RENT-A-FRONT: New Group Wages Stealth Battle Against Wall Street Reform

[Segami]

Sunlight is the BEST disinfectant!


" In the last few weeks, a new player entered the financial reform fray with a $1.6 million ad buy, a respected economist on board, a blitz of opinion columns on left-leaning websites, and a message, cooked right into the group's name -- Stop Too Big To Fail -- that liberals could love.


But as TPMmuckraker has looked into the group, every indication is that Stop Too Big To Fail is an astroturf operation funded by corporate interests to give the appearance of grassroots opposition to reform.


The group's leader has a long history running a rent-a-front operation: offering up his services to large corporations who are willing to pay top dollar for a "consumers group" that will engage in stealth advocacy on behalf of industry. The group refuses to divulge its funding sources. The respected economist whose support the group touts now says he was deceived. And Stop Too Big To Fail has links to DCI Group, one of Washington's best-known astroturf operators.


Besides all that, Stop Too Big To Fail's real goal is clear: kill the financial reform bill.


"These guys made the KGB look like amateurs, and I used to work in Russia quite a lot," says Simon Johnson, a former chief economist at the IMF, now at MIT, who is a prominent advocate of breaking up the big banks.


Stop Too Big To Fail reached out to Johnson earlier this month to participate in a media conference call purportedly on the topic of breaking up large banks. The theme was "protecting small investors." Johnson agreed to be on the call and outlined his views as usual, but he also noticed something seemed off. "I thought they seemed a little different from the other people I talked to on these issues."


Stop Too Big To Fail is now featuring Johnson's picture prominently on the landing page of their website -- and he is angry.


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<http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/04/rent-a-front_stop_too_big_to_fail_fights_reform.php?ref=fpb>

[FiveGoodMen]

1. K&R

[Nikki Stone1]

2. K & R

:thumbsup:

[dchill]

3. K&R

[gratuitous]

4. Ring, ring, the New Media Darling phone is ringing!

Look for STBTF's spokespeople to appear all over the teevee shows, touting their "grass roots" opposition to financial reform. The talking chuckleheads will let them go on for five minutes or more, and nary a word will be heard that viewers have just been treated to a paid advertisement, courtesy of their "trusted" hosts and anchors.

[Segami]

5. The first question that should be asked by the so -called journalist talkin-heads is " Who is

financing their ' grass-roots ' organization? They SHOULDN'T be allowed to begin spewing out their prepared talkin-point-infomercial on how bad this financial reform will be for the nation if it passes. If they have any journalistic integrity, they'll challenge these ' swiftboat con artists ' claims......but don't hold your breath on that happening. One of the few people thats NOT been afraid to challenge their guests with hard, direct questions has been Rachel Maddow and KO.