I hadn’t heard about the connection between Joe Trippi, Dean’s recently-ousted campaign manager, and his involvement with the ad agency Dean used until recently. Dean spent a sizeable amount of his war chest (about a quarter of funds spent through the end of last year) with them on TV ads.
When I first heard this, I thought something smelled, and that Dean probably did as well, which is why Trippi was canned. The LA Times chimed in today with this article:
Thoughts?
From my limited understanding of teh issue, it seems Joe Trippi used the campaign funds to have his bunch make TV commercials. To call that ripping Dean off is a bit much. Making TV commercials is a big money sink for any campaign. I see no reason why Trippi wouldn’t have used his own shop for them, in fact I would imagine it was largely his affiliation with that group that got him the job. Now if he was embezzling the funds, or Dean hadn’t authorized that much to be used for commercials, then there’s a problem. Otherwise I would say this is just idle speculation from newspersons that don’t have much experience in campaigns.
You don’t hire Lucas and then complain that he’s using ILM.
Trippi wasn’t even fired. He was replaced as campaign chief and then offered a different post. He declined and chose to quit. That doesn’t strike me as the way you treat an embezzler. I’d think you fire him and then press charges.
At least part of the flap is over Trippi’s ad agency getting commissions of perhaps 15%. The commissions weren’t directly paid by the campaign but presumably discounts from the media.
That media discount is typical. They pay it to the ad agency as a volume incentive and because unlike ordinary adversters, agency people are easier to deal with. Ad folks know the business, requirements etc.
I suppose a separate ad firm could have been established by the campaign or Trippi’s firm could have rebated some of the funds back, but either of those possibilities might have run afoul of campaign funding laws.