This should elate approximately 30% of you and disgust the balance.
A newly formed Pro-War astroturf – think false, ideological grassroots organization – group, Freedom Watch (YouTube) has some local connections, as described at Fables of the Reconstruction. Most prominently, sports fans, is CEO of Comcast-Spectacor Ed Snider (wiki) Comcast-Spectacorp is a partnership with the Comcast Corporation, which manages the sports arenas, the ComcastSportsnet, the 76ers, the Philadelphia Flyers, and some other related ventures.
Via Politico:
A new group, Freedom’s Watch, is launching Wednesday with a $15 million, five-week campaign of TV, radio and Web ads featuring military veterans that is aimed at retaining support in Congress for President Bush’s “surge” policy on Iraq.
The Orwellian-named Freedom Watch, helmed by Plamegate-accomplice Ari Fleischer has an interesting cast of characters.
Again, from FotR:
The board consists of Blakeman; [Ari] Fleischer; Mel Sembler, a Florida Republican who was Bush’s ambassador to Italy; William P. Weidner, president and chief operating officer of the Las Vegas Sands Corp.; and Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition.
The donors include Sembler; Anthony Gioia, a Buffalo businessman who was Bush’s ambassador to Malta; Kevin Moley, who was Bush’s ambassador to the U.S. Mission to the United Nations in Geneva; Howard Leach, a former Republican National Committee finance chairman who was Bush’s ambassador to France; Dr. John Templeton of Pennsylvania, chairman and president of the John Templeton Foundation; Ed Snider, chairman of Comcast Spectacor, the huge Philadelphia sports and entertainment firm; Sheldon Adelson, chairman of the Las Vegas Sands Corp. and ranked by Forbes magazine as the third-wealthiest American; and Richard Fox, who is chairman of the Jewish Policy Center and was Pennsylvania State Chairman of the Reagan/Bush campaign in 1980.
[...]
Richard Fox is local. Comcast, as the article says, is right here in Center City Philly. So Philly is subsidizing pro-war propaganda. Wonderful. The Templeton Foundation is located in a Philadelphia suburb, and has a right-wing track record.
The TV-buys are interesting in that they attack both Democrats and any moderate Republicans who have been less than 100% loyal to the President, and seem to imply that the participation in our Democracy is tantamount to treason and "stabbing the troops in the back".
The ads are an attempt to grab the security-moms and armchair generals by having Laura and Vicky relate the sacrifices of their sons, Travis and Jesse, as well as linking retreat from Iraq with retreat from Vietnam, and further attempting to confuse Osama Bin Laden's Al Qaeda with the insurgents in Iraq. As September draws nearer, expect more political attacks designed to attack any criticism of the effectiveness of "the surge".
