Mayhill Fowler Secretly Taped PRIVATE/CLOSED Obama Fundraiser Where "Bitter" Happened (She's A Plant

[KittyWampus]

I didn't get the part where some blogger on Huffpost posted about Obama's comments made on April SIXTH and the story appeared on April ELEVENTH.

Heard she represents herself as sympathetic Obama supporter and appeared on Dobbs.

Here's excerpts from a DailyKos thread:



She has been the one putting out the anti-Obama stories on Huff. for quite sometime. If you go to the Huff.Post you can find all her blog postings there and find out what she thinks of Obama.

he says she lives in Oakland.

It was noted on this post that she did donate to Fred thompson

She is NOT an Obama Supporter (10+ / 0-)
I'm from Oakland and just spoke with one of my friends there. Her husband has donated over $25K to the Clintons. She is an awful person who is damn elitist. My parents were at that very same fundraiser and people are FURIOUS that this happened. This was a private fundraiser and that means private. It was not supposed to be tape recorded or videotaped and they specifically said that you would be asked to leave if you were caught doing so.

Wow, do you know her husband's name? (4+ / 0-)
This needs to come out. If she is posing as a supporter and is the one making the smears, this is huge.

I saw her address on fundrace, (8+ / 1-)
and she is not a poor blogger. She has serious money she lives on Ocean Park Drive.

perhaps if someone from that event posted the real scoop at Huffpo, or contacted Cafferty the real story could get out there. Were there any big names in attendance who would make a good spokesman to push back on this?

Please rec this folks, I think who she really is needs to come out if she is flat out lying. Obama is above discrediting the messenger, but in this case I think we have every right to do so. She sure doesn't sound like a Joe Wilson type to me!

If she was reporting there and asking questions (0+ / 0-)
find out who she was asking and what she wanted them to tell her. Was she by herself? Enquiring minds want to know.

She had this to say to PBS (9+ / 0-)
regarding her "job" at Huffington Post as a "civilian reporter"

"There"s nobody out there telling me not to slant a story for the candidate I favor. So I"m always checking myself to see if I"m being fair. " Mayhill Fowler, Off the Bus contributor

She/they sat on this story for a week! Unleashing it without going to Obama for context clarification , when she supposedly follows him around is very telling, don't you think?!

She couldn't go to Obama for context (2+ / 0-)
Because they would have thrown her out of the fund raiser. She is disgusting.

You are missing the point!! (14+ / 0-)
If she is constantly attacking Obama and disagree with his ideas and proposals, why donate to him. Why lie about being a supporter?

Let's be freaking honest. There was absolutely nothing wrong about what he said. Sometimes the truth is uncomfortable.

Leave up to ignoranus clintons to twist it around.

I don't give a shit anymore!!!! If people don't realize the clintons and mccains are less of what we need we are going to be in some real tough shit.

What else is she going to say? (5+ / 0-)
Would she come out and say, Hi, I'm a Republican operative, or, Hi, I work for Hillary Clinton's campaign? No, she needs to be at arms length.

So why donate? Because it's a cheap way of getting on the inside.

I could see doing it for McCain. Drop $2300, get invites to functions where he talks to his sympathetic audience, the ones he assumes are on the same page, where he lets his hair down and makes statements like those W. made, which fell into the hands of Michael Moore -- The haves and have mores?

It cuts both ways, regardless of what we think of this particular blogger/journalist.


I disagree vehemently. She said this (1+ / 0-)
about Californians in the same article she wrote about Obama dissing small town America!

"Californians, who are a people in a state already surfeited with a smug sense of superiority and, as an ironic consequence, a parochialism and insularity at odds with the innovation, prosperity and openness for which California is rightly known. (Of course, this is a generalization, and as such does not fit everyone; but as a state characteristic I stand by it.)"

get a whiff of that hypocrisy?


She wants to get her name out as a journalist, (8+ / 0-)
and this is how she is getting attention. Everything is reporting what she says, Politico, CNN and others. She is pimping herself, but who for? Is it simply to benefit her own career and make her mainstream, or is she helping someone out? Nothing wrong with asking questions.


You had to pay to go to the FUNDRAISER (0+ / 0-)
The fundraisers cost $2300. Only people who had not previously given were included. So my guess is she gave $2300 to get in and now qualifies as a contributor who maxed out.


They also said she maxed out in contributions (3+ / 0-)
to Obama. (I think I heard CNN say that because it surprises based on the the few stories I read by her at HuffPo)

I wonder how she got the invite to the private event? And how exactly did she record it? With her mp3 or something? (it is not very high quality)

phone is the device I'd heard of. (4+ / 0-)
So, she donates money to his campaign, that gets her invited to the fundraiser.

A FUCKING PLANT!!!!! (4+ / 0-)
The only way she could get insider info is for her to donate. It's clear!!!!!



Mayhill Fowler started all of this at HuffPo with her blog that used a recording of a closed event. She says on CNN yesterday that she was an Obama supporter and sat on this for a week. But, I looked at the fundrace and while she has given $2224 to Obama, she had earlier donated to Fred Thompson's campaign. Some of her blogs on Obama haven't been exactly glowing, so I have to wonder which side she's really on.

Fred Tompson? so she's a Republican (7+ / 0-)
who just donated to get access.


I doubt her support of Obama (12+ / 0-)
The hit piece she wrote on Obama was proof. She even went on Lou Dobbs and said she "didn't want to bring the campaign down" What a power trip? She think her f'n column can bring down a campaign. She needs to get over herself. I hope the campaign refunds her $2300. They can do better.


Oddly, it seems there are two dramatic Mayhill Fowlers. Unless the blogger, who says she graduated Vassar in 1968, went back to school and got a theater degree at Princeton in 2000. Here's her self-description from HuffPo.

What can I tell you? I'm an over-educated sixty year-old woman with politics in my blood. Shall I write about my family's political fortunes from time to time, if relevant to 2008? I'm thinking about it.

Born and bred in Tennessee. Many of my family GTT ("Gone to Texas," a Tennessee tradition). Houston--or Hoo-town, as I fondly call it. Lived all my adult life in California. Oakland. B.A. Vassar '68. M.A. U.C. Berkeley '72.

Worked a bit as a teacher, editor, and writer, but mostly raised my two daughters. Husband a lawyer. Have spent the last few years researching and writing small books on my family history so that our younger generation, scattered from coast to coast, of course, will know "from whence they come."

My mother, family Matriarch, decreed "no politics at the table." Her table encompassed her house and the houses of her five daughters. Her hatred of politics will become clear in my blog, over time. But now that my mother has passed away, my innate love of politics, suppressed since a grade school adventure, rises again. . . .

By the by, you can check out my Middle East blog at http://junehill.blogspot.com.

I checked out the junehill blog - unreadable.

I honestly don't see how someone (11+ / 0-)
who supports Obama would be offended or 'uncomfortable' with Obama's comments about bitter voters or for that matter bitter Americans.

Her Huffpo editor (3+ / 0-)
gives the inside scoop right here.

Considerable debate about blogger vs journalist roles and ethics.

I don't care if she supports the man on the moon
I think this is a problem of ethics, not what Obama said. That event was closed to the press and was specifically instructed that no press or video/audio should be taken. Her ethics as a journalist should be in question. I have worked with a lot of journalists and the first thing they adhere to is a standard of whether things are on or off the record.

How do you justify bringing a tape recorder into an event that was closed to the press, taping someone's words without their knowledge or consent, and releasing them to the public without their knowledge or consent.



total agreement
The tone of her articles is self-involved and all about self-promotion.

And calling herself an Obama supporter is a stretch, just another way to draw attention to the personal "struggle with her conscience" that she went through.


Look if Mayhill is really undercover
for Hillary's campaign, she is working in the best possible place to help Hillary. The Left Blogs have street cred. with rank and file Democrats and if she can question Obama's strengths that is where Hillary can do the most damage, without anyone knowing. It is smart and stealth. It can not be ignored.

It is important to find out the truth about who Mayhill Flower is and who she represents or the liberal blogosphere will be no better than the Big Tent Media.

A real supporter of Barack's she would have known that everything that he said mirrored what was in his "A More Perfect Union" speech. He didn't demean anyone. He was bringing to light the frustration, anger, and hurt that so many in the midwest have. If she were a real supporter she would know exactly who Barack is and what he stands for. An "ardent' supporter would know their candidate inside-out and knows exactly what he or she means.

She is no supporter of Barack's. Anyone can donate to his campaign and claim that they're a supporter. It's not like you sign a pledge saying you are 100% behind such candidate. It's interesting that out of everyone in the room, she was the only one to find his remarks "offensive". Surely, if the remarks were that offensive it would have been reported the next day by others who attended the fundraiser. She and her motives are suspect.

If she wanted to be honestly credible wouldn't she say that she isn't a supporter of any candidate, and if she wanted to create the perception that she is being more fair to Obama when she is not, she would donate money to his campaign for the street cred.

The only problem I have with Mayhill
Fowler's claim regarding this event is that she and OTHERS were uncomfortable with his remarks. However, not one other person has come forward to agree with her. In fact, there is a posting by a woman identified as "Sandy" on the Obama website who contradicts Fowler's claim about the context and reaction by the attendees. She also takes issue with Fowler's claim that those in attendance were all upscale donors (elites).

One other thing Fowler has contributed to the Obama meme: she has repeatedly used words like "arrogant" and "cocky" to refer to him in her articles on HuffPo. My concern with her tone is that given she was born and raised in Tenn. (perhaps explaining the donation to Fred Thompson)there is a hint of that "uppity" feeling in her attitude toward the Senator.

It also should be noted that she was following both the Thompson campaign and Clinton campaigns before trailing the Obama camp. I suspect her choice to identify as an Obama supporter has more to do with trying to lend credibility to her commentary. It smacks of "I'm a supporter so I can say this.."


Food for thought (1+ / 0-)
There have been a lot of rumors buzzing around for awhile that Clinton had some "bomb" waiting to drop on Obama for a little over a week now. When I read that Fowler's article was about a fundraiser earlier in the month, and that this was actually her second posting on the story, I got a bit suspicious. Even her editor states he would have worded the story differently. So if the earlier post in this diary claiming her husband gave a huge sum to HRC'S campaign is true, could this then be the "bomb"? Could HRC have been apprised of this story before it was published? And when Fowler switched from following the Clinton campaign to the Obama campaign, did she then start using a recorder?

If this is the Clinton "bomb", I suspect it may blow up in their face.

some insight from someone who was (0+ / 0-)
at the San Fransisco fundraiser about Ms Fowler:

Imagine my surprise to see an article in the Huffington Post by Mayhill Fowler describing his answer as "a problematic judgment call in trying to explain working class culture to a much wealthier audience." and his answer being like "explaining the yawning cultural gap that separates a Turkeyfoot from a Marin County." I guess Ms. Fowler thought that, unlike herself, the other attendees had never gone outside the large house in Pacific Heights where the event was held. I grew up working class in Texas. I thought it ironic that Ms Fowler, was attempting to paint Obama as a condescending elitist, while at the same time she was stereotyping everybody at the event with her omniscient insight. In any case, her agenda was clear. Despite Ms. Fowler talking about the people at the fundraiser being middle class in an earlier post, the "rich man poor man" theme fit better with the "Obama as a judgmental elite, talking to judgmental elites" spin. This also seemed to fit with some of her earlier articles where she had described Obama as cocky, arrogant, and even "flirty". What a coincidence that she now writes an article putting another twist on Obama's personality. All she had to do was a sneak a recorder in an small event for Obama supporters and do a little bit of crafty writing and out of context editing. Now Fox News and Lou Dobbs are having a field day.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/4/12/15638/8512/891/494398