Caddell Unloads on 'Racketeering' GOP Consultants

Pat Caddell, the Fox News Contributor and Democrat pollster who engineered Jimmy Carter’s 1976 Presidential victory, blew the lid off CPAC on Wednesday with a blistering attack on "racketeering" Republican consultants who play wealthy donors like "marks."

Breitbart

"I blame the donors who allow themselves to be played for marks. I blame the people in the grassroots for allowing themselves to be played for suckers....It's time to stop being marks. It's time to stop being suckers. It’s time for you people to get real," he told the audience that included two top Republican consultants.

Caddell stole the show as a panelist in the breakout session titled "Should We Shoot All the Consultants Now?" He spoke with a fire and passion that electrified the room. When the session began the large room was half filled, but as word spread of the fireworks going on inside, the audience streamed in. By the end, it was standing room only.

Breitbart News spoke with Caddell prior to his talk, and he promised he would deliver a "brutal critique" of the Republican establishment and its political consulting class. He did not disappoint, pulling no punches with an unyielding evisceration of a small group of Republican consultants, the Romney campaign, the Republican National Committee, and Karl Rove's Crossroads GPS Super PAC.

"When you have the Chief of Staff of the Republican National Committee and the political director of the Romney campaign, and their two companies get $150 million at the end of the campaign for the 'fantastic' get-out-the-vote program...some of this borders on RICO [the 1970 Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act] violations," Caddell told the crowd. "It's all self dealing going on. I think it works on the RICO thing. They’re in the business of lining their pockets."

"The Republican Party," Caddell continued, "is in the grips of what I call the CLEC--the consultant, lobbyist, and establishment complex." Caddell described CLEC as a self serving interconnected network of individuals and organizations interested in preserving their own power far more than they're interested in winning elections.

"Just follow the money," Caddell told a rapt audience. "It’s all there in the newspaper. The way it works is this--ever since we centralized politics in Washington, the House campaign committee and the Senate campaign committee,  they decide who they think should run. You hire these people on the accredited list [they say to candidates] otherwise we won't give you money. You hire my friend or else."

Financial corruption is a key component of the current process, according to Caddell. "There's money passing under the table on both parties. Don’t kid yourself...If you can’t see racketeering in front of you, God save you."

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