Tell me again who's astroturfing?

[nova]

Dem officials set stage for corporate-backed health care campaign - Ben Smith and Kenneth P. Vogel - POLITICO.com

At a meeting last April with corporate lobbyists, aides to President Barack Obama and Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) helped set in motion a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign, primarily financed by industry groups, that has played a key role in bolstering public support for health care reform.

The previously undisclosed meeting April 15 at the offices of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee led to the creation of two groups — Americans for Stable Quality Care and a now-defunct predecessor group called Healthy Economy Now — that have spent tens of millions of dollars on TV advertising supporting health reform efforts.

Indeed, attendees describe a more subtle dynamic: The Democratic officials made no overt demands. Rather, they brought together the players and laid the groundwork for the creation of the coalition, and that was followed by more direct solicitations from an outside Democratic consultant, Nick Baldick, retained by Healthy Economy Now, asking attendees at the meeting to join the coalition and contribute to its ad campaigns

One ethics expert, however, said the meeting still raises issues. No matter how careful Messina and Selib were to avoid conversation about Healthy Economy Now, their mere presence at what proved to be the coalition’s creation raises questions, said Bill Allison, a senior fellow at the Sunlight Foundation, a nonpartisan, nonprofit group that advocates for greater transparency and ethics in government.


“There’s no problem with sitting down at the table and talking,” said Allison. “But if they are signaling that they would really like these groups to support health care reform and trying to tell the groups how they’ll benefit from the plan, they’re laying a ‘quid’ on the table, and — even if they don’t discuss dollar amounts or advertising strategies — they’re suggesting what the ‘quo’ is, which is the groups’ support for the plan.”

Some participants said they felt distinct pressure to sign on to the coalitions. “What were we supposed to say? No?” asked a participant who represented a group that joined the coalition but who did not want to be identified discussing the meeting for fear of jeopardizing the group’s position in ongoing talks.