Value Judgment: Clark Spams, Literally

Value Judgment is a daily weblog written by two independent voters on the eastern seaboard of the United States. VJ will focus on the 2004 U.S. Presidential campaigns, including strategy, tactics, and substance. The authors supported Howard Dean in the Democratic primary. Accordingly, his activities will be a prominent topic on this site.

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December 29, 2003

Clark Spams, Literally

An email account associated with another website of mine recently received a spam email from Wesley Clark. Given the legalese at the bottom, it looks like the Clark campaign paid an actual spammer to send out this email. (The account that received this message gets a lot of spam.) Here's the text that was included:

Paid for by Clark For President, Inc.
Contributions and gifts made to Clark for President are not deductible for federal income tax purposes.

If you prefer to not receive future promotions and offers, please let us know by clicking here to update your subscription.

The 'clicking here' pointed to a sub-URL of email.realbargaindaily.com. RealBargainDaily.com says of itself:

With our network of leading merchants and specialty shops, we strive to make life easier, cheaper, and more fulfilling for consumers.

Given Clark's association with privacy-insensitive corporation Axciom, I guess it's not surprising that he'll do business with a spammer. The spam doesn't bother me too much, actually (I believe that the exemptions in telemarketing do-not-calls for political speech are correct) but I did try to sign up for Clark campaign emails three seperate times and haven't received a one, so it's kind of ironic, in a way.

Posted by J at December 29, 2003 05:09 PM

Comments

That doesn't sound right to me...I just got a piece of campaign email today that had an unsubscribe link at the bottom. The link took me to http://action.clark04.com/unsubscribe/
Which was a completely legitimate Clark campaign website selling nothing other than his candidacy.

Posted by: Rob at December 30, 2003 12:35 PM

Well, the message seemed quite sincere and on point. A couple of pull-quotes:
--
My Fellow Americans,

My name is Wes Clark. I'm running for President because I love this country and want to see us fulfill our great promise as a nation. I'm running to restore leadership to the White House, to revitalize our economy, and to reclaim our role as a respected leader of the free world.

Please join my campaign today!

I'm a retired General, and in the three years since leaving my post as NATO Supreme Allied Commander, I've watched in dismay as everything we fought for has unraveled before our eyes - 3 million lost private sector jobs, rising health care costs, failing schools, and a loss of security at home and around the world. These difficult times call for bold and visionary leadership, but instead, we've been given short-sighted policies that have alienated our allies, and tax cuts that only benefit the richest Americans, those earning more than $200,000 a year. [...]
--
There was nothing in the message that suggested it was other than an ad paid for by the campaign, as stated at the bottom of the email.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if in addition to regular campaign email they were trying other avenues as well. The email was dated 12/18/2003.

Posted by: J at December 30, 2003 12:42 PM