Who is Mark Penn and who is Charlie Black, Jr. and why are they gaming America's national election?

[Skidmore]

Hillary supporters, I'm very much interested in your response to this article.

http://www.americablog.com/2008/02/mark-penns-tangled-corporate-web.html

Monday, February 25, 2008

Mark Penn's tangled corporate web: Clinton is a client; McCain is a client.
by Joe Sudbay (DC) · 2/25/2008 10:18:00 AM ET · Link
Discuss this post here: Comments (124) · reddit · FARK ·· Digg It!


As has been widely reported, Hillary Clinton's top guru, Mark Penn, is leading the charge within the Clinton campaign to go aggressively negative against Obama. Besides the fact that Penn is the architect responsible for Hillary's presidential aspirations going from "inevitable" to being on life support, he is reportedly obsessed with destroying Obama. While it is understandable that Clinton's top adviser wants his client to win at all costs, going massively negative against Obama (or Hillary for that matter) risks damaging our candidate in the fall election against McCain. Unfortunately, this is something another "client" would welcome. That client is named John McCain.

Penn is the CEO of Burson-Marsteller, a DC public relations (PR) firm. Burson-Marsteller owns a subsidiary, BKSH. BKSH is run by Charlie Black. Black is a longtime Republican politico, and a top adviser for John McCain for President. And, as Think Progress notes, while Black is a volunteer on the McCain campaign, he views Mcain as his client and continues to take a paycheck from BKSH. JedReport dissected these relationships in a diary on DailyKos last night.

[BeyondGeography]

1. Charlie Black is evil

that's all I have to say.

[blm]

32. Charlie Black is BFEE - longtime pr fixer for BushInc. No surprise Penn is part of that crew.

..

And so many Dems still want to stick their heads in the sand and pretend all these DECADES of LINKS between Bushes and Clintons don't matter.

It used to just make me sad that Dems could be so gullible, now it is making me SICK.

[NightWatcher]

2. I also read that Penn was charging Hillary about 3-4 million for his services

she should fire his ass toot sweet

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/02/06/mark-penns-firm-paid-4_n_85192.html

Through the course of the primary, Penn's consulting firm, Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates, has been paid more than $4.3 million by the Clinton campaign, according to a review of campaign finance filings.

[LSparkle]

6. Try $10 million ...

NOT good. I heard Hillary's big donors were upset when they heard about the $1300 for Dunkin Donuts and $10K for snow shovels. Wonder how they'll feel when they hear about this connection re Penn's services ...

[Skidmore]

14. It wouldn't surprise me if McCain isn't benefitting from

Penn's company serving as a conduit for information supplied courtesy of Hillary.

[DJ13]

3. Hillary's Republican roots run deeper than I thought

[marylanddem]

11. Well, she WAS a Goldwater girl...

when some of us were passing out LBJ fliers...

[babylonsister]

4. I look forward to their response also. nt

[blogslut]

5. Essentially, McCain and Clinton have the same consultants

n/t

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

7. Makes sense.

Their rhetoric sounds identical.

[Skidmore]

9. I remember Charlie Black's chew-stained teeth clacking as part of the

bunch of Republican politicos who made the rounds as they tried to bring Bill down during the Lewinsky mess. Now why would she even want to be in the same room as these people?

He also was on continually supporting * during his campaigns. Guess Hillary hasn't had enough of * policies.

[TwilightGardener]

8. Sick. Hillary supporters, how do you defend this conflict of interest?

[marylanddem]

10. This is so freaking outrageous

Good that it is coming to light - indefensible far as I can see...

[Forkboy]

12. K&R for any thread highlighting these two shitheels.

:kick:

[backscatter712]

13. Shocking, but not surprising.

What did Clinton think she was going to get when she hired Blackwater Penn?

These guys are scumbags, and the only saving grace is that on top of being evil, they're clearly incompetent when facing smart and motivated opponents.

[MagickMuffin]

18. Billbo has been in bed with Penn for a long long time

I read an article that mentioned Penn has been a long time poller for Billbo.

[antigop]

15. IS BKSH & Associates lobbying for AT&T on FISA?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=4758125&mesg_id=4758125

[antigop]

17. Charles Black is shown as a lobbyist for AT&T on that lobbying report n/t

[Skidmore]

16. Crickets chirping in the Hillary camp.

[Vinca]

19. If this is true, it stinks to high heaven.

To keep the company coffers filled they have to deliver for McCain . . . yet they're also representing Clinton. As if there aren't hoards of bona fide Democratic consultants for her to choose from.

[Skidmore]

20. Kick. Still waiting for an explanation that makes sense.

[Skidmore]

21. K, not able to R.

[TwilightGardener]

22. Kicking, still waiting for a Hillary supporter to defend this incestuous relationship.

[Hieronymus]

23. Thanks for that ..

[H2O Man]

24. Nominated

Thank you for telling the truth.

[starroute]

25. It helps to recall where Charlie Black started out

http://www.famoustexans.com/karlrove.htm

In the years of the Watergage scandal, Rove's career as a big-time political handler began with a motley crew of friends and associates. He was chairman of the College Republicans when George Herbert Walker Bush was chairman of the state Republican Party {sic -- actually the Republican National Committee} in 1973. He won the presidency of the College Republicans in a race against Terry Dolan. The late Lee Atwater, who later became famous as the political attack dog for the Reagan-Bush team, managed Rove's campaign. Dolan went on to become a Soft Money pioneer by helping form the National Conservative Political Action Committee, then died of AIDS in 1986 at age 36. Dolan's advisers in his loss to Rove were Charlie Black, Paul Manafort and Roger Stone. Those three were later instrumental in the success of Ronald Reagan's 1984 campaign.

Atwater joined the consulting firm of Black, Manafort and Stone after the '84 election. The firm later worked for the 1988 Bush-Quayle campaign. Two of Nixon's dirty tricksters also worked for Bush-Quayle: Frederick Malek, Bush's Republican National Committee rep, who had compiled lists of Jews in the Bureau of Labor Statistics as part of Nixon's investigation of a "Jewish Cabal;" and Dwight Chapin, who was jailed for lying to a grand jury about hiring Donald Sigretti to disrupt the 1972 Democratic primary campaign of Senator Edward Muskie. Chapin worked under Manafort in 1988. The firm's other clients included drug-connected Bahamian Prime Minister Oscar Pindling, Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos, and UNITA, the South African-supported Angolan rebel group led by CIA asset Jonas Savimbi.

Rove may have won that election by being dirtier than the opposition, but it didn't take Black, Manafort, and Stone long to get the message, or to form their own ties with the Bush dynasty. They've gone their separate ways since the 90's -- but not all that separate. Charlie Black is with BKSH and is advising McCain. Paul Manafort is partners in another lobbying firm with McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis. And Roger Stone is up to his usual slimeball tricks and has been smearing both Hillary and Obama.

At times like this, I'm all too ready to agree with James Joyce's message that history is a nightmare from which we're trying to awaken.

[KittyWampus]

26. whoa

[Skidmore]

27. Still interested in why Hillary supporters think it is okay that she

hired Republican dirty tricksters who also represent McCain and are attempting to swiftboat the Democratic Party. Someone put a shine on that one for me, please.

[Pavlovs DiOgie]

28. K&R!

Finding this late, but it's worth kicking to the top!

[Skidmore]

29. Kicking.

[Skidmore]

30. Kick.

[apocalypsehow]

31. K & R.

:kick:

[Mme. Defarge]

33. I have long believed

that Hillary was to be one of the two candidates representing a one-party system. The ace-in-the-hole for the corporate overclass.

[Skidmore]

34. Kicking for another morning.

[Skidmore]

35. Kick.

[Skidmore]

36. Kick, because the facts are still the same.

[Warren DeMontague]

37. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

Nothing to see here, move along...

[Flabbergasted]

38. kick

[jazzjunkysue]

39. BKSH BKSH BKSH BKSH BUSH BKSH BKSH BUSH

No, your eyes are not deceiving you.

Hillary is one of them. The Bush Cabal.

This is like the next-to-last scene in the movie where you find out the bad guy is the guy you thought was the good guy.

Can anyone here really avoid Manchurian Candidate heebie-jeebies? :scared:

[bigbrother05]

40. Mark Penn and his cronies

flop sweat

[Coexist]

41. response?