshore is expensive, risky and has a long development curve.

Shale is short term development but being so is more susceptible to spot price fluctuation.

Big oil just likes weak and submissive governments. They think long term so spot prices don't deter them.

When they say, "drill baby drill" the are talking out into the future not the day after tomorrow.

[sulphurdunn]

19. Dangerous business he's in.

Guys like Berman usually have closets full of skeletons, and often more than a few that could send them to jail.

[47of74]

24. "Sow the wind, reap the shitstorm."

[jtuck004]

21. Here's some advice from another kind of veteran...

“If you win, you need not have to explain...If you lose, you should not be there to explain!”
― Adolf Hitler

Berman reminds me of him.