Yeah, So, That Donna Brazile Piece

[ehrnst]

It is, to put it mildly, a curious piece, given that it reports information that was long ago publicly reported as though it's shocking new.

Link to tweet

.................................

Further curious is Brazile's villainization of Hillary Clinton for solving the DNC's financial problems and imposing discipline, and further curious still her decision to leave enormous space for the inference that Clinton's agreements with the DNC are somehow "proof" of primary rigging.

That is simply not the case.

Hillary Clinton, a Democrat, saved the DNC, a Democratic institution, with money raised from Democratic donors, and wanted to make sure it was used to elect Democrats.

Bernie Sanders isn't a Democrat.

Bernie Sanders also had his own fundraising agreement with the DNC, which he chose not to use, because he preferred his own fundraising strategy, famously associated with his ubiquitous $27 rallying cry.

All of that is fine. None of it is illegal, nor unethical. None of it should even be controversial. It certainly doesn't amount to a "secret takeover of the DNC."

To be abundantly clear: I have no problem with Brazile disclosing mismanagement at the DNC. Frankly, I believe it's an important discussion to have, especially when there is legitimate debate about the efficacy of the organization altogether, as party institutions, for good or ill, have increasingly taken a backseat to powerhouse individual fundraising (and personal branding).

My concern is with the framing of this piece, which is designed for maximum appeal to people who believe there was "rigging," despite the fact that none of the facts here actually support that narrative.

http://www.shakesville.com/2017/11/yeah-so-that-donna-brazile-piece.html

[Gothmog]

1. K&R

[ismnotwasm]

2. Exactly

There is nothing wrong with visiting and acknowledging errors of strategy and/or management, but there’s a lot wrong with finger pointing hyperbole

[Me.]

3. KR

[NurseJackie]

11. Same. KR. (Emoji inside.)

[Me.]

21. Cracked Me Up

[Steven Maurer]

4. Does anyone seriously believe State parties would have gotten those donations otherwise?

Wealthy hollywood multimillionaire movie stars were never going to donate to the state parties; they wanted to donate more than $2700 to the Democratic general election fund, and this was a way to do it.

The state parties, by the way, still all came out significantly ahead in the deal. Which is why they did it.

[get the red out]

5. This is old news

the minute the next indictment comes.

[zipplewrath]

7. I do think that is says more about the DNC and DWS

The vast majority of this is "Hillary saved the DNC from itself".

I do think that getting control of the DNC as early as she did was not the smartest move on the part of the DNC. Agreeing to let her have that much control that early wasn't the smartest move. I can see agreeing to a budget, but letting HRC control the strategy and staffing was probably a mistake.

But the really big thing here is more about what a mess the DNC was and how neither DWS nor Obama seemed to be doing anything about it.

[ehrnst]

8. Which is the REAL scoop. And not that there was "a secret takeover." (nt)

[zipplewrath]

16. Pretty much

Quite honestly, other than the fact that HRC was in a position to control the schedule and strategy of the debates, there wasn't much here that affected much about the primary. To some degree, it exonerates the DNC staff, and also shows that the vast majority of what was going on was the HRC was saving the DNC. Yes, she was smart and negotiated some control as well, but really who wouldn't. Again, DWS is primarily responsible for yielding quite that much authority when she may not have had to. As much as the DNC needed HRC, the reality is that HRC, or any nominee needed them as well.

[Hortensis]

52. The DNC had no choice and neither did Hillary. I read looong

ago about how her exhaustive and exhausting fundraising rescued the DNC from devastating debt going into the election season. I'd just forgotten the shocking figures. (And if authors of the articles long ago knew, and I knew, Brazile certainly knew.)

In this era, political party leaderships are very weak, nothing like the powerhouses they once were. BUT the parties are the LABELS most voters identify with. They're almost nothing but label. But people expect to vote Dem or Repug, so the parties have to somehow provide a election structure even though the important decisions are being made by others at many other power centers instead.

So Hillary, as the party's strong man coming into 2015 (Obama couldn't as president), rescued the party and enabled the DNC to do its job over the 2015-2016 election period. She must have at least been unofficially sounded out on Sanders' being allowed to run against her as a Democrat, including allocating him DNC funding that she herself raised.

In return, she and party officials in state after state were then dishonestly and ruthlessly accused of stealing primary elections, convincing a critical number of prospective voters that she was hopelessly corrupt. But she's being depicted as victimizing her opponent.

And for all her tremendous strength, competence and critically important service to Democrats, as usual she's being depicted by others as merely a corrupt evil witch.

[ehrnst]

54. +1000. (nt)

[MaryMagdaline]

57. Yes

And yes!

[R B Garr]

15. What did Bernie contribute to the DNC?? Hillary paid off debts and infused it with money.

This agreement is from 2015. Bernie could have contributed millions, as well.

[zipplewrath]

17. Well, yes

Like I say, the primary take away here is the HRC bailed out the DNC. She ALSO got control of much of its functions WELL before she was the nominee. Really, despite the fact that Donna used her call to Bernie as a context for explaining much of what the book is about, it really isn't about Bernie at all.

[R B Garr]

19. None of this is in context when you hear it from Bernie.

If it's not about Bernie, then he shouldn't have made it about himself.

But there's more to her "control", as she was also focused on making the DNC as competitive in their data infrastructure as the RNC had become.

An excerpt from her interview at the ReCode 2017 forum:
I mean it was bankrupt, it was on the verge of insolvency, its data was mediocre to poor, nonexistent, wrong. I had to inject money into it...

Mossberg: This is the DNC you’re talking about.

The DNC to keep it going. Okay. Donald Trump who did nothing about really setting up any kind of data operation, inherits an RNC data foundation that after the Republicans lost in 2012, and they thought they had a very good operation with the setup that Romney did called ORCA, they thought that was really state of the art, they lose.

So they raised - best estimates are close to a hundred million dollars, they brought in their main vendors, they basically said, “We will never be behind the Democrats again,” and they invested between 2012 and 2016 this hundred million dollars to build this data foundation. They beta tested it. They ran it... somebody was able to determine about 227,000 surveys to double check, triple check, quadruple check, the information. So Trump becomes the nominee and he is basically handed this tried and trued, effective foundation. Then you’ve got Cambridge Analytica and you know, you can believe the hype on how great they were or the hype on how they weren’t, but the fact is, they added something. And I think again, we better understand that, the Mercers did not invest all that money just for their own amusement. We know they played in Brexit, and we know that they came to Jared Kushner and basically said, “We will marry our operation,” which was more as it’s been described, psychographic, sentiment, a lot of harvesting of Facebook information, “We will marry that with the RNC.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2017/05/31/read-full-transcript-hillary-clinton-recode-interview/0niING5P2tfNBCnR1lSq9H/story.html

[ehrnst]

24. Well "Our Revolution" is quick to make this into a fundraiser

no matter the facts.

Brazile has now gone from "establishment" to "proof" of whatever they are touting.

[R B Garr]

35. Yes, I've noticed that -- she is no longer "establishment" and is now a

"solid D" (as one thread starter said today, lol). And thanks for this thread that showed they both signed fund-raising agreements. Someone else pointed out (maybe that was you, as well..?) that it makes Donna's account here contain a lie that it was some secretive operation.

[sheshe2]

9. Thanks for clearing that up, ehrnst.

So much for all those 'Ah Ha' threads. Lol.

[uponit7771]

10. Yeap, Divide and conquer

[Pathwalker]

12. Donna Brazille was also Karl Rove's mole in Gore's 2000 campaign.

But that's just old news, I guess. So, it's not like we can believe her now.

[NCTraveler]

13. Clinton helped to financially stabilize the party.

Remember the names of those “upset” by it.

[The Polack MSgt]

44. +1

Exactly right.

[horseshoecrab]

14. Thanks for posting this, ehrnst ...

[zipplewrath]

18. It wasn't well known how much control she had.

Yes, the fund raising angle was well known, although I suspect few understood how little was actually going into many state coffers. It isn't clear it was well know how much control it gave her over the DNC.

[uponit7771]

20. No one said it was well known, this subject is starting to look like a retraead

[ehrnst]

45. She had the same control once she won the nomination that Obama had when he won the nomination

in 2008.

Clearly many people don't understand that, including Brazile, who "wondered why we had to clear everything through Brooklyn" when she came on in July of 2016, after HRC won the nomination in June.

I don't think she had any idea that there was a new agreement signed after HRC won the nomination, and thought she "discovered" the 2015 agreement, when she was actually reading the June 2016 update to the agreement...

[zipplewrath]

46. That's entirely possible

I'm dubious that any smart campaign would have "rescued" the DNC and not gotten a fair amount of control over the DNC,. I mean, it was obviously disfunctional and who wants that going into the general. Furthermore, when these agreements were being signed, most of us, and I suspect the DNC as well, thought it was a foregone conclusion that she'd end up as the nominee. So why not sign over control/influence/authority just as they would about a year later.

It was a mistake, but in the end, it was a mistake that was based upon the reality of the future, as oppose to some commitment to "optics". That said, it was foolish once the contest became more competitive and furthermore, the Bernie campaign's complaints about the debate schedule should have been more favorably considered.

[ehrnst]

50. Are you saying that Brazile saw the 2015 JFA, and not the 2016 JFA?

Is that the "mistake" you are talking about?

And Obama canceled the last debate with HRC in 2008 after he had the delegates to secure the nomination.

HRC did push back initially, but ultimately she supported Obama full on, with no recitations of her delegate count at every opportunity.

[lapucelle]

55. Money raised under a joint fundraising agreement cannot be released to individual states

until there is a party nominee, as per federal law. Because there was no formal concession until July 12, 2016, no funds raised under the agreement could be dispersed to individual states until that date.

Why the interim chair of the DNC was unaware of the statutory regulations concerning standard campaign agreements is bewildering at best.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/11/102.17

[tomp]

22. that's right, it's just a coincidence...

...that Hillary had control of the dsc and that the dsc was biased against sanders.

[ehrnst]

23. DSC? And you have proof of any of that?

Because the Brazile piece certainly doesn't offer any.

[tomp]

30. I meant dnc.

you want proof? sorry, I'm not going to play that game with you.

I'm reaction to learning that Clinton essentially took control of the dnc with money. maybe others knew that before...I didn't. I can't prove anything, but there's smoke, and likely fire there.

any party that cannot maintain itself without a massive influx of money form the Clintons is highly suspect and does not command trust or loyalty. proof or no proof, the optics are horrendous.

the way our country is being run the average citizen can never truly know what is going on. we don't have the luxury of waiting for proof of the obvious: the old ways of politics must change.

[ehrnst]

37. Of course backing up your accusations is a "game"

Not surprised.

"Likely fire." Still no evidence. Just some wishful thinking.

Just confirmation bias, clearly.

[ehrnst]

41. According to Wikileaks - this is the document she signed in 2015

There are no control provisions:

Link to tweet

If Brazile read THIS agreement, then she got the date wrong:

On Jun 16 -

”Hillary Clinton's campaign is taking the reins of the Democratic National Committee, installing a new top official on Thursday to oversee the party's day-to-day operations through the general election…."

http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/16/politics/hillary-clinton-campaign-dnc/index.html

[emulatorloo]

27. Donna Brazile debunked the false "rigged" and "biased DNC" narrative here

http://time.com/4705515/donna-brazile-russia-emails-clinton/


"When I was asked last July to step in temporarily as D.N.C. Chair, I knew things were amiss. The D.N.C. had been hacked, and thousands of staff emails and documents were plastered on various websites. Staff were harassed, morale suffered, and we lost weeks of planning. Donors were harassed, and fundraising fell off.

Snip

By stealing all the DNC’s emails and then selectively releasing those few, the Russians made it look like I was in the tank for Secretary Clinton. Despite the strong, public support I received from top Sanders campaign aides in the wake of those leaks, the media narrative played out just as the Russians had hoped, leaving Sanders supporters understandably angry and sowing division in our ranks. In reality, not only was I not playing favorites, the more competitive and heated the primary got, the harder D.N.C. staff worked to be scrupulously fair and beyond reproach. In all the months the Russians monitored the D.N.C.’s email, they found just a handful of inappropriate emails, with no sign of anyone taking action to disadvantage the Sanders campaign."

-----------

[zipplewrath]

47. Except for DWS

The problem with that narrative is that DWS virtually decided the debate schedule on her own, and it was decidedly unfavorable to Bernie. There is a very good chance that this decision was made in consultation with HRC's staff. We can argue whether that was decisive in any sense, but non the less, it has little to do with Brazille's observation that the DNC staff didn't exhibit any overt bias.

[emulatorloo]

48. There were more debates in 2016 than there were in 2008

[ehrnst]

51. Obama cancelled the last debate in 2008

in April after he had secured the bound delegates to confirm his nomination.

Do you think that the DNC was exhibiting overt bias then?


http://www.esoterically.net/2008/04/26/obama-says-no-more-debates/

[lapucelle]

56. What's the dsc? N/T

[Madam45for2923]

25. Kicking!

[betsuni]

26. K&R

[NCTraveler]

28. Looks like some people jumped the gun today with their attack on Clinton.

All over a book promotion.

I swear they put on a show like they are on the left but more often than not it looks more like dancing with Rove.

[leftofcool]

32. And now Donna is trying her hardest to unring that bell.

She is tweeting like mad praising Hillary for bailing out the DNC and blah, blah, blah

[NCTraveler]

34. I like her.

This was very poorly done. Just a bad move.

[elmac]

29. nothing new, boring stuff

if the election wasn't stolen by the fascists and putin we would have a president Clinton now and America would actually be great.

[njhoneybadger]

31. But that call to Bernie

It was the way she lit the candle and put on gospel music that almost made me FUCKING PUKE!

[sarah FAILIN]

33. I thought it was old news

Thought I must have missed something, but no

[Skittles]

36. she is trying to sell a book

[onlyadream]

38. Wasn't Donna Brazile the one who leaked debate questions to Hillary?

And if so, did she do that to make Hillary look bad? In light of her new book, I'm starting to wonder.

[Squinch]

39. Kick.

[brer cat]

40. K&R

[Nonhlanhla]

42. So Hillary saves the DNC

Bernie does not contribute anything.

And yet Hillary is the evil witch, eh?

Got it...

[bullwinkle428]

43. I never cared for her going back to the BILL Clinton days. She always

struck me as not 100% trustworthy, and I think this pseudo-"revelation" just gives further evidence that she's out for no one other than herself.

As someone who supported Bernie in the primaries and very quickly moved that support to Hillary once he dropped out, I'm not at all buying into the meme that she's apparently trying to sell.

[zipplewrath]

49. Well

the fundamental issue here is whether her control of the DNC was "premature". Yes, she "saved" it from its own mismanagement. However, the deal that was struck was ultimately a bad one. Presuming that the deal included a fair amount of control over the DNC (potentially including the debate schedule) that should not have happened. I can understand that in August of 2015 that looked alot like a foregone conclusion so why wait. But some where in the fall that should have changed.

Never the less, it is dubious that is was particularly decisive. Bernie's problems were mostly of his own making. I enjoyed his message, but his campaign on the ground was flawed.

[ehrnst]

53. Well, Obama had the same deal in 2008 when he won the delegates

Was it "dubious" then?

"This is in fact what happens," Howard Dean, former Democratic Party chairman, told CNN. "Debbie will still have the title, but somebody else will be the effective operator of the DNC. It's Hillary's pick."

In an interview on Thursday, Dean recalled how he transitioned immediately to simply raising money and campaigning for Barack Obama in 2008 after Paul Tewes, a trusted Obama aide, stepped in to lead the committee.

"We basically just turned it over to him and I left the building to him. He ran the DNC," Dean said. "It was very clear I wasn't going to be running the DNC as soon as there was the a nominee."

http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/16/politics/hillary-clinton-campaign-dnc/index.html

[Hortensis]

58. Of course not. The special Hillary standards don't apply to others.

Hillary should have turned $100 MILLION she raised for the party over to lower level people appointed to the DNC, many of whom she'd never even met, and scrupulously never asked how a single cent would be spent. Nothing else would be right. Even if the donors emphatically would not agree.

[ehrnst]

59. Yep. The Hillary standards never applied to her male counterparts

Again, and again and again....

[zipplewrath]

60. When he won the delegates

Not the previous August.

[ehrnst]

61. So, Brazile's claims of being "puzzled" by this arrangement with Hillary's campaign in July 2016

shows she's either lying, or clueless. Not much credibility either way.

It was HRC who insisted that the DNC funds she raised not be released until after a nominee was clear. Bernie's refusal to concede led those to be held until July, when they could have been released to down ballot candidates in June. Or earlier when some of his staff said they knew it was over.

I think you also may have missed this:

"Nothing in this agreement shall be construed to violate the DNC's obligation of impartiality and neutrality through the Nominating process. All activities performed under this agreement will be focused exclusively on preparations for the General Election and not the Democratic Primary.

Further we understand you may enter into similar agreements with other candidates."

Is that clearer?

I think that what all this shows us is that HRC was saving the financial health of the Democratic Party, the party that Sanders needed for the infrastructure and credibility to run for POTUS. Sanders refused to do so. If anyone is owed an apology and a big thank you, it's Hillary from Bernie.