In the comments over on his new Daily Kos diary, he admitted (after having been confronted a few days earlier by Markos Moulitsas) that a number of user accounts had been created by his "interns or staff" for the purpose of posting pro-Maloney and anti-Gillibrand diaries and comments on Daily Kos.
Here are the accounts and what I learned about them:
There are two accounts that were created on Kos but never were used:
Albanywonk
BuffaloOrBust
These Accounts were created and used on kos:
liveblueordie
nysmith123
solid blue rob
pilotlarry
ny democrat23
A little research through the TAP user database finds that almost all of these users also registered here within late June, although only one was used to issue comments, and none wrote diaries. Trippi also vehemently denied association with other suspected astroturf accounts.
How sincere Trippi was in his most recent apology, one can only guess. While he did come cleaner about what was going on than he previously had, there remain several inconvenient facts for him.
One is that the astroturfing staffers he "didn't know about" just happened to comment positively on his diaries within minutes of them being posted. Since he claims that the situation only happened because he was on the road and out of touch, this is a bit questionable.
Second is that he claims there was no link between his employment by Carolyn Maloney, and the sudden rush of pro-Maloney postings and astroturf, which doesn't pass the smell test. Particularly when he goes on to say that he stands by everything the sock-puppet accounts said, and then adds that his own contracting with Maloney has nothing to do with advocating for her or supporting her in a primary against Senator Gillibrand, the latter part of which is simply laughable. |
