The Rounds for Senate campaign paid Republican blogger Pat Powers $2,136 for advertising during the third quarter of 2013. According to Rounds's Q3 FEC report, Team Rounds paid Powers's Dakota Campaign Store $636 on August 17 and $1,500 on September 27.
The Rounds-enriched Powers natters away this morning about Rounds's impressive campaign war chest but declines to mention his own appearance in the FEC report. Power pages through his (forgive me, Rounds's) opponents' FEC reports and razzes Stace Nelson but praises Annette Bosworth, which fits perfectly with the Rounds camp strategy of weakening their greatest threat by puffing up non-contenders.
I've previously written about the caution with which we should read Ken Santema's blog posts about the U.S. Senate race in South Dakota, given that he is an official member of Rep. Stace Nelson's official and sprawling statewide campaign team. Santema has been transparent about his preference for Nelson in the Senate race. Santema makes this support clear by contributing $250 to Nelson's campaign (as reported on Nelson's Q3 report to the FEC). His bias is open, honest, and unbought.
Meanwhile, Pat Powers has adopted a façade of neutrality in the GOP primary. He has rebranded himself on his blog and Twitter as @SDSenate2014, a clearinghouse for "reporting" on the highly watched Senate race.
Let us be absolutely clear: Mike Rounds is paying Pat Powers for advertising in this campaign. A politician advertising on a political blog is not by itself news. I've run advertisements for candidates, some whom I've supported, and some who wouldn't necessarily get my vote. When I have run such ads, I've made clear where I stand.
Pat Powers isn't doing that. He's pretending to be neutral while taking thousands of dollars from the one candidate whom his posts favor. That payment and poorly faked neutrality together call into question the reliability of any "analysis" Pat Powers offers on the Republican Senate primary in South Dakota.
p.s.: I have not caught mention of any other bloggers, myself included, in the FEC Q3 reports. But Rounds's Q3 report shows that he pays slimy campaigner Dick Wadhams $3,500 a month for advice.
I think Rounds should watch out for bolstering Bosworth too much. She is the only woman running against a boys club, and that alone will get her some votes. We could see something similar to how Mike won the primary for governor simply because he was the only nice guy in the barroom fight between Kirby and Barnett. Voters do strange things. I am sure the powers that be (the pat powers that be?) in South Dakota have always been in the Rounds corner, which is why "Dr. Bos" has been left alone. But I can see the Rounds campaign green-lighting her to be hit hard about a month or so before the primaries. IF she is still in it at that time, she will have to be seen as some type of threat.
You make clear, Dave, exactly why Team Rounds can use Bosworth for now against the real threat of the Nelson campaign. The lawyers on Team Rounds have a bigger file than I do on her Medicaid fraud troubles, her run-ins with the state medical board, her foreclosures, her raffles, her husband's Utah mortgage-flipping company, all that stuff. As long as she's just cutting into the anti-Rounds vote and keeping that opposition from uniting behind one effectively challenger, Rounds can happily entertain her play. The moment that opposition shows any sign of uniting behind Bosworth, the Rounds-Wadhams team mails out 100,000 Annette-Che flyers and and includes that photo in airtime buys in every commercial break on KELO between 6 and 10:30 p.m. She is the perfect non-entity to run interference for Rounds.
I need to register as a Republican just so I can get one of those Annette-Che flyers!!!
Two things the Net lacks ... Privacy and neutrality. 'Twill never change, tovarishch.
$3,500.00 to be slimy AND give advice. Damn, now I know I'm in the wrong business.
I was considering Talk Show host, but this might be too good to pass up.
$3,500 a month -- I'd work for that check!
I feel sorry for Pat: he doesn't have a pot or a window because of his eating disorder and has to pay for all those kids with bad diseases. It's sad.
Larry, I'm going to try really hard not to engage in the bitter personal attacks that characterize Pat's blogging. He uses them to distract people from realizing he hasn't really addressed the serious issues at hand.
If it's any consolation I have no pity for Santema: he's merely sleazy.
As long as the blogger boys are getting paid, maybe they can sugarcoat the GOP proposed cuts to SNAP that would hurt 900,000 veterans.
Earn your money fellas.