Friday, February 21, 2020

The Syndicate strikes back



When it became apparent in 2018 that the Citizens Amendment for Single Member District Voting could win at the ballot box, the development interests in Sarasota County spared no expense. Within a few months, the syndicate raised over $155,000 to squelch the citizens' initiative. Where'd all that money come from?

The major contributors, according to the Superintendent of Elections site are:

Who got the cash?

Direct Mail operators and political marketeers:

What came of this?

Under the (ripped off) rubric of Stop! Stealing our Votes, the ads swarmed:



One ad used in this negative campaign was remarkable: It mounted the lie that voters should oppose Single Member District voting because it would give more power to developers (!). 


Sarasota's esteemed business leaders were not above this level of public disinformation - i.e., fake news.


Pretending to oppose the very interests that in fact you are working to advance is known in the world of strategic digital media as "astroturfing." It might also be called bullshit.





What did the Syndicate find so frightening about single member districts? Did the possibility that citizens might choose their representatives based on real knowledge of who their candidates were and what they stood for scare them because it meant the Syndicate would cease to control the major planning, zoning, financing and infrastructure decisions facing Sarasota County?

The thought of having an Board that wouldn't rubber stamp Pat Neal's roads, Benderson's fake critical area plans, or Gabbert's special exceptions must have been terrifying, because they paid and paid and lied and lost. The citizens Amendment won all five districts and virtually every precinct, including precincts that are supposed to be heavily Republican:
After working for more than a year to collect enough signatures to get the proposed Sarasota County Charter amendment on the ballot, leaders of the Sarasota Alliance for Fair Elections (SAFE), won 59.84% of the 193,439 votes cast on that measure - Sarasota News Leader
Argus et al were not pleased. It wasn't long before the County, with the aid of a fictive mapmaker who turned out to be disgraced political operative Bob Waechter, concocted fictive reasons to redistrict all five districts. Conveniently along the way, the Hail Mary Waechter Map to Save Mike eliminated two prospective candidates known to have considered opposing Moran in District 1.

And that in turn brought a Federal lawsuit, accusing three Commissioners -- Detert, Maio and Moran -- of racist motives to carve minorities out of Moran's district. The suit is expected to be heard this spring.

 ~ Stay Tuned ~


Screenshots from Sarasota County's Supervisor of Elections site:










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