As you may recall, one of the features of Randy Brock’s Titanicampaign for Governor was the fact that he outsourced many of its functions to out-of-state firms with a history of working for ultraconservative candidates. Indeed, he spent a boatload of money on “experts” from Ohio, Indiana, and California, as well as the shameful amount of cash hoovered up by his supposed friend, Darcie “Hack” Johnston.
One of those “experts” was Nick Everhart, president of the Ohio-based Strategy Group for Media. who served as Brock’s “media consultant.” In other words, Everhart was in charge of deciding which ratholes Brock would pour his money into. Nice work if you can get it.
Well, Buzzfeed has a long and very juicy story about dissension within the ranks at Strategy Group, including the extremely sudden firing of Mr. Everhart on April 6.
It’s well worth your time. It documents a cultlike atmosphere within the firm, and thoroughly displays its extremely conservative (and right-wing Christian) orientation. Buzzfeed reporter McKay Coppins describes the firm as…
…the largest, most combative, and perhaps most controversial band of messaging warriors in Republican politics. Their blandly named company, Strategy Group for Media, has spent more than a decade developing a slashing formula for turning the party’s right-wing rejects into members of Congress. Now there are at least 40 Republicans in Congress who have worked with the Strategy Group, which serves as a campaign and strategy clearing house for the uncompromisingly conservative wing of the congressional caucus that has been at the center of American politics since 2010.
… The company had the rare distinction of working, serially, for two presidential candidates last year – Michele Bachmann then Newt Gingrich. Other clients include the great Right hopes of 2016: Senators Rand Paul and Ted Cruz.
I guess Randy Brock didn’t make the list of “distinctive” 2012 clients. Sorry, Randy.
Everhart’s abrupt exit came after a falling-out with company founder Rex Elsass, who is a real piece of work if the article is to be believed. You can read all the gory details at Buzzfeed; for our purposes, the story is a useful reminder of the kind of people Randy Brock chose to get in bed with.
Which makes you wonder what kind of Governor he would have made. There are several Republican Governors around the country who ran on relatively inoffensive platforms who have now swerved hard to the right (Wisconsin’s Scott Walker and Michigan’s Rick Snyder, for example).
Was Randy Brock another stealth candidate for the Koch Brothers/Tea Party agenda? Thankfully, we’ll never know. But the same question could be asked more broadly of the Vermont Republican Party: are they really all that different from their national brethren, aside from ceding ground on lost-cause social issues that are tangential to the agenda of the national party’s paymasters?
I’d have to say he is not in the same league of conservative with those other celebrated clients.
I think he was simply dancing with the one “what brung him,” and was badly served by a campaign so incredibly out-of-touch with Vermonters…even Republican Vermonters…that his PR people and the dollars they spent were more of a liability than an asset.
A friend of mine was confused by the mixed references to “Strategy Group for Media” and “Strategy Group,” apparently referring to the self-same gang doing Republican PR work.
She says, “Strategy Group” works to elect Democrats. They worked on Pres. Obama’s and Sen. Tammy Baldwin’s campaigns among others, and have offices in Chicago, Detroit, LA, DC, and Philly.
Strategy Group for Media work for Republican campaigns.
Just in case anybody wondered or wanted to check the two PR firms out.
NanuqFC
In this world of sin and sorrow there is always something to be thankful for; as for me, I rejoice that I am not a Republican. ~ H. L. Mencken