Cross Posted at Legal Schnauzer
Alabama's master politician has shown that at least one Democrat in the U.S. still has a spine. And in the process, he showed that Republican hypocrisy has reached a new zenith.
That's quite a feat. But Paul Hubbert, executive secretary of the Alabama Education Association (AEA), pulled it off. And Democrats around the country, including the one who resides at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, should watch and learn.
Bradley Byrne, Governor Bob Riley's hand-picked successor, has been conducting a whinefest ever since he got thrashed in the Republican primary by the relatively unknown Robert Bentley. Now we know, at least partly, why Byrne got trounced. Paul Hubbert took him to the proverbial woodshed.
Byrne had run on a platform of attacking "union bosses," a thinly veiled reference to Hubbert and the AEA. Did Hubbert choose to tuck tail and "look forward, not backwards"? Not exactly. He fought back--big time.
Associated Press reports that newly released records show AEA provided every dollar of a $711,020 media blitz that targeted Byrne in the Republican runoff. Reports AP:
Before the July runoff, a new and secretive organization called the Conservative Coalition for Alabama ran an extensive ad campaign that criticized Byrne's record in state government. Little was known about the group other than it listed its official address as a rented mail box at a package shipping store in Montgomery.
But a newly released report reviewed by The Associated Press shows its only donor was AEA, which provided $750,000 on June 23. That was one day after the coalition was created.
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