Prepare for your inbox to be swamped with Republican lies

Oh, great. Just fucking great. I'll take the Nigerians and their spam over
the Republicans any day -- at least the Nigerians know their spam is all
lies -- the Republicans believe theirs.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/10/AR2006061000718.html

QUOTE

Loophole a Spigot for E-Mail
Critics Fear Voters Will Be Deluged as Fall Elections Near

By Jeffrey H. Birnbaum
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, June 11, 2006; Page A06

A new loophole in election spending regulations is likely to produce a
torrent of unsolicited e-mails to voters -- and widespread complaints about
political spam -- as the midterm elections approach this fall, political
consultants say.

Purveyors of private e-mail addresses and designers of campaign Web sites
report that their businesses are booming this year as partisans take
advantage of an exemption in election rules that allows wealthy individuals
to pour unlimited sums into Internet communications without having to
disclose their identities or total expenditures.

The loophole is "potentially breathtaking," said Roger Alan Stone of
Advocacy Inc., an e-mail address retailer.

"It provides an enormous opportunity for political campaigns," agreed Max
Fose of Integrated Web Strategy, which also sells e-mail addresses to
political campaigns. Both men are expanding their staffs in anticipation of
what they expect to be a multimillion-dollar surge in unregulated campaign
spending via the Internet.

Critics worry that electoral e-mailing, which blossomed two years ago but is
still in its infancy, could grow so quickly that millions of voters will be
deluged with unwanted electronic messages before Election Day. Critics said
the result could be a backlash against the candidates being advertised.

"I can't imagine this will be a particularly effective method of getting out
the vote," said Jim Jordan of Thunder Road Group, a political consultancy.
"It is spam after all, and there are few things that annoy us more than
spam."

The e-mail exemption, which was approved by the Federal Election Commission
in March, might become the next big avenue for campaign funding abuses, some
experts warn. Heavy spenders, such as individuals or groups not affiliated
with campaigns, could use mass e-mailings to alter the outcome of key
congressional races and still remain anonymous, a result that runs counter
to the intention of federal election laws.

Carol C. Darr, director of the nonpartisan Institute for Politics, Democracy
& the Internet, foresees "a complete free-for-all" because of the loophole.
She added: "Sure, the FEC may still regulate the nickel-and-dime stuff. But
.. . . in the Hundred Years War against political money, big money has won."

The FEC voted unanimously March 26 not to regulate political communication
on the Internet, including e-mails, blogs and the creation of Web sites. The
commission had decided two years earlier to exempt all Internet activity
from regulation, but that ruling was overturned by a federal judge who
ordered the FEC to write rules that apply to at least some parts of
cyberspace.

Bloggers, who are a fast-rising force in politics, pushed hard (with the
help of their readers) to convince the commission that their writings should
not be considered for the purposes of regulation the same as campaign
contributions. In the end, they won. Only paid political advertisements
placed on Web sites were ultimately subjected to campaign finance
limitations.

Web site activists celebrated the decision as a significant advance for
Internet freedom; political entrepreneurs recognized a commercial
opportunity.

Fose, with offices in Virginia and Arizona, has more than doubled his staff
to 12 people this year largely in response to the FEC ruling.

Advocacy Inc.'s Roger Alan Stone, who is not Republican media consultant
Roger Stone, explained in a note to clients and associates why he is
expecting a surge in revenue: "A wealthy individual could purchase all of
the e-mail addresses for registered voters in a congressional district . . .
produce an Internet video ad, and e-mail it along with a link to the
campaign contribution page," he wrote. "Not only would this activity not
count against any contribution limits or independent expenditure
requirements; it would never even need to be reported."

Stone said that he is in discussions with representatives of wealthy
individuals as well as state party officials about expanding their use of
e-mails this year. He has contracted with at least three wealthy groups that
e-mailed massively for primary campaigns this month.

Other political consulting groups are also feeling the impact of the FEC
exemption. "We are hiring a new programmer or campaign specialist every
three days," said John Aristotle Phillips, chief executive of Aristotle
International Inc., which provides software and data services to electoral
campaigns.

Voter Contact Services, which compiles lists of registered voters and
matches them with e-mail addresses, expects its e-mail sales to double this
year to more than 20 percent of its business, up from more than 10 percent
in 2004.

The only impediments to growth, VSC chairman Bill Daly said, are
increasingly sophisticated systems that block electronic spam and the dearth
of middlemen to sell e-mail addresses for political uses. Campaigns can buy
e-mail addresses for about 12 cents per name, retailers say.

"The e-mail loophole will be the vehicle that large donors will use at the
last minute to get their message out this year," Fose predicted. "After
they've put money everywhere else, the Internet will be the place where they
will pour their funds at the end of the campaign season."

The election two years ago was the first in which a national list of
registered voters was cross-referenced with multiple listings of e-mail
addresses collected from magazine subscribers, catalogue shoppers, and
online poll participants. As a consequence, lawmakers, candidates for office
and interest groups were able to sell more than 25 million e-mail addresses
of registered voters, and contact them at will.

SonicWall Inc., a California-based Internet security provider, estimated
that more than 1.25 billion unsolicited political e-mails were sent to
registered voters in 2004, up from virtually none during the presidential
contest in 2000. SonicWall said it is too early to accurately predict the
growth for this year, but for the presidential race in 2008, "there could be
an exponential increase in the number of unsolicited political e-mails,"
SonicWall spokeswoman Mary McEvoy said.

With the FEC loophole, "everybody is looking at new ways to use the Internet
to communicate," said R. Bruce Josten, executive vice president of the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce. "Not just us, but the unions and every interest group
you can think of."

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