President Barack Obama Targeted By Anonymous Hate Text Messages
WASHINGTON -- A sting of vitriol-laden text messages hit voters' phones Tuesday night, blasting President Barack Obama with anti-gay attacks and false claims.
Some of the messages did not seem well-targeted.
Jennifer Cryer tweeted that she got one from
that said: "Stop Obama from forcing gay marriage on the states. Your vote is your voice."
Cryer used her voice, and answered back, saying "I'm gay, you f**king douchebags."
The senders were all anonymous. A quick search for one -- votegopett -- found it was registered in February, with the owner information blocked.
Scott Goodstein, a progressive online strategist with the group Revolution Messaging, said the texts "are coming from an email address."
"It is not just random cell phone numbers," Goodstein said. "There is a company out of Northern Virginia that does this." He said the company data "matches right-leaning voters ... It registers a URL and you can't find out without a court order who owns the URL. And they send emails to your phone number via text messaging."
Goodstein added: "It costs consumers money. It is disinformation and there is no source as to where it is coming from."
WASHINGTON -- The man behind the company that blasted anti-gay, anti-Barack Obama text messages to voters in the Washington area this week said he learned at the feet of infamous Republican slash-and-burn political operative Lee Atwater.
The firm ccAdvertising confessed to being behind the blast of emailed text messages that showed up on phones Tuesday night saying things like " "Obama supports homosexuality and its radical social agenda" and “Obama believes killing children is a right until the umbilical cord is cut.”
Many of the texts went to registered Democrats, political operatives and journalists who are unlikely to be swayed. Some wound up reaching people perhaps inappropriately, such as the abortion message going to a 13-year-old girl, and the anti-gay message that went to a gay woman.
ccAdvertising President Gabe Joseph said the burst had the effect he intended, describing it in terms he learned from Atwater, the legendary GOP consultant behind the infamous 1988 Willie Horton ad.
"Sometimes we do things to cause a reaction," Joseph said, adding later, "I was raised in the school of politics of Reagan-Bush '84 under Lee Atwater, and one of the things he taught me is that you win elections when your opponents react to what you do." Atwater, who chaired the Republican National Committee for a time, died in 1991 at age 40.
that said: "Stop Obama from forcing gay marriage on the states. Your vote is your voice."
