He Could Have Run the Budget
He Could Have Run the Budget - Where did all the money go?
Howard Dean's use of internet fundraising got a lot of attention last year. This year, it's another story:
As Howard Dean's presidential campaign tore through the millions it raised last year, nearly a quarter of it went to the company owned in part by his former campaign manager.
The campaign paid $7.2 million to Trippi, McMahon and Squier, the Virginia-based consulting and media firm - 23 percent of the $31 million it spent through Dec. 31, according to PoliticalMoneyLine, which tracks political spending.
Joe Trippi, one of the company's partners, was Dean's campaign manager for a year - until he was ousted last month and replaced by Roy Neel as chief executive. Dean asked Trippi to stay with the campaign as an adviser, but Trippi quit.
Instead of a salary, Trippi's company had been paid a commission of the campaign's television advertising buys - a percentage he and his company's partners said he never knew.
Remember his title - campaign
manager?
Of course, given the results he got from the money, there are a lot of quesions about that title...
"I didn't want to know. I didn't do this for the money," Trippi said. "I was interested in beating [President] Bush. I was interested in building a campaign that could get Howard Dean in position. I'm proud of what I did. Anyone who knows me knows my personal money was never, ever on my mind, and it was nothing that motivated me."
That begs a couple of questions:
- Does he think the American people are that stupid? If so, what does that say about the Dean campaign as a whole?
- If "beating President Bush" was more important than keeping track of their contributors' money and making sure it was going where it was supposed to be going, what would that say about a Dean presidency?
Not that it's an issue anymore, of course.
BRIGHT IDEA: Maybe we should do a staging of "The Rainmaker", only change the title character's name to "Howard."
Just a thought...
Posted by Mitch at
February 10, 2004 05:00 AM
