Good on BuzzFeed for catching this:
http://www.buzzfeed.com/...
Negative comments criticizing a Minnesota Republican’s Senate campaign ad for featuring a child hitting the candidate in the groin have begun to mysteriously disappear from his Facebook page and appear to have been replaced with comments praising the spot.
On Monday, Mike McFadden — a wealthy executive expected to self-fund some of his Senate bid — put up his first broadcast TV spot of the cycle. The ad features McFadden coaching a youth football team and, eventually, getting hit by one of the players.
“I’m Mike McFadden and I approved this message,” McFadden says in tone of voice that’s a pretty standard impression of a guy who just took a hit to the groin.
The buzzy spot did its job and created a firestorm of conversation in and out of Minnesota. But not all of the comments were positive. Some objected to the hit in the groin. That led the campaign to formally say it was, in fact, not a hit to the groin but rather a hit to first “the gut” and later “the stomach.” But bolstering the case for groin-hit truthers was the fact that the ad was crafted by the same firm that made Iowa Republican Senate nominee Joni Earnst’s memorable pig castration spot, perhaps the most groin-focused TV ad in American political history.
The local press quickly declared the whole episode “groingate.”
On McFadden’s campaign Facebook page, the ad landed to decidedly mixed reviews. While it picked up several dozen likes, it also invited a raft of negative comments, some from those inclined to support McFadden.
“Terrible ad. Shame on you. Hoping I don’t have to watch it again. Kids mouthing what some adult told them to say,” wrote one commenter. “Please do better or you will loose [sic] my support.”
Around 3:30 PM central time yesterday, according to a Minnesota Democrat who was watching the Facebook traffic on the ad closely, that negative comment and several others disappeared from McFadden’s Facebook page. By 3:35 PM, they were replaced by three positive comments about the ad. - BuzzFeed, 7/10/14
Below are some screenshots of deleted comments:
Yeah, not so smooth there Mike. McFadden is vowing to outwork his work horse opponent, Senator Al Franken (D. MN):
http://www.marshallindependent.com/...
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Mike McFadden has been a repeat visitor to Marshall over the past year. And it looks like that visibility is in keeping with his campaign strategy. At a meet-and-greet event in Marshall on Wednesday afternoon, McFadden told area residents he intends to "out-work" his opponent, U.S. Sen. Al Franken, in the leadup to the November election.
Wednesday's visit marked the third time that McFadden has made an appearance in Marshall. He told area residents he had just kicked off a new statewide tour, visiting 20 counties during the Fourth of July weekend. Statewide television ads for McFadden have also started broadcasting this month.
McFadden said he will win the election, in part because "We have a better message, and we will out-work (Franken)."
McFadden said strengthening the economy and encouraging industry in Minnesota were key issues for him.
"That's how we create good jobs, high-paying jobs," McFadden said. In the past six years, he said, average weekly wages have only increased $8. Encouraging the growth of business would do more to raise average wages, he said.
McFadden said he would support limits on government regulation that serves as an obstacle to business and industry.
"It's small and mid-sized businesses that are getting smothered by regulation," he said. At the same time, he said, lucrative, job-creating developments like copper mining in northern Minnesota have been tied up for years in regulatory bureaucracy.
"I believe in smart regulation," McFadden said. Right now, he said, "We're great at innovation, but we're horrible at regulation."
In particular, McFadden said he would support measures like sunset provisions on regulatory laws, and he would like to form a Senate deregulation committee. - Marshall independent, 7/10/14
And of course he's been pushing this lie against Franken:
http://www.minnpost.com/...
In a righty radio interview (KTCN Am 1130 “Up and At Em with Jack and Ben”), McFadden said:
“The carbon emission reductions that came out yesterday from the White House… It is estimated that these new regulations will cost the equivalent of 250,000 jobs. This is from the Chamber of Commerce.”
A little more on McFadden’s statement below. But first, McFadden wanted me to ask Franken what he thought about the proposed rule. I did. “What I like about the order is that it rewards good actors,” Franken said.
He added that Minnesota had already adopted a standard that was pushing utilities to reduce coal emissions, so Minnesota energy firms like Xcel Energy were “actually going to get to some degree rewarded,” because of steps Xcel already had in the works. Franken said:
But basically, we have to acknowledge that we have a problem; that there is climate change; it’s happening; 98 out of 100 climate scientists say it’s happening; it’s undeniable.
You can’t look at the fact the sea level has risen and not say there’s been some warming because it means polar ice caps are melting… Greenland is melting.
I’m on the energy committee, and six months before superstorm Sandy we had a hearing on rising sea levels and they said, Well, these storm surges, you’re going to have greater damage and we think that sometime in the future the New York City subways will flood. And they did.
Now you can’t point to one weather event and say that was caused by warming, but I think there’s an overwhelming consensus that’s undeniable that we have to do something about this and we have to lead. We have to lead the world… Also I think we’re going to benefit from this. Because renewable technologies … are the energy of the future.
You look at China. China is choking on itself and they are going to be a trillion-dollar market for renewable energy. They’re investing tremendously in renewable energy themselves; we need to be doing it. And we need to be doing wind, solar and biomass. I wrote the energy title in the Farm Bill… Minnesota doesn’t have gas, it doesn’t have coal, it doesn’t have oil, but we do have a lot of biomass. So I am, in that bill I wrote stuff that will help our state.
Franken went on several paragraphs longer, touching on biomass projects and ways that the new standard can be met not just by cleaning up what comes out of the smokestacks of power plants but by conservation and energy efficiency and it doesn’t mean having to replace all the old plants because it allows for retrofitting.
I mentioned above McFadden’s statement about how many jobs would be lost because of the new EPA rule. Googling around for background McFadden’s statement, I found that the Chamber of Commerce job loss estimate he cited is wrong. It has been retracted by the Chamber itself. The Chamber had prepared its estimate before the draft rule was published, based on the belief that the EPA’s proposed rule would call for a 42 percent reduction in carbon emissions. When the rule came out, it called for 30 percent. McFadden was not the only Republican to go public with the wrong estimate. Politifact checked the statement when U.S. House Speaker John Boehner similarly cited the out-of-date Chamber estimate. Politifact gave the statement a rating of “False.” - Minn Post, 7/10/14
Yeah, wouldn't worry too much about this race, Franken has a double digit lead and is kicking ass in fundraising:
http://www.twincities.com/...
U.S. Sen. Al Franken is leading the money chase as he seeks a second term.
Franken's campaign says the Minnesota Democrat raised $3.3 million in the second quarter -- more than three times that of his top Republican challenger, businessman Mike McFadden.
McFadden's $1.1 million haul this quarter, announced by his campaign earlier Thursday, brought his total on hand to more than $2 million. Franken's campaign says he has more than $5 million in the bank. Both candidates have launched ad campaigns. - Pioneer Press, 7/10/14
Of course Franken will take his re-election campaign seriously but right now, he's taking this very seriously:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
One of the most vocal skeptics of industry consolidation, Sen. Al Franken hasn't pulled any punches when it comes to the proposed merger between Comcast and Time Warner Cable — a deal that would give Comcast control over roughly 30 percent of the pay-TV market.
Now, the lawmaker is setting his sights on another major deal: AT&T's proposal to acquire DirecTV. In a letter to federal regulators, Franken warns that letting the deal go through could turn AT&T into a gatekeeper to the mobile Internet. Franken also complains that AT&T took inappropriate steps to block Internet applications like Google Voice and Skype.
"AT&T has a history of skirting the spirit, and perhaps the letter" of the government's rules on net neutrality, Franken wrote. Those rules were written in 2010 — and AT&T has pledged to abide by them for three years if its DirecTV purchase goes through — but were knocked down by a federal court in January. - Washington Post, 7/9/14
Lets keep Franken in the Senate by donating and getting involved with his re-election campaign:
http://www.alfranken.com/...