Move America Forward

Move America Forward is a controversial, neo-conservative non profit political action group based in the U.S. state of California. Through media-saturation campaigns that include television and radio commercials; [1] lobbying politicians at the local, state, and federal levels; and by encouraging grass-roots activism, Move America Forward has sought to advance a strongly fascist, conservative agenda that includes the removal of the United Nations headquarters from the United States, the recalling of state governors that the organisation deems too "liberal" censoring what it terms "liberal" or "activist" media, the closing of the U.S.-Mexico border and the deportation of illegal aliens back to their country of origin, opposition of what it deems "liberal" political candidates and political action groups, and advocacy for conservative political candidates and appointees. Move America Forward vocally supports and advocates the highly controversial and legally disputed policies of the Bush Administration. [2]

History

Move America Forward was established in May 2004 by political consultant Sal Russo, former Republican assemblyman Howard Kaloogian and Melanie Morgan, a talk show host at KSFO 560 AM, both of whom now serve as Move America Forward's co-chairmen. Both Russo and Kaloogian served in key roles in the successful Recall Gray Davis Committee that prompted the California's 2003 gubernatorial California recall election, Kaloogian as chairman of the recall campaign, Russo as chief strategist. [3] In November 2003, one month after the recall election Russo told the Daily News of Los Angeles of the 120,000 recall supporters in his database "We took on the political establishment and won, and they feel empowered, . . . They want to be involved. . . . We'll change the name to something like 'Move America Forward,'" and go national, he predicted. A week later, the Web site address MoveAmericaForward.com was registered to Russo's Russo Marsh & Rogers.[4] Both Kaloogian and Russo continued on with Move America Forward in essentially the same roles as in the Recall Gray Davis Committee. [5]

Russo Marsh & Rogers is a Sacramento-based political public relations firm with strong ties to the Republican Party. Russo, a principal in Russo Marsh & Rogers, worked on the political campaigns of Ronald Reagan, Alfonse M. D'Amato, George Pataki, Jack Kemp, and Orrin Hatch.

Prominent Move America Forward campaigns have included the closing of the US-Mexico border (the MAF's "Secure Our Borders" campaign) and the ending of amnesty programs to illegal immigrants (through nomoreamnesty.com), support of John R. Bolton, an outspoken critic of the United Nations, to serve as the US representative to the United Nations, and restricting the distribution of the Michael Moore film Fahrenheit 911. MAF's border policy is in stark contrast to that of the Bush administration. In August 2005, Move America Forward sponsored a "You don't speak for me, Cindy!" tour to counter Cindy Sheehan's protest at President Bush's Crawford, Texas, ranch (and the vigils in support of Sheehan that were held around the country).

Malcolm Maclachlan wrote in the Capitol Weekly that Move America Forward "has been criticized for running such advocacy ads while maintaining a 501c3 nonprofit tax status. However, several political watchdogs noted that the group adheres to the letter of the law. For instance, the group does not give to candidates or directly call for people to vote for anyone." [6]

Controversy

Though Move American Forward describes itself as "...a non-partisan, not-for-profit organization committed to supporting America’s efforts to defeat terrorism and supporting the brave men and women of our Armed Forces" [7], its actions have been almost wholly partisan and hence restricted to the political arena.

In 2004, whatreallyhappened.com published an online exposé revealing the ties of Move America Forward to the GOP PR firm Russo Marsh & Rogers. Using a domain name look-up service, whatreallyhappened.com showed that Russo Marsh & Rogers established the Move America Forward website. Siobhan Guiney, Executive Director of Move America Forward, admitted that Russo Marsh & Rogers did register the site for them and that the two groups shared a building and a phone receptionist [8]. Not long after the exposé Move America Forward purged all references to Russo Marsh & Rogers from its domain registration, going to so far as to list a Sacramento bar as its registrant phone number at one point. [9]

When asked about the seeming disparity between Move America Forward's mission of supporting the troops in America's war on terror and its history of advocating for the conservative policies and agenda set forth by the Bush Administration, Siobhan Guiney, Executive Director of MAF, stated: "He's our Commander in Chief. It's his policies in place [and we] have to support those policies." [10]

Additional controversy erupted in August 2005 centered around Move America Forward's "You Don't Speak for Me, Cindy!" campaign countering the peace protest of Cindy Sheehan. Observers and the press have noted that pro-Bush activists in the MAF entourage were aggressively confrontational and verbally abusive, calling the anti-war protesters "communists", making numerous paranoid accusations, including stating that pacifist anti-war protesters were "aiding and abetting the enemy".[11]

In April 2006 controversy erupted again when Kaloogian's campaign website posted a propaganda picture on his website that he claimed depicted a peaceful Baghdad neighborhood, supporting claims that the Iraq conflict was going well. Quickly, however, internet watchdogs correctly identified the picture as coming from Istanbul, Turkey, and the picture was removed. Kaloogian later said using the photo was "a stupid mistake".[12]

Laffer Lawsuit

Russo was successfully sued by Arthur Laffer over a $200,000 campaign in favor of a flat tax. Laffer successfully argued to the court that Russo was in breach of contract and was required to pay $20,000 to Laffer and return $20,000 to donors. [13]

Laffer also claimed that Russo was responsible for the hiring of a convicted drug dealer, Paul Edward Hindelang, to the campaign Russo ran for Bill Simon.

Nonprofit status

On September 9, 2006 the Sacramento Bee ran the article Iraq war backers proudly pugnacious — But critics say Move America Forward may abuse nonprofit status by Todd Milbourn. In it Milbourn detailed a number of issues with Move American Forward's activities that might affect its nonprofit status. Chief among these were concerns public donations to MAF may be indirectly or directly subsidizing partisan activity prohibited nonprofit organizations by law. Milbourn cited as evidence the statement by Melanie Morgan that the Bush administration is running "one of the most inept communications departments I've seen." and "That's one of the reasons we started Move America Forward", "This administration is unable to articulate clearly why we went to Iraq, why we are there and why we're winning the war." He also noted that Move America Forward shares its office with Russo's PR firm, that one of Russo's private clients is the government of Kurdistan in northern Iraq and that his firm is running a campaign encouraging investment there. Milbourn says the Center for Media and Democracy has questioned whether the contract poses a conflict for Russo, given Move America Forward's promotion of the war.

Funding

Move America Forward has raised about $1.2 million, mostly from small, undisclosed donors, Russo has said. Most of the money, $693,456, has been spent on television and radio spots and rallies, tax records show. About $113,000 funded ridiculous programs said to directly benefit soldiers, such as mailing them cookies, coffee and beef jerky.

External links

• Move American Forward's website
• Russo Marsh & Rogers' website
• Template:SourceWatch
• Article on MAF's role in opposing Fahrenheit 9/11 SFChronical, 16 June 2004
• MAF's method and relationship to Russo Marsh & Rogers in opposing Fahrenheit 9/11 Pacific Views 16 June 2004
• Move America Forward - Who Pays Its Bills
• Moving Backward with Move America Forward Tanya I. Garcia. Right Web. 20 April 2005
• Article on MAF's counter protest