On December 9, 2009, Aaron was fired from Red Countyas a blogger.
I have it in writing that the Poizner camp has been secretly paying one of our writers, “Sgt. York,” for favorable coverage all year long.
Now, to be fair, the Poizner camp wasn’t paying him directly. Instead, they were paying a “consultant,” and that person was paying our now-former writer. But it is a fact that the person was paying York explicitly for pro-Poizner, anti-Whitman commentaries, articles specifically to be written on RedCounty.com.
But who is St. York? Aaron often brags about his black bag operations and was kind enough to link the following news story on his blog.
You may remember last week’s flap involving gubernatorial candidate and Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, whose campaign indirectly paid a blogger to write nice things on RedCounty.com about the candidate. RedCounty.com owner Chip Hanlon fired Aaron Park, who posted as “Sgt. York,” for failing to disclose the renumerative impetus behind his Poizner e-gushes.
Hanlon did the right thing. Paid praise is a poor substitute for unsolicited admiration.
OK so who was the evil political consultant?
Now, to be fair, the Poizner camp wasn’t paying him directly. Instead, they were paying a “consultant,” and that person was paying our now-former writer…Shame on Steve Poizner, Steve Frank and Aaron Park.
Yeah, ole Steve Frank was the money man.
Now – when I went to Steve Frank about what transpired in the conversation on 12/24/2008 to let him know that there was an offer on the table… that is what ultimately led to my arrangement with Steve Frank. Note that I worked for Steve Frank, not Steve Poizner.
This pattern of using political consultants as the go-between to move money from candidates to the Park brothers is a business model that they still use to this day. Occasionally, the Parks will actually sign their work.
Aaron went from being a paid blogger at Red County on December 9, 2009 to his first blog post on RightOnDaily a week later, December 16, 2009. The post is even tagged with St. York.
By searching the St. York tag on Aaron’s blog I found another gem. This time Aaron was bragging about his services and offering them to a US Senate candidate. Again, his link to Red County is a fun read.
To all you Republican politicos out there in California: ever wonder why Mr. Conservative himself, Aaron Park (AKA Sgt. York), has been trashing Chuck DeVore relentlessly? Well, probably not (judging by his new blog’s anemic Alexa ranking it must get about a dozen visitors a day), but let’s just say he has been finding ever more bizarre and picayune ways to criticize the most conservative Senate GOP candidate in the race recently.
Seems odd given you’d assume the two of them should be pretty darn close to one another, philosophically, right?
Perhaps I can shed some light.
The email below was provided to me by the DeVore campaign, one I have known about for months—since the days after our rather public split with Mr. Park (it helped confirm I had made the right decision on that one). Because it has since become an increasingly open secret that Park made this advance and was declined, DeVore’s campaign gave me the go-ahead last week to share it with all of you:
From: Aaron Park <aaron…@yahoo.com></aaron…@yahoo.com>
Date: November 8, 2009 9:28:56 PM PST
To: Chuck DeVore <chuckd…@….com></chuckd…@….com>
Cc: Josh Trevino <josh…@trevinostrategies.com></josh…@trevinostrategies.com>
Subject: Re: Campaign Opportunities
Hi Josh and Chuck –
Chuck – thanks for the hour long conversation on the phone. If you want to know more about me, Dan Logue, Roger Niello or Ted Gaines might be good people to speak with in the Assembly.
I am going to help you find a chair for Placer County. In fact, I have one in mind… Angelo Andriotti – check out www,conservativerule,com, his site. He is new on the scene in Placer and would be a great fit as he could really benefit from the exposure.
My problem is that I have a number of paid gigs so to speak and my time to volunteer is quite limited. I think Chuck and I were clear on the phone about that.
However, as someone that loves to stick it to the establishment, I am committed to helping.
To that end – I can be retained at a quite reasonable rate or for “projects”. I assume you’re both familiar with my work (ask Doug Ose or Meg Whitman how effective it is)…
Again – it is awesome to make the connection. Stand by as I will put Angelo in contact with Josh asap.
Regards,
Ahhhhh, right… since she’s only leading in the gubernatorial primary by 40 points, Meg must tremble every time Park unloads on her with the full force of his mighty pen!
But seriously, folks… the message in the email is as clear as day, no?
Is his trashing of DeVore lately a result of having been told “no?” You be the judge, but “no” was the DeVore response.
Oddly, I’ve heard some say that Park blames DeVore for having outed him and his Poizner payment scheme which got him booted from Red County. That would be particularly bizarre since I have since shown that Park outed himself directly to me.
Regardless, many out there suspect that Park only writes about candidates he’s being paid to shill for; I have no idea if that’s true, care little and simply share this so readers can draw their own conclusions, but given the email above it’s not hard to see why folks have that impression.
Two of the banner advertisers on Park’s new blog—which I will not do him the service of linking to—are from McClintock and Poizner, guys who we know have paid Yorkie to shill for them. One should be forgiven for wondering whether similar deals are in place for the other advertisers on his 3.5 Million Alexa-ranked blog.
At the very least, now it’s perhaps easier to take a guess at what’s fueling the surprising anti-DeVore rhetoric that has been spewing forth of late from one Aaron Park.
So what we know from multiple sources is that Aaron is happy to take your money in exchange for praising you and trashing the opposition. While this does include his blog, it also includes a host of other “projects” and endorsements. He is a gun for hire. However, as mentioned in my other article, sometimes Aaron forgets to point his guns away from his client.
Aaron frequently admits to things that make most folks shudder.
Maybe what we are doing here at www,rightondaily,com will be ground-breaking. If you advertise here – it means an endorsement.
Update 05-21-2015 correct Red State to Red County
