Republican Insider Exposes Billy Long's Campaign Strategy: Lie About Debates, Lie About Scott Eckersley, Avoid the Media

I was contacted by a long-time Republican insider Friday night who exposed the Billy Long campaign strategy. He calls the Billy Long campaign a mess while confirming what most of us have expected all along, Billy Long is running from the debates.

The insider said it's the official Long strategy to agree to the debates, but the Long campaign never intends for Billy Long to debate. Rather they will drag their feet and make debating impossible while pointing fingers as Scott Eckersley as being impossible to deal with. They hope this will frustrate voters and Eckersley and the talk of debates will just go away.

As well, the Long campaign is intentionally keeping Billy away from the media as much as possible. They know Billy Long is weak on the issues, and know that will be exposed the closer we get to the general election if Billy Long is easily accessible.

So it is amazing Billy Long went on KSGF at all last week. However, Billy controlled the interview and managed to keep the interview all over the place to keep the average listener confused. We do have a revealing soundbite that parallels what the insider told me. From the KSGF interview (this is where Long shows he is short tempered):

BL: Sure it could happen, I mean the way it is going, and, and, and if you know what he says is not accurate, I’m only gonna, you know, go along so long without havin’ somebody misrepresent things and say things---give you one example: we’re at the Farm Bureau the other night and we’re doin’ our interviews for their endorsement.

NR: uh huh.

BL: Ok, they’re 30 minute. Jay Wasson 6:30 to 7, he goes in, does his. I pass him in the parking lot as I’m walking in, I’m 7-7:30. I don’t know who’s coming after me. The candidates are not supposed to be in together, they’re not supposed to hear each other. So, I do my 30 minutes. I walk out of the building, I’m standing out, we’re just on the back steps of the Darr Center, over here, talking to Anson Elliott, from MSU, you know, about agricultural things that are happening at MSU. One of my aides is with me, so there’s three of us standing there. The door behind me, bang, the door flies open, Scott Eckersley dives out at me, shakes, puts his hand out, big smile, hey, hey, and I turn around, shake hands say how are you , you know, and he said hey, we need to get those debates goin’, we need to get those debates goin’. And I said, I said, we just had them Scott, you’re late, they were in there, I just got done, you just missed the debate. You know, just being, just being jovial, friendly, upbeat like I am. He puts on his twitter page—ran into Billy Long at the Farm Bureau, asked him about the debates he said he was late and he had to leave and he took off! Come on! You know I mean, there’s only, you know I ran for 18 months in the Republican primary never running against my opponents. I told who I was, what I was, what I did, what I wanna do in Washington and that’s what I want this to be.

On another note, the Republican insider also told me the political shenanigans are starting to happen within the Republican Central Committee as Billy Long begins paying back political favors owed during the primary. Billy Long the political insider playing the political outsider is already acting like a career politician making sure his friends are taken care of.

According to the insider, Gordon Kinne, a key Long supporter and donor, having never served on the central committee was moved up all the way to the chairman of the Republican Central Committee. The writing is on the wall on this one. Billy Long once again shows he isn't above politics as usual.