Another Plant Attempt Revealed

Geoffrey Mitchell, 32, says he was approached by an operative for the Clinton campaign to ask a planted question about standing up to President Bush on Iraq war funding.

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Mitchell tells Fox that Clinton campaign worker Chris Hayler approached him and asked him to ask Sen. Clinton a question about how she was standing up to President Bush on the question of funding the Iraq war and a troop withdrawal timeline.

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Mitchell said he refused to ask the question.

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Mitchel told Fox that Hayler, the Clinton campaign worker, was unhappy and moved on to others. "I know he tried to have others ask that question," Mitchell said.

Ultimately, Mitchell said Clinton took no questions at the event.
CameronBlogs

JOHN EDWARDS ON CLINTON'S PLANTING:

Edwards, in a press conference after his speech to the Farmers' Union, hit Hillary for planting a question at an Iowa event.

"That's what George does: George Bush goes to events that are staged where people are screened," he said. "That's not the way democracy works in Iowa."
BenSmith's Blog

You may remember when an an Iowan asked Clinton why she voted for Kyl-Lieberman and she verbally berated him as a "plant" from another campaign.

Friday afternoon brought a report that her campaign is planting some of her questions.  Maybe that's why she assumed the Iran question was a plant?

On Tuesday Nov. 6, the Clinton campaign stopped at a biodiesel plant in Newton as part of a weeklong series of events to introduce her new energy plan. The event was clearly intended to be as much about the press as the Iowa voters in attendance, as a large press core helped fill the small venue. Reporters from many major national news outlets came to the small Iowa town, from such media giants as The New York Times, Los Angeles Times,
the Associated Press, and CNN.
Grinnell Scarlet and Black

Senator Clinton must have been afraid of real questions from the audience.

Clinton called on Gallo-Chasanoff after her speech to ask a question: what Clinton would do to stop the effects of global warming. Clinton began her response by noting that young people often pose this question to her before delving into the benefits of her plan.

But the source of the question was no coincidence--at this event "they wanted
a question from a college student," Gallo-Chasanoff said. She also noted that staffers prompted Clinton to call on her and another who had been approached before the event.

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[A]ccording to Grinnell College student Muriel Gallo-Chasanoff ', some of the questions from the audience were planned in advance. "They were canned," she said. Before the event began, a Clinton staff member approached Gallo-Chasanoff to ask a specific question after Clinton's speech. "One of the senior staffers told me what [to ask]," she said.
Grinnell Scarlet and Black

At first the Clinton campaign denied it to the Grinnell newspaper:

But the Clinton campaign also denied the practice of planting.

"It's not a practice of our campaign to ask people to ask specific questions," said Mark Daley, Clinton's Iowa Communications Director. Daley said that when an event is focusing on a specific topic, such as health care or Iraq, "people are encouraged to ask questions in these regards," but denied that they are given specific questions.
Grinnell Scarlet and Black

But late last night the Clinton Campaign came clean:

The Clinton campaign has admitted to planting questions in Iowa. They have
confirmed that a campaign staffer approached a student to ask Sen. Clinton a question about global warming during a campaign stop at a biodiesel plant in Newton, Iowa, on Nov. 6.

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Clinton Campaign spokesperson Mo Elleithee tells ABC News that "on this occasion a member of our staff did discuss a possible question about Sen.Clinton's energy plan at a forum.  However, Sen. Clinton did not know which questioners she was calling on during the event.  This is not standard policy and will not be repeated again."

The staffer still remains with the Clinton campaign and they would not reveal his or her name. The campaign did not comment on whether this is the only time they have planted questions among audience members.
abcnews

John Edwards takes any questions:

When asked if the John Edwards campaign employed such practices,
Jenni Lee, Edwards's Iowa Press Secretary said, "No, they ask whatever they
want."
Grinnell Scarlet and Black

I wonder how long this has been going on?  How many questions were planted? Remember Yearly Kos?  A few people who attended her session told me that it looked like the questioneers were pre-selected at her break out session.

I went to John Edwards' session.  Those questions definitely came from real Kossaks and Edwards took whatever was asked.

Why does this matter?  It's a funny story, but by itself does not mean a lot.  Campaigns try to manage their message.

But when one steps back and looks at the Politics of Doubletalk, a pattern emerges: time after time, Clinton muddles her message with evasive non-answers.  Now we have a FEMA-like
controlling of message by planting questions.

If Senator Clinton cannot handle questions in debates and cannot handle questions from real citizens, her prospects in a general election are less than optimal.

Furthermore, her campaign keeps screwing up. The tip kerfluffle never should have happened and then the campaign staff made it worse with conflicting stories: was it on a credit card, was it cash, did it happen at all?

And after the Politics of Parsing (TR not pending)(PartI and Part 2), the Clinton campaign should have known better. These are the best operatives money can buy and their ability to contain these problems is poor.  Perhaps it's because they have to do so much damage control and work so hard to obscure the candidate's positions?

Inevitability, it ain't.

People see this and they are noticing.  Yesterday, Caucus4Priorities of Iowa, the political arm of Iowans for Sensible Priorites endorsed John Edwards for President.

Here's what they said about former Senator Edwards:

Edwards gave an excellent answer," said Huppert. "He said we have to stop buying into their frame which equates spending money on the Pentagon with keeping us safe. He also said we can't have a Democratic candidate who cowers and runs away from this issue."

abcnews

And this about Senator Clinton:

Although Clinton filled out the group's detailed policy questionnaire, she was not among the final two candidates under
consideration for the endorsement.

"She didn't answer any questions 'yes' or 'no,'" said Huppert. "She has a refusal to commit to anything."

abcnews

"It's what the Clinton campaign calls the politics of planting."

Patterifico'sPontifications