Politico posted an article this morning discussing Rex Elsass and Strategy Group for Media, the consultants managing Todd Akin's hot mess of a Senate campaign in Missouri. There's one quote near the beginning, about how SGM's response to the backlash against Akin's ridiculous "legitimate rape" comments was to have the candidate film a TV ad apologizing:
No, it sounds to me like SGM was giving Akin the "opportunity" to make a big media buy and give his consultants the "opportunity" to get the commission from that media buy. (If you weren't aware, that's how the game works - the media consultants get a percentage off the top of all TV/radio/etc. buys)
Don't miss Rick Wilson's comments later in the article:
Read the whole article here.
Rex Elsass, the founder and CEO of the firm, defended Akin and SGM’s work for him in a local TV interview Tuesday: “We’re giving a very good man an opportunity to speak directly to the electorate.”Ummm...no, Rex, you weren't giving him the "opportunity to speak directly to the electorate." The whole darn country heard him say that rape victims' bodies have "ways to shut that whole thing down" and magically avoid pregnancy.
No, it sounds to me like SGM was giving Akin the "opportunity" to make a big media buy and give his consultants the "opportunity" to get the commission from that media buy. (If you weren't aware, that's how the game works - the media consultants get a percentage off the top of all TV/radio/etc. buys)
Don't miss Rick Wilson's comments later in the article:
Florida-based GOP consultant Rick Wilson — no establishment squish himself — said the argument that SGM was simply standing by its client amounted to “the consulting Nuremberg defense of saying, I’m just following orders.”
“It’s a distraction from the core message. We’ve been off it for five days, all because of one idiot and his consultant who is enabling him,” said Wilson, who was an informal adviser to one of Akin’s primary opponents. “Anybody who’s helping [Akin] do this right now, anybody who is counseling or encouraging him or advising him, is effectively working to reelect Claire McCaskill and Barack Obama.”
Read the whole article here.
Tread lightly Sarah, as consultants we have all made money off of candidates who have said ridiculous things. Just because these consultants have very few options to resurrect this dead campaign, we shouldn't immediately tar and feather them as opportunists. This is their career and quite frankly a not so tiny portion of the republican electorate fully agrees with Mr. Akin. That said, I am sure they have privately advised he exit the race.
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