DescentBB

Labor Department spent $500G in stimulus on green-job ad blitz on Olbermann, Maddow

According to government records, the Labor Department paid the money in late 2009 to a company that negotiated a media buy on MSNBC's "Countdown with Keith Olbermann" and "The Rachel Maddow Show." The ad was set to run more than 100 times -- 14 times a week for two months.

Discuss

I know 500 grand is a lot of money, but compared to the U.S. government haul, it's little drops in the bucket. The success of any product depends greatly on its marketing and promotion (as any business person will tell you). Now, I'm sure most of this board will disagree with the notion that the Govt would have to sell something like this, it makes sense to me that the administration would want people seeing and knowing that the green industry is not some passing fad, that it is a place where people can look for work. As for the chosen medium, Obama running ads on Fox News would be a complete waste of money.

the military probably spends 500 grand every minute. So what? Once again, blind hate leads to harping on absolute drivel.
Seriously, CUDA, why would you even bring up a half-million dollar ad budget, for a legitimate program, that has had some success, and as Cob points out, seems like a sensible targetted buy? The programs chosen were 1)viewed by affluent persons who tend to be sympathetic to enviromental causes and 2) have a relatively young, college-educated demographic. Where is there anything to 'discuss', by way of controversy?? You realize that 500 thousand bucks over several months is NOTHING to MSNBC, in terms of income, right? FWIW, Olberman(who I used to refer to on Progressive sites as 'the Failed Sportscaster') is a complete hack and has since been fired, twice. Maddow, though, is a Rhodes Scholar, smart as hell and probably as good a spokeswoman as the left side of the political spectrum has on the air today.

All i did was say discuss and you accuse me of blind hate. You proved yourself to be a blindly partisan hack. Is it even possible for you to criticize your party?
You rag on Woody. You're every bit what you accuse him of being

CUDA wrote:All i did was say discuss and you accuse me of blind hate. You proved yourself to be a blindly partisan hack. Is it even possible for you to criticize your party?
You rag on Woody. You're every bit what you accuse him of being

excuse me, be I've been able to criticize this admin on BIG things. Such as kowtowing to a useless Congress instead of leading more boldly in the first two years. Like continuing Patriot act abuses. But, bitching over a 500,000 dollar ad campaign, or even bringing it up is laughable.

1). a person who loves, supports, and defends his or her country and its interests with devotion.

2). a person who regards himself or herself as a defender, especially of individual rights, against presumed interference by the federal government.

...what the hell are you even defining? And no matter what it is, why are you defining something?

Lol, Patriot, no wonder

Which, I ask again, has what to do with this thread? Seriously flip, enough with the random tangents.

I think Cuda's point is....why the hell is stimulus money being used to promote a favored child of the left that has repeatedly been shown to be a loser industry. And Slick... 500g here and 500g there, pretty soon we are talking real money. Coupled with all the other waste we have seen I think most people would agree it is no longer the amount. It's all about govt. agencies throwing money away with no consideration for where it comes from.

why should there be need to advertise stimulus money? were they hoping to be able to sell something?? it's not like the whole world didn't know that the US government was giving away Billions. Hell they even knew about it in Finland where we helped to build a Car company that put so many Americans to work
And your right Wood. I don't give a damn about 500K it's peanuts in the overall scheme of things. but slicks comments were expected and typical. you start by trying to discredit the individual posting

Once again, blind hate leads to harping on absolute drivel

then you finish with trying to discredit the point. no attempt at honest debate. lets just call the poster hateful and stupid and call the topic stupid also,
slick was always so fond of telling a member of a different forum to run along the adults are trying to have a conversation. I guess slick led him off to the play room and forgot to come back. he used to be someone that I enjoyed having a debate with, that's why I invited him here, now we just get left wing crap and insults, no honest discussion from him.

An Honest debater would have looked at the stimulus money being given to two of the most liberal mouth pieces on the left who are (or were)on the most left bias "news" org out there and is CLEARLY campaigning to have Obama re-elected and had seen a conflict of interest. but not slick. it's much easier just to Ad-hominem attack the OP then it is to honestly discuss a topic. you can be damn sure that if a Republican had done the same thing there would be screaming from the left and slick about it.

Top Gun wrote:Which, I ask again, has what to do with this thread? Seriously flip, enough with the random tangents.

Dude, you may be the only one here that didn't get it. It was a response to Slick in what I felt was based on my perception of his cognitive ability .

HINT: Patriot Act abuses. Which in my opinion are a fact of life you have to accept. There is no way you can expect privacy with technology that is able to see a quarter from a satellite. That is peanuts to todays tech. Believe me, any of your wildest dreams, someone else has already thought the same thing and tried to make it reality, which they will. It all means nothing if you live in such a way nothing can be said against you.

woodchip wrote:I think Cuda's point is....why the hell is stimulus money being used to promote a favored child of the left that has repeatedly been shown to be a loser industry

because, if this nation does not(as China and others do)start to underwrite new technology to wean away from greenhouse gases and dependance on fossil fuels, we will doom our economy to second-class status, as the reast of the world increases demand for such things. It's really, really basic macroeconomics.

. And Slick... 500g here and 500g there, pretty soon we are talking real money. Coupled with all the other waste we have seen I think most people would agree it is no longer the amount. It's all about govt. agencies throwing money away with no consideration for where it comes from.

as has been pointed out, quite lucidly, a half-million dollar ad budget is a sensible buy, probably far to small to promote something so vital. Thus, your assumptions as to lack of consideration are laughable.

CUDA wrote: it's much easier just to Ad-hominem attack the OP then it is to honestly discuss a topic. you can be damn sure that if a Republican had done the same thing there would be screaming from the left and slick about it.

um, CUDA, I pointed out why I felt whining about this non-issue was ludicrous. Further, I seem to not recall one word out of you when Bush, et al, pumped literally BILLIONS toward a corporation fromerly managed by the Vice President. Not one word.
Hypocrisy, anyone?

flip wrote:HINT: Patriot Act abuses. Which in my opinion are a fact of life you have to accept.

Lolno. I don't care what technology is available...you don't violate the principles of the goddamn Constitution while employing it against innocent citizens. And the name of the act is the biggest laughingstock of all.

CUDA wrote:Labor Department spent $500G in stimulus on green-job ad blitz on Olbermann, Maddow

According to government records, the Labor Department paid the money in late 2009 to a company that negotiated a media buy on MSNBC's "Countdown with Keith Olbermann" and "The Rachel Maddow Show." The ad was set to run more than 100 times -- 14 times a week for two months.

Discuss

Never saw any ads of this nature, on either show. Maybe I blinked or missed something. Considering Olbermann is long gone because of Keith's prima donna syndrome, they wasted our money on him. Of course, I always hit the 30 second skip button on the DVR during most commercials, as do probably most people with DVR's, so it's for sure a waste of our money.

But is it any more of a waste to promote green jobs with taxpayer money than it is for the Koch Brothers to put out their petroleum institute pro-oil ad propaganda BS using the profits, err, money, we gave them for the fuel we put in our cars? Either way, the money for some ad came out of our pockets. If it was taken by the government or by private industry, what's the difference? I'd rather see green jobs promoted by the government rather than to line the pockets of dirty energy companies that don't care if we have to live in the pollution their product creates.

callmeslick wrote:I seem to not recall one word out of you when Bush, et al, pumped literally BILLIONS toward a corporation fromerly managed by the Vice President. Not one word.
Hypocrisy, anyone?

you must be confusing me with Ruggbutt. Because I would guess the reason you didn't hear a word from me about Bush giving money towards anything was because you didn't know me when he was President. I had only joined CWOS just a couple of months before the board change to the new format and that was Sept 09 AFTER Bush was out of office and since you've been on this BB I do not believe the subject has been raised. Apology anyone?

tunnelcat wrote:Never saw any ads of this nature, on either show. Maybe I blinked or missed something.

are you saying they gave 500K and never ran any ads

But is it any more of a waste to promote green jobs with taxpayer money than it is for the Koch Brothers to put out their petroleum institute pro-oil ad propaganda BS using the profits, err, money, we gave them for the fuel we put in our cars? Either way, the money for some ad came out of our pockets. If it was taken by the government or by private industry, what's the difference? I'd rather see green jobs promoted by the government rather than to line the pockets of dirty energy companies that don't care if we have to live in the pollution their product creates.

I do believe that your confusing Tax payer $ that is mandatory taken from you, and then you have no say over where it's spent, to a Private Company that spends their earned profits for advertising and that you have a choice to not spend your money with.

CUDA wrote:

callmeslick wrote:I seem to not recall one word out of you when Bush, et al, pumped literally BILLIONS toward a corporation fromerly managed by the Vice President. Not one word.
Hypocrisy, anyone?

you must be confusing me with Ruggbutt. Because I would guess the reason you didn't hear a word from me about Bush giving money towards anything was because you didn't know me when he was President. I had only joined CWOS just a couple of months before the board change to the new format and that was Sept 09 AFTER Bush was out of office and since you've been on this BB I do not believe the subject has been raised. Apology anyone?

apologies indeed, I thought you were there from 06 someplace.
Still, did you find Bush's funnelling of money to Halliburton objectionable, and would you not agree that a half million ad budget is comparatively trivial?

edit: and,no I would NEVER confuse you with Ruggbutt. You frequently make sense.

CUDA wrote:[I do believe that your confusing Tax payer $ that is mandatory taken from you, and then you have no say over where it's spent, to a Private Company that spends their earned profits for advertising and that you have a choice to not spend your money with.

I think TC is rightly equating tax money spending from budget, with tax income foregone in corporate subsidies to oil companies. Either way, you paid for those ads, either directly or indirectly. Difference is, the oil companies get billions.

Top Gun wrote:

flip wrote:HINT: Patriot Act abuses. Which in my opinion are a fact of life you have to accept.

Lolno. I don't care what technology is available...you don't violate the principles of the goddamn Constitution while employing it against innocent citizens. And the name of the act is the biggest laughingstock of all.

Yep exactly! The Patriot Act was quickly installed at a time of public distress, but the point of it had nothing to do with terrorism. It federally relaxed standards under that of the standards of the Constitution. Were you not paying attention?

EDIT:And when I say accept it, I mean there is no way to prevent it. Not that I agree with it.

callmeslick wrote:Still, did you find Bush's funnelling of money to Halliburton objectionable,

never did like the whole Halliburton thing so the answer to your question would be yes.

and would you not agree that a half million ad budget is comparatively trivial?

I said it was, where I see the glaring difference is that Halliburton does not have the power to sway voters through the media like MSNBC to keep the President in power. where making contributions to a "News "agency especially one already with it's head so far up the Presidents butt that they can kiss his tonsils from the inside. stinks of TASS and Hugo Chavez. that is my sole objection

CUDA wrote:

tunnelcat wrote:Never saw any ads of this nature, on either show. Maybe I blinked or missed something.

are you saying they gave 500K and never ran any ads

Like I say, I skipped the commercials. Never paid attention to the little frozen snippets in between while hitting the skip button. And Olbermann was so much a no-show on his own show that I rarely got to watch him. And I do have a life you know.

CUDA wrote:

tunnelcat wrote:But is it any more of a waste to promote green jobs with taxpayer money than it is for the Koch Brothers to put out their petroleum institute pro-oil ad propaganda BS using the profits, err, money, we gave them for the fuel we put in our cars? Either way, the money for some ad came out of our pockets. If it was taken by the government or by private industry, what's the difference? I'd rather see green jobs promoted by the government rather than to line the pockets of dirty energy companies that don't care if we have to live in the pollution their product creates.

I do believe that your confusing Tax payer $ that is mandatory taken from you, and then you have no say over where it's spent, to a Private Company that spends their earned profits for advertising and that you have a choice to not spend your money with.

Like I have any say with what the Koch Brothers do with the money I have to give them for the privilege of purchasing their crappy ethanol-laced sucky fuel system eating fuel. It's kinda mandatory to me to buy fuel so that I can even get around in my car or mow my lawn. Even if I took the bus, it uses Koch fuel too. I could get a horse, but I'd rather give it to the government to promote greener energy than give it to these 2 greed mongers who are polluting the world with their profits. You think the government's a waste pit, I think the petroleum barons are a bigger waste pit.

I don't watch hardly any "news shows", who the hell is Rugbutt?

different forum

Now I wish there was someone on an actual news show with that name.

tunnelcat wrote:


Like I have any say with what the Koch Brothers do with the money I have to give them for the privilege of purchasing their crappy ethanol-laced sucky fuel system eating fuel. It's kinda mandatory to me to buy fuel so that I can even get around in my car or mow my lawn. Even if I took the bus, it uses Koch fuel too. I could get a horse, but I'd rather give it to the government to promote greener energy than give it to these 2 greed mongers who are polluting the world with their profits. You think the government's a waste pit, I think the petroleum barons are a bigger waste pit.

So you are saying the Koch Bros control all oil production and all gasoline manufacture and distribution? That's pretty impressive of them.