Updated 2/19/2010 from original posting 2/4/2010
As we learned from the Orange Juice Blog – Chip Hanlon is a paid vassal of Meg Whitman for Governor. He never disclosed this – and still hasn’t even after being exposed as a fraud.
Chip Hanlon and Matt “Jerbal” Cunningham have exempted themselves from their own standard of disclosure. Hey, they own the place – they can be hypocrites… comes with ownership. The problem is when you are a public leader – your standard has to be higher than that of everyone else.
Many times – I spoke with Hanlon on the phone and every time, he complained about the fact that Steve Poizner’s campaign did not purchase an ad on the Red County system. We now know that this was a red herring as Hanlon’s firm greenfaucet.com was a recipient of Whitman’s lavish campaign cash.
When Chip Hanlon chose to very publicly and aggressively expel this blogger from the Red County system – he made threats including threatening to Sue either myself or Steve Poizner for lost advertising revenues…
And given the fact that Hanlon openly blustered about Poizner’s sleazy campaign tactics and how he was using me in lieu of purchasing an ad…
The issue all along was the money.
It is a not-too-closely guarded secret that the Red County system is a money loser. The Whitman ad on the home page of the site is worth a reputed $2500 a month – which seems to have been a low estimate when you look at $20K that greenfaucet.com received from Whitman, one could easily draw the conclusion that Whitman bought Chip Hanlon.
Look closer – the payment to greenfaucet was dated 12/03/2009 – I was expelled 12/09/2009. Calbuzz actually got it backward in their post from a few weeks ago.
Fake Blog Post?
Some in Southern California will remember the post I put up that was deleted within a couple hours about the Orange County Lincoln Club endorsing Steve Poizner for Governor. Chip Hanlon asked me to put it up and ultimately, Matt Cunningham deleted it after people in Orange County complained about it.
It was a ploy for traffic.
Deleted Posts
Several contributors to the Red County System have had posts deleted – including myself.
During the Doug Ose vs. Tom McClintock primary – I had posts far less incendiary than those I wrote against Meg Whitman deleted.
I remember a posting about a news story regarding a fundraiser that Linda Ackerman was employing – Matt Cunningham deleted my post and emailed me regarding “Dez” – one of the subjects of the media firestorm. (The stories referred to her as Desiree – so apparently Cunningham knew her)
People have emailed me screen shots of comments that either Hanlon or Cunningham deleted.
None of this paints a bright ethical picture for the Blog that expelled Sgt. York and grandstanded on the platform of ethics.
It’s interesting that the same circles that produced Mike Duvall also are home to Cunningham and Hanlon… things that make you go hmmm…
Smashmouth politics.