Today, Kimberly Strassel of the Wall Street Journal reports that the Obama campaign has been singling out Romney donors for special targeting. As Strassel writes:
This past week, one of his campaign websites posted an item entitled “Behind the curtain: A brief history of Romney’s donors.” In the post, the Obama campaign named and shamed eight private citizens who had donated to his opponent. Describing the givers as all having “less-than-reputable records,” the post went on to make the extraordinary accusations that “quite a few” have also been “on the wrong side of the law” and profiting at “the expense of so many Americans.”
What did these nefarious characters do? They “outsourced” jobs. “Not one holds elected office,” writes Strassel. “Not one is a criminal. Not one has the barest fraction of the position or the power of the U.S. leader who is publicly assaulting them.”
But this has become the modus operandi of the Obama Administration. While Obama claims that Sandra Fluke, who was attacked for her House testimony, is a private citizen, he has worked with groups like Media Matters for America (MMFA) to target private businesses for destruction if they oppose his agenda. It is Obama’s minions who suggested that the White House should put a boot on the throat of BP. It is Obama-connected 501(c)3 groups like MMFA that have targeted the American Legislative Exchange Council, and private businesses like Coca-Cola, AT&T and State Farm which give money to it. It is that same network that has aimed its fire at Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and talk radio generally. It is those same folks who attacked donors to the Proposition 8 effort in California, trying to shut down their businesses with so-called “secondary boycotts.”
These people are bullies. With the bleed-over from the Obama campaign to the Obama Administration, this is quasi-governmental action. Whatever it is, it’s certainly a chill on free speech and political giving.