As I previously posted, a non-profit in NC named Blueprint NC has been caught distributing a memo with talking points on how to attack Conservatives, the GOP and Governor Pat McCory. What has not been so publicized is the link between this progressive group and the local media – specifically local Raleigh station, WRAL.

Let’s review what Blueprint NC advocates (full memo here courtesy of RedState):

• “Crippl(e) their leaders (GovMcCrory, House Speaker Tillis, Senate leader Berger etc.)”

• “Eviscerate the leadership and weaken their ability to govern.”

• “Pressure McCrory at every public event.”

• “Slam him when he contradicts his promises.”

Pay attention to the last item. Funny how WRAL now displays its shiny new McCrory Promise Tracker on their site. I re-iterate from my earlier post:

After my initial reading of the article, the last one struck me as familiar – WRAL’s shiny new “Promise Tracker“.   When this promise tracker came out, I questioned WRAL on why there wasn’t a Bev Perdue tracker. This is the answer I received was in a Private message on Twitter. I tweeted them publicly and they replied PRIVATELY. Which means they had to follow me and unfollow me just to send this message:

 

They didn’t have the resources to have someone jot down and post Bev Perdue’s promises to their site? What kind of resources would that take exactly? A pen? Some paper? Ethics?

As I mentioned above, WRAL has a story on their site about the Blueprint NC memo leak. It is void of any link to their own owner, Jim Goodmon. Civitas already has a response up; citing :

The WRAL reporter left out the very deep connections WRAL has with BlueprintNC through its owner Jim Goodmon, donations and former employees. The AJ Fletcher Foundation has given $35,000 to BlueprintNC and $380,000 to the NC Justice Center which initially housed BlueprintNC when it was formed (the foundations 990 IRS reports are not current so there may be more) . The Goodmon family which owns WRAL has 4 family members on the board of the Fletcher Foundation including Barbara the President and Jim the chairman of the board. The Executive Director was formerly the head of the NC center for Voter Education, one of the original members of BlueprintNC. In addition Chris Fitzsimon, former WRAL reporter,  is head of the liberal NC Policy Watch, the original lead attack group in the Blueprint coalition. Fitzsimon is also provided free airtime on Goodmon owned WRAL-FM from which he launches daily attacks on political opponents. The Fletcher Foundation has been a long time funder of Policy Watch is now housed in the Justice Center.

The best section comes next:

Wral is also actually doing one of the items in the strategy memo. The memo on page 3 calls for tracking McCrory “Campaign Promises” and “slam him when he contradicts his promise.” WRAL appears to have taken that for action by launching their “Promise Tracker“, complete with cute little ”Skull & Crossbones” symbols.

Gee, isn’t that a coincidence?

I took to Twitter to ask the station for comment on the omissions in their current story covering Blueprint NC:

@wral where is mention of your OWNER financing them? Liberal groups lay out blueprint for attack on state leaderswral.com/liberal-group-…

— LL1885 (@LadyLiberty1885) February 22, 2013

As of this posting, I have not received a reply from WRAL.

Updates/ Related Reading: 

Great piece at RedState which includes the web graphic below showing all of Blueprint NC’s associations:

Blueprint NC: How A Shadowy Left-Wing Hydra Plans A Targeted Attack On NC Republicans

Cross-Post at WatchdogWire  Linked by PJ Media – Thank you!