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You are here: Home / Past Elections / Election 2008 / PUMAs return as “a project of the 99%”

PUMAs return as “a project of the 99%”

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Today, Democrats from across America have been getting robocalls from Zombie-PUMAs. I got one of them this afternoon in Baltimore. Sam Stein and others have posted the audio, which has your typical free-from-the-constraints-of-reality PUMA rant:

America would be better off today if Hillary Clinton was our president. The Wall Street robber barons would be jailed, young people could afford college and find jobs and six million homeowners wouldn’t face foreclosure. We need to change our course. Please sign our petition to draft Hillary Clinton for president.

The message pimps a PUMA fronting web site with no information about who is behind the effort. Well, almost no information. Each page of the site proclaims the effort is: “a project of the 99%”, which is kind of funny because in 2008 the goal of the PUMA movement was to help John McCain and this year’s effort seems designed to help the next Republican nominee. I’m betting the “99%” line has the 1-percenters funding this effort pissing their pants from laughter.

Some blogs and news organizations are reporting on the robocalls and some are leading with the notion that the 99%/OWS movement is organizing the effort to draft Hillary. (Proof that just placing a tag line on your web page can generate results!) I expect that by the morning the “serious” people of our media and blog-o-sphere will be discussing this grift as a real movement and another “proof positive” sign that the “Left” hates President Obama just as much as the “Right”.

It will be interesting to learn which wingnut asshole is funding this effort to reanimate the PUMA corpse. So far, I think it’s safe to assume that the comedy team of Caddell/Schoen is on that wanker’s payroll.

Cheers

Reader Interactions

67Comments

  1. 1.

    Xecky Gilchrist

    Maybe they meant a project of the 99, because if there were ever really any of them, there were no more than that.

  2. 2.

    Southern Beale

    I stumbled across a right-wing blog alleging that OWS/995ers and “liberals” were trying to draft Hillary and I immediately smelled bullshit. It’s just another way of trying to divide the left, cause internal bickering (liberals are so good at that, after all) and try to discredit OWS and the 99% by making it political.

  5. 5.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    somebody mentioned this earlier today, and I googled “Hilllary Clinton 2012” to see what came up, and the third hit was Dick Cheney saying HRC should primary Obama.

  6. 6.

    Baud

    I read that a recent poll that the number of Dems who want to renominate Obama is rising. I wonder if these types of crazy antics are actually bringing Dems closer together.

  7. 7.

    dmsilev

    I like how on their “Join the conversation” page, there’s a grand total of 26 members. Why, it’s a grassroots movement that puts Joementum to shame!

  8. 8.

    MattF

    Yeah, I also found one of these calls waiting on my phone when I got home from work. My thought was that maybe America’s brilliant and effective Secretary of State could inform these individuals into what bodily orifice they should place their, um, concept.

  11. 11.

    dmsilev

    Semi-OT, but it seems that brave Sir Boehner decided to run away from the vote on the payroll tax:

    House GOP postpones vote on payroll tax bill
    __
    House Republicans postponed a planned Monday night vote on the Senate-passed payroll tax cut bill, bowing to pressure from rank-and-file lawmakers to fight the battle in a fresh media cycle, avoid a dark-of-night vote and, perhaps most important, find a way to reject the Senate bill without voting directly against a tax cut.

    Real profile in courage there.

  12. 12.

    CT Voter

    This will get traction in a few weeks. “Supporters of Hillary Clinton are building a grass-roots effort to draft Clinton, in yet another sign that the Obama Administration is under fire from all sides.”

    Or sooner than a few weeks, once Mark Halperin gets a sniff of this. I just looked at “The Page” for the first time in months. My god. He’s not even trying to camouflage any longer, is he?

  13. 13.

    Southern Beale

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    …and the third hit was Dick Cheney saying HRC should primary Obama.

    Snort. Absofuckinghilarious.

    I look forward to the day when the left pools its money and issues forth robocalls to conservative voters urging everyone to get Ron Paul to run as third party candidate.

  15. 15.

    Suffern ACE

    So Americans Elect are going to go with Jeb Bush / Hillary Clinton as their dream ticket? I have no idea what this is about. Since Hillary isn’t running (or she would have, you know, quit her job and entered primaries). Will this convert Hillary supporters to Romney or Paul voters?

  16. 16.

    Karen

    Silly Dennis, didn’t you know there are no such things as PUMAs? Or so Corner Stone always tells me.

  17. 17.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    I hate the PUMAs with a white hot fire. They are so much a disservice to the movement. The moment that Lady De Lynn I am a fucking Millionaire called Obama an “elitist” I swore I would tell these fucking elitists to fuck the hell off/ I am sure that Hillary is 44 is hyperventilating about this “movement”. Fuck them, with a rusty pitch fork.

  18. 18.

    Quaker in a Basement

    How very strange.

    The “pro-Hillary” site features a bunch of quotes–a recent one from a Canadian, one a year old or so taken from an opinion piece that praises Hillary and says nothing at all about Obama, and several that date back to before the 2008 election.

    Hardly seems like a groundswell of support, does it?

  20. 20.

    The prophet Nostradumbass

    Funny enough, I just posted a comment about having received one of these calls in the Open Thread below, and here’s a post about it!

  21. 21.

    Baud

    @Dennis G.: Thanks. That is where I first read it. And the Caddell/Schoen is outrageous. They deserved to be shunned.

    What I find really offensive about these “Draft Hillary” campaigns is that Clinton has really been amazing. The Obama/Clinton dynamic is one I was concerned about early on, but it has been about as seamless as you can reasonably expect. Clinton deserves a great deal more respect than to have her name associated these yahoos.

    @dmsilev: Maybe the first time in history that a vote was postponed because lawmakers were concerned that a tax cut might pass.

  22. 22.

    Suffern ACE

    @CT Voter: Has any “grassroots” “Draft Major Pol” campaign ever succeeded in drafting a candidate who doesn’t want to run?

    I’ll believe these guys are serious when they start sending Harold Ford around the country on goodwill tours to get to know the people, like they did in New York last year.

  23. 23.

    CT Voter

    @dmsilev: Yes. Fight that battle in a fresh news cycle, so that everyone understands that when you chumps “reject the Senate bill” you are, in fact, voting for a tax increase.

    Sadly, it may even work.

  24. 24.

    Suffern ACE

    I’m still laughing at the idea that Team Hillary would be busting banker balls. Yep. That’s what she was known for.

  25. 25.

    Hill Dweller

    @dmsilev: Maddow is doing a rundown of Boehner’s mistakes as Speaker right now during her “Boehner is bad at his job” segment.

  29. 29.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @amk: Heh. I just deleted a comment about the Blunderbubba, being as I am all about Teh Comity and Civility. Even Joe Klein said on MSNBC the other day that Bill Clinton campaigning for Obama could turn into a double-edged sword.

  30. 30.

    dmsilev

    @Hill Dweller: With the number of knives sticking out of his back, it’s a wonder he can go through airport metal detectors. That’s his main problem, really, that he’s the notional head of a congress of fanatic clowns.

  31. 31.

    MattF

    @dmsilev: House Republicans may have actually gone too far, believe it or not. Post-ABC poll results from 12/18 show a jump in Obama’s direction in all Obama vs. Congress questions and that will now increase.

    Wingers are feeling the consequences of their assumption that everyone hates Obama. It’s their weak spot, IMO, not unlike the 90’s Clinton Derangement.

  34. 34.

    priscianusjr

    … if Hillary Clinton was our president. The Wall Street robber barons would be jailed, young people could afford college and find jobs and six million homeowners wouldn’t face foreclosure.

    What possible basis could there be for such a belief, other than sheer fantasy?

  37. 37.

    jl

    How can you listen, or read, or even think that nonsense without laughing?

    I certainly wish HRC were President, now. I did not understand so many things. She would have done nothing wrong. No mistakes no gaffes. All wars would have ended immediately. No recession from the housing bust. Everyone would be friendly with all peoples.

    HRC would not have been so divisive, everyone would love her like a cute puppy.

    Newt would not say mean things.

    I was mostly indifferent between HRC and Obama, thought they both had advantages and disadvantages. If only I had known the truth!

    Glad that HRC won my state, otherwise the guilt on my shoulders would be unberable. Perhaps, but for my vote we would be living in the utopia of fragrant flowers in broad meadows and rainbows, we would all be happy campers on big rock candy mountain.

    Of course, that all assumes that HRC had kicked the habit of murdering anyone who who got in her way, and that Presidential income would have persuaded her to give up the huge worldwide Clinton drug cartel profits. And that the GOP crazies would have believe it (/snark).

  38. 38.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @jl:

    This:

    Of course, that all assumes that HRC had kicked the habit of murdering anyone who who got in her way, and that Presidential income would have persuaded her to give up the huge worldwide Clinton drug cartel profits. And that the GOP crazies would have believee it

    is a thing of beauty.

  39. 39.

    Jerzy Russian

    @dmsilev:

    Hillary vs. Tim Tebow. Discuss.

    If it is football, Tebow kicks her ass. In any other type of competition, she cleans his clock.

  41. 41.

    jl

    @dmsilev:

    What will they look like to the public after they emerge from the self induced whirlwind of spin?

    Maybe they are watching old Looney Tunes to see how Taz managed it.

  45. 45.

    El Cid

    Also, all the hippest anarchists I know are for the Concord Coalition and Pete Petersen! It’s true! It’s true because maybe somebody said it!

  47. 47.

    mk3872

    REALLY? The Clinton’s with NAFTA, Welfare Reform, DOMA & DADT would be the choice of the 99% ???? LOL!

  50. 50.

    Nellcote

    @Baud:

    The Obama/Clinton dynamic is one I was concerned about early on, but it has been about as seamless as you can reasonably expect. Clinton deserves a great deal more respect than to have her name associated these yahoos.

    Indeed

  51. 51.

    Corner Stone

    Myyyy name’s Dennis G
    And I’ve got nuthin to say!
    I’m a bad shithouse writer from ’round the way
    I don’t want no mess, I don’t want no trouble
    But if you’re posting PUMA better make it a double!
    Booooyyyiiiiii

  52. 52.

    Admiral_Komack

    Dear PUMA’s:

    Hillary isn’t running for President; she’s already said so.

    Eat shit and bark at the moon.

    Toodles.

  56. 56.

    binzinerator

    If it wasn’t obvious the PUMAs were astroturf at the core (who funds this shit, and continues to fund it now 4 years into a successful presidency?) this attempt at co-opting the OWS’ now powerful meme of “We’re the 99%” ought to make it clear we’re looking at another Koch-funded rovian-type rat fucking operation.

    In 2008 I thought the original PUMAs were what they purported to be: mostly disgruntled Hillary supporters who were bitter it wasn’t “their” turn, along with Dems who just couldn’t deal with the reality of a black President.

    But I think the rightwing ratfuckers saw a wedge waiting to be driven. After Obama was elected the momentum was sustained as a winger operation. Yes the Hillary bitter-enders and bigots of the (formerly) Dem persuasion still front it (just like the three-corner hat fools do the teaparty) but what keeps it going springs from pretty much the same “grassroots” source as the teaparty.

  59. 59.

    LongHairedWeirdo

    An interesting bit: per my (*non*lawyerly) understanding of trademark law, you can’t trademark a number. This is why there was no “586” chip after Intel’s 486 – there was a “Pentium”.

    Anyone can claim to be “the 99%” without any fear of any organized (or disorganized) group trying to stop them.

  60. 60.

    Tom W

    There have never been more than a couple dozen or so PUMAs – any reference to them as a large group, movement, constituency past July 2008 displays an unfortunate divorce from reality. It’s almost as if some people *wish* there were a big PUMA movement somehow opposing the President etc. This is just plain silly – there are more commenters on this post than PUMAs in existence.

  62. 62.

    SFAW

    This is why there was no Intel-produced “586” chip

    A few of the others (NexGen, Cyrix, maybe AMD?) had 586es, although they added trademarkable twists (Nx586, 5×86).

    Or something.

  64. 64.

    carpeduum

    If he had any money or organizational skills I would say John Christopher Hitchens is so interesting Cole…. but he doesn’t so that leaves your Hamshers, Greenwalds etc….funded by the Koch brothers through a front group.

  65. 65.

    Dennis G.

    @ruemara: It is always nice to see a pet troll inspired to write poetry, but at times I fear that he’ll get so angry he’ll pull a Rumpelstiltskin and be no more–and then every BJ post would have fewer comments.

  66. 66.

    Richard

    Back in 2008, there were a few PUMA blogs that I used to check out and comment on (before they’d ban me that is).

    There were three types of folks who seemed to be participating on them …

    The genuine PUMA ringleaders, who, despite their claims of being “liberal”, really didn’t care about any progressive causes beyond getting Hillary elected.

    The clueless. I remember having an exchange with someone who said she was going to vote for the GOP, because the PUMAs told her that weren’t so bad (nominating Sarah Palin as VP was proof of their commitment to women, unlike those misogynist Dems who nominated Obama). I asked her what she knew about the Republican platform, and if she agreed with it, and her response was “I don’t know”.

    The college GOPers pretending to be disgruntled Dems. There seemed to be an awful lot of these folks, whose characteristically boorish behavior made them easy to spot. Their key tactic in responding to me was accusing me of being a paid troll. I guess they knew a lot about that sort of thing from personal experience.

  67. 67.

    My Truth Hurts

    People who think that Hilary would do better as President with this Congress and in this current political climate were either too young or too wasted to remember the 1990’s. The only people the rabid rightwing dogs might hate more than the Obamas are the Clintons.

    Give me a fucking break.

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