This has everything to do with naked intimidation
Politicians recognize they give up a degree of privacy when they run for office.
But Democrats are testing the outer limits of that understanding with a practice that raises questions about when campaign tracking becomes something more like stalking.
While most serious campaigns on both sides use campaign trackers — staffers whose job is to record on video every public appearance and statement by an opponent — House Democrats are taking it to another level. They’re now recording video of the homes of GOP congressmen and candidates and posting the raw footage on the Internet for all to see. […]
Republicans whose homes have been videotaped say they understand that politics is a contact sport and that every public utterance they make is fair game. But, they argue, filming a home — and posting actual addresses — ought to be off-limits, if only out of respect for their families and neighbors.
“I think your family or your personal life should be off-limits unless it enters the campaign,” said Ohio Rep. Jim Renacci, who said a neighbor informed him that a tracker had been crouching in the bushes taking footage of the first-term congressman’s home. “It’s hard for my neighbors or my family to get comfortable when someone is in the bushes.”
Politico makes a lame attempt at tu quoque but cannot help but admit that no tape of Democrat candidate homes, including addresses, has been posted on the internet.
In an email, Paul Lindsay, an NRCC spokesman, wrote: “Our trackers serve as eyes and ears to hold Democrats accountable in public events and public spaces only. Anything beyond that would be a violation of our policy.”
Democrats, on the other hand, insist the videos are fair game — and are unapologetic about the hardball tactics.
They say showcasing the homes — most of which are spacious and neatly maintained — underscores what will be a key avenue of attack for the party this fall: communicating that Republicans just can’t relate to economically struggling voters.
Oh my, I guess if one is “struggling” one is incapable of keeping oneself and home “neatly maintained.”
What a wonderful set of condescending assumptions Democrats have of their pet identity groups.
Democratic officials said placing the videos on the DCCC’s website and YouTube serve a useful purpose, most notably making the footage available to friendly outside groups for use in TV commercials. That way, they don’t violate laws against coordinating with those groups.
Not that is the only reason for the Stasi surveillance or even the primary one.
Though, the Occupy & Union labor thugs might like to think twice before acting on the actual targeting coordinates offered:
California Republican Assemblyman David Valadao, whose two Central Valley farms are the subjects of videos that also include their addresses, said he recognized the risks that come with campaigning for office and is prepared to deal with them. So is his wife.
“It’s one of those things. We know we’re in this position, and it’s part of the job. I wish it wasn’t,” he said, noting that a mechanic on one of his farms chased away a tracker filming the scene. “We have alarms on the house. My wife knows how to use weapons. As far as safety goes, we do our best to be cautious and to keep track of our kids.”
h/t Weasel Zippers via geoffb
Your linky is self-referent. You meant to send to the dawgs of Politico?
Democrats are throwing firecrackers in the dry grasses. tick, tock, tick….
oops, thanks, serr8d. Sometimes the linkies go amissin’ when I hit “publish”
Democrats, on the other hand, insist the videos are fair game — and are unapologetic about the hardball tactics.
Sure they do. Right up until the tactics are used against them. Then it’s “OMG! Fascist jackbooted Rethuglicans are harassing my family!”
You’ve sown the wind, fuckers. Don’t think we’ll let you cry foul when the harvest comes.
This is just a continuation of what was done to Palin’s family (and other Republicans), where no personal issue or family member was off-limits, including Trig. It was a coordinated attack by the MSM under the guise of “vetting” (as if “just asking questions” about her OB-GYN records was legitimate) and the entertainment industry (crude jocks by TV comedians, SNL) – each providing the other fodder for the next round of vetting/mockery.
What’s most disturbing is how this is being facilitated and legitimized by mainstream organizations. Washington Post publishes numerous front page stories about a Dem operative’s recording of Allen’s “Macaca”slip or a candidate’s college paper. An established book publisher hires a creepy biographer who rents a house next to Palin. Mainstream magazines let a looney like Andrew Sullivan blog endlessly about Palin’s private life with seemingly no oversight because it drive traffic to their sites. The Dems know that whatever they record or dig up can be handed off to the MSM and people in the entertainment industry to get widespread coverage.
Anyone care to hypothesize the motivation behind the Left’s vigorous attempts to minimize and marginalize Breitbart’s properties, especially the work of O’Keefe? We’re talking about people whose leader said — out loud, in public, and on the record — that they should bring their guns to a knife fight.
There should be no doubt in anybody’s mind that this crowd will do their utmost to keep their weapons out of our hands. Don’t let them get away with it.
And lest any newcomers take my advocacy for vigorous pushback as some sort of wish to bring about a civil war, let me make my motivations plain: the Gadsden flag depicts a coiled rattlesnake. The rattlesnake is the most courteous of all snakes, because it issues a warning before it strikes. I don’t want to sink to the Left’s level, but I want to make them very aware that I’m willing to do so if need be. My belief is that the Left are fundamentally cowards; my hope is that once they recognize that we will resist them, they will back down before it comes to a direct confrontation. I hope they do, for all our sakes.
Especially well put.
Some of you aren’t into tats. I’m getting the Gaddsden flag on my neck.
That’s my rattle.
Anyone care to hypothesize the motivation behind the Left’s vigorous attempts to minimize and marginalize Breitbart’s properties?
They’re effective. Not only at getting people to see how supposedly mainstream organizations like ACORN & NPR truly operate, but at destroying the media in the process. Breitbart’s genius is in HOW he reported these stories, with the whole rope-a-dope approach that demolishes the media and the target’s as they attempt to denying or dismiss a story.
I hope they do too, for all our snakes. But I don’t believe for a moment they’ll do the right thing. It’s just too foreign a concept to them, right.
But I don’t believe for a moment they’ll do the right thing.
They’ll never do it out of a sense of goodness, fair play or conscience. But maybe — just maybe — they’ll do it out of a sense of self-preservation. When you’re dealing with sociopaths and narcissists, appealing to their sense of self-preservation is really the only avenue you have.
Yep Squid, there’s the difficulty standing before our preferences — just as we’d rather not have to come to threats of blows or to actual blows, so the left political man will not recognize the preference as anything but weakness, moving on this mistaken assumption to provoke the very outcome we’d rather not reach.
That’s a big part of why I advocate that OUTLAW!s make it plain: “I have no desire to harm you, but I will see us both destroyed before I allow you to enslave me and my family.” It’s the central driver of my arguments of yesterday: I’m at the point where I want them to come after everyone’s guns, because it strikes me as the most likely way to bring about the active resistance that needs to be shown if we’re to tame the juggernaut.
Heh, as a leading neck tattoo critic, I can honestly admit that a Gadsden flag might be so bad-ass as to change my mind.
By the way, Squid, you’re quite nicely expressing what I’ve been trying to say lately. From now on, if something is going to be off the table, it needs to be off the table for both sides. They’ve gone too far across the board for us to grant them these constant advantages.
Something I’d really like us to develop as a credible threat is that we’ll take their structures and use them against them after they’ve pissed us off rather than just partially roll them back every other decade.
There’s a reason you don’t give the government these kinds of incredible powers but they’ll never realize this if they’re immune to the abuse.
The EPA doesn’t actively fuck their businesses? The IRS doesn’t target them? The Dept of Ed doesn’t put a thumb in their eyes every chance it gets?
The government only does these things to their opponents?
Well, seriously, I can kinda see why they like this.
Neck tattoos make a man look like a thug.
Neck tattoos are for trashy thugs and high school drop-outs who don’t ever want a job with decent people. Not that I am opinionated about tattoos or anything.
I had a very nice old old lady show me her tattoo from one of the death camps once upon a time. She wasn’t down with tattoos in the least and couldn’t understand why people saw them as a fashion statement when to her they were a sign of being treated like livestock.
Soon enough our SSNs will be encoded on RFID chips implanted in our necks. Along with our racial categories and voting history.
The tattoo will be for those holding CCW permits.
Same-same, Comrade. A version of “May I see your papers, please.”
Yeah, I gotta say, a neck tattoo is about as cool as a goiter. I’m not a fan in any case, but I think you should consider the bicep instead. That way you could flex, and ask menacingly, “hear the rattle?”.
Neck tattoos worn by non trashy thugs and non high school dropouts are for non trashy thugs and non high school dropouts. And the fact of the matter is, if someone doesn’t want to hire me because I’ve declared myself a defender of liberty, that’s on them.
Body art, incidentally, predates the WWII work camps, and just because it has been used as a stamp doesn’t mean that it must always and only function as one. Maybe you should have answered that nice confused old lady with the moral imperative thus.
Real men don’t need tats, Jeff.
I don’t need tats. I want them.
You are free to judge me based on the fact that I have something on my skin that God Above didn’t himself put there.
I’m not judging. I’m expressing my opinion. Good tats (ha!) are quite expensive and if that’s the way you want to spend your money, then you are certainly free to do so.
Used to be the only people with tats were sailors and convicts. Now practically every teenage girl in the country has at least one.
These days, not having one makes me feel outlaw.
That’s the way I feel about it Lee.
off-topic, but because there are lots of gun people here, I thought I’d offer this: I have a brand-new Streamlight TLR-1s gun rail light, still in the box. Fits nearly all rail systems, for pistols, rifles, what have you. Aluminum housing, semi-water proof, very well reviewed, and more than half the price of a Surefire light (which is also a great product). Paid $100 for it off Amazon. Rather than sending it back and dealing with that, I’ll offer it here first. $95 takes it.
Outlaw is a state of mind. Tattoos don’t have anything to do with it.
The reason I don’t have a tattoo is, I’ve never come up with an image worthy of the canvas.
Though my canvas tends to look more like a topsail in a dead calm, than a candidate for the Louvre.
I figure if I’m willing to put my neck on the line for liberty, I may as well make it a performative piece.
Luffable then, McG, which doesn’t preclude lovable to the right lady swabby.
Well, if women don’t find me Louvre-able, they might as well find me luffable.
becalming hehs
Depends on the rational for getting one, doesn’t it? I suspect the state of mind behind most tattoos is the opposite of outlaw. Not saying it’s your motivation, but I bet the vast majority are bought to be cool and hip and all my friends got’em. A tribal marker.
At least there’s one Democrat who clearly thinks that the Democratic behavior outlined above is going too far:
Dateline 2004
Hence my comment at 8:10, Dave.
Oh, rereading my last comment, I’d like to add a small edit:
This couldn’t possibly end badly. (like so many other DNC tactics)
Text of Romney speech at the NAACP.