It appears Rob Reiner went to the Air America school of honest financing. "Meathead" from the Archie Bunker show appears to be misusing public money. Here is the lowdown from an interview with a reporter on Hugh Hewitt's show (via RadioBlogger), Jeb Babbin Hosting:JB: We're talking again about this whole scandal, the growing scandal surrounding the First 5 Commission, Rob Reiner, and Proposition 82. Joining me right now to talk about this and bring us up to date is Bill Bradley of Newwestnotes.com. Bill, thanks for taking the time to join us.
BB: Hi, thanks for having me on.
JB: You know, this whole thing, I'm new to the story, I'm just getting up to speed on it. Reset the clock for us. The whole basic bottom line is that you have a public commission here, headed by Rob Reiner. Apparently they're spending public money on a campaign to pass a proposition on the ballot this Fall?
BB: Essentially, that's right, except that the proposition will be on the June ballot, the California primary.
JB: Oh, wow. So this...
BB: Rob Reiner promoted an initiative which passed here in California narrowly in 1998, to slap more of a tobacco tax on cigarettes in California to fund early childhood development programs. But it's turning out that there is very little oversight or control over how this money is spent.
JB: All right. Now you've reported earlier that about $230 million dollars has been spent by this commission on advertising and public relations?
BB: On advertising and public relations. Actually, over a quarter of that on public relations, which is a stunning amount of money.
Wow, Rob, you need that much of the PUBLIC'S money to promote your initiative? Why not donate some of your money from your films? Wait, I forgot, Hollywood Limosine libs like you only believe in taking other people's money for public projects. And, 230 million just for advertising? What about the actual programs, Rob? After all, this money IS SUPPOSED TO BE for "the children." Here is more:
JB: Well, I mean it's a big amount of money. $230 million bucks is a lot more than I make in a year, and in all seriousness, this is astonishing. That's probably more than Budweiser and Tylenol spend in an entire year on TV advertising.
BB: Actually, as it turns out, the commission spent $23 million dollars in just one quarter of the past year, promoting preschool for all, which was then the initiative that Rob Reiner had his political organization out in the field gathering signatures for. And in that one quarter of time, that $23 million dollars spent promoting the universal preschool initiative, public money, was actually more than the California Lottery spent on advertising for the entire year.
JB: Well, you know, that's important, though. I mean, it seems to me this is a huge, huge slush fund. I mean, the last time I looked into something like that, it was being run by the U.N. You know, this is something that is so out of control. Let's talk about some of the contracts that you've found between Reiner's commission and this ad agency. I mean, I'm reading some of your stuff today, and I am just astonished. How do you have the chairman of the commission, supposedly which is conducting a competitive bid to get the services of some ad agency...the chairman of the commission is signing the cover letter of the proposal?
BB: Yes, it was very odd. Now he's trying to distance himself now from the spending that promoted his own initiative, but the fact is that this campaign firm...
OK, so what we have here is millions of dollars being mismanaged to provide advertising for Rob Reiner's pet projects, when in fact the money should be going to fund children's programs. OK, but here comes the Kicker, that proves this is not "about the children":
This is a situation that is out of control here, and Rob Reiner, who I'm acquainted with through Hollywood friends, he has a political media firm called GMMB, which also turns out to be the media firm, the advertising agency for the First 5 Commission. And it's actually founded and headed up by a fellow named Frank Greer, who's a terrific consultant, who also is a media consultant for Bill Clinton.
So, if I read this correctly, Rob Reiner is using PUBLIC MONEY to give his own private political consulting firm a job at the expense of the taxpayer....Jeb and the guest some it up:
If there is a bright line that separates the mission of the First 5 Commission from the campaign for Proposition 82, then somebody's going to go to jail over this.
BB: Well, we'll see. These contracts were apparently dubbed to be legal when they were signed and executed, and that the funds were transferred. But at the very least, this is a very bad situation. And in fact, the state legislature, dominated by Democrats here in California, is jumping into this tomorrow, and will almost certainly authorize an investigation by the state auditor into this situation.
JB: Well, it seems like a lot of people ought to be investigating it, because...again, and maybe I'm not asking the question in the right way. But is the mission of the First 5 Commission to get something like Proposition 82 on the ballot, or to get it passed? Is there any commonality between the statutory purpose of that commission, and someone saying well, you know, that falls within our ambit to push Proposition 82?
BB: No, I don't think there is. Proposition 10 authorized the collection of these tobacco tax funds for the purpose of promoting and funding early childhood development programs. As it turns out, a lot of the money has gone, as you've said, into advertising/public relations efforts, which as the commission evolved over time, and we see this in the contracts I was revealing today, the primary mission of the commission, as articulated by its internal documents, was to promote universal preschool, which was not what Proposition 10 was intended to do, and not what the voters thought that they were doing. So in other words, to cut to the chase here, what we have with this contract, a $67.5 million dollar contract over several years time for advertising services, is to promote the stimulation of public demand for more state spending, and involvement with preschool programs, which of course happens to be the purpose of Rob Reiner's current initiative, Proposition 82, which would...that initiative would enact a higher tax on wealthy taxpayers to fund a universal preschool program throughout California.
So, here the liberals are, out touting Republicans as the culture of corruption, when in California alone we have the case of Mr. Meathead, Rob Reiner, engaging in malfeasance with public funds, basically to give his own ad agency a job and to get more public money to redistribute.
Check out the guest's coverage of the Reiner scandal, which has already produced a resignation, at newwestnotes.com
