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

Confidential memo outlines a plan to

Blueprint NC - Organizations
On Thursday, the Charlotte Observer ran a story about a leaked confidential memo released by a below-the-radar shadow group called Blueprint NC. The confidential memo revealed a left-wing plan to attack North Carolina’s governor and other conservative leaders.

According to the Observer’s piece, the confidential memo was from Bluepint NC’s Communications Coordinator Stephanie Bass and addressed to its “partner groups.”

As part of a two-year plan to “Eviscerate, Mitigate, Litigate, Cogitate, and Agitate,” the memo outlines a strategy to target Republican Governor Pat McRory and other conservative leaders:

  • “Crippl(e) their leaders (McCrory, Tillis, Berger etc.)”
  • “Eviscerate the leadership and weaken their ability to govern.”
  • “Pressure McCrory at every public event.”
  • “Slam him when he contradicts his promises.”
  • “Private investigators and investigative reporting, especially in the executive branch…”

If you’ve never heard of Blueprint NC, you’re not alone. The semi-private group seems dedicated to keeping a low public profile, according to its website:

Blueprint has been created as a strategic initiative – focused on creating collaborative change and not focused on a public identity beyond our partners. Blueprint does not seek recognition for itself, but prefers that its partners be recognized for the good work that they do. [Emphasis added.]

In 2010, Blueprint NC’s “partners” were  identified by the Civitas Institute which revealed a conglomeration of national and state “progressive” organizations—including the AFL-CIO’s A. Philip Randolph Institute, as well as the anti-life group NARAL.

  • Read Blueprint NC’s secret memo in its entirety here (or below).

In fact, Blueprint NC’s Director, Sean Kosofsky, is a NARAL alum, according to this bio:

Sean Kosofsky is currently the Director of Blueprint North Carolina. He is the former Executive Director of NARAL Pro-Choice NC, and has been an active visible LGBT leader since 1994. He was the Director of Poliyc for 12 years for Michigan’s leading LGBT rights organization, Triangle Foundation.

Blueprint NC also appears to be very well funded. The Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, which was established in 1936 as a memorial to the youngest son of the founder of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, gave Blueprint NC $850,000 for “general operating support” in 2010.

The Foundation is apparently still giving Blueprint NC money—to the sum of $400,000, according to a report in Friday’s Observer.

However, due to the light being shined on Blueprint NC’s strategy (and, consequently, the Foundation), that support may now be in jeopardy:

Leslie Winner, executive director of the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, said she was “surprised and disappointed” by the actions of Blueprint North Carolina.

“(Z. Smith Reynolds) believes in robust debate on issues of public importance, (it) does not support attacking people,” Winner said. “We were disappointed to learn that Blueprint is advocating this strategy…

“We are taking this seriously. We are determining our options and our obligations. We will get to the bottom of it.”

The Foundation is providing $400,000 of Blueprint’s nearly $1 million budget, Winner said.

It is hard to fathom how a progressive foundation that doles out hundreds of thousands of dollars to an organization like Blueprint NC to coordinate Left-wing activist strategies and tactics can claim ignorance to Blueprint NC’s tactics.

It is even harder to fathom when it appears Blueprint NC and its “partners” appear to be simply carrying out the “social jusctice and equity” goals of the Foundation.

According to Civitas Institute, the Foundation’s executive director is indirectly tied to Blueprint NC:

It should also be noted that the Z Smith Reynolds Foundation which has given $425,000 to Blueprint and $2.7 million to the Justice Center which housed Blueprint, was headed succesively by Tom Ross the current UNC system President and Leslie Winner a former Democratic state senator and UNC VP.

Amid the controversy, Blueprint NC’s director Kosofsky is blunt as to the strategy the secret memo revealed:

“If you want to impact the effectiveness of a lawmaker … one way to do that is to find out where they’re weak and use that to your advantage,” [Kosofsky] said.

Here is how the group describes itself on its website:

Blueprint NC is a partnership of public policy, advocacy, and grassroots organizing nonprofits dedicated to achieving a better, fairer, healthier North Carolina through the development of an integrated communications and civic engagement strategy. Ultimately, Blueprint aims to influence state policy in NC so that residents of the state benefit from more progressive policies such as better access to health care, higher wages, more affordable housing, a safer, cleaner environment, and access to reproductive health services.

We are determined to change the public policy debate in this state, and are dedicated to becoming more effective and prolific speakers and writers about progressive ideas and values. We are determined to engage more citizens in the public dialogue, because we believe that the strongest democracy hears from all people, not just those with the loudest voices or the shiniest megaphones.

[Perhaps it would be much easier for the group to simply state its goals as: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs."]

Regardless of what transpires with Blueprint NC, if it suddenly disappears off the radar screen, one thing is certain, much like the “downfall” of ACORN, more groups like it will spring up to replace it…until they too have the light shed on them.

Blueprint NC Secret Memo

Related:

_________________________
“Truth isn’t mean. It’s truth.”
Andrew Breitbart (1969-2012)

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COMMENTS

  • DerKrieger

    These damn Marxst/Progressive/Liberal/Socialist groups re everywhere and involved in every issue. They are always in attack mode seeking to force their agenda on us, undermine our culture and our country.

    Unlike the Left we conservatives by and large simply want to be left alone to live our lives. We are mostly reactive rather than proactive and only organize to push back against the relentlessness of the Left.

    I want to split the country in half with the Leftists to one side and conservatives to the other. And we would then need to outlaw Liberalism.

    I would enjoy watching the rapid descent into tyranny a Leftist nation would experience without the brakes of the opposition to restrain them.

    Liberalism is a sickness that seeks to smother us, rule over us, and micromanage our lives.

    I think that one day we will reach our limit and start to fight back. I’m sick of the Left, their perversion of the language, their lies, and the fact that they refuse to just leave us alone.

  • Jack_Savage

    So the director of Blueprint NC is a gay guy from Michigan who transplanted himself to North Carolina. Figures.
    Hope I see him around Raleigh now that I know what he looks like. Something tells me he and I don’t hang around the same places, but you never know.

    Thank you for posting this, LUR.

  • http://www.laborunionreport.com LaborUnionReport

    Forgive me for stating the obvious, but it’s time to start thinking differently.

    You/we cannot wait for “one day” to start fighting back.

    I’ve been posting PowerPoints and Mobilization Manuals for a reason–to better equip activists to get engaged again. The reason I embdded the entire memo in this post is for people to read it, learn the tactics, and use them.

    If you wait for “one day,” it’ll be too late.

  • raginpatriot

    As LUR stated in his response to you, we need to start fighting back, and now.

    You stated that they seek to force “their agenda on us, undermine our culture and our country.”

    You intuitively recognize this, but the actuality of what you stated is far, far worse. It is very much part of a decades long plan of action concocted by collectivists (in the end progressives, fascists, communists and socialists / Fabian socialists are all mere variations of collectivism).

    Talking of “plans” sounds at first blush tin-foil hat conspiratorial. But read Jonah Goldberg’s “Liberal Fascism,” David Horowitz’s “The Shadow Party,” Saul Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals” and Stanley Kurtz’s “Radical in Chief” and you’ll discover that since the 1960′s far-left groups have been working within the system to in fact undermine our culture (amongst other things).

    There has been an undeclared war going on against our country as founded, and we’ve suffered numerous defeats without even recognizing cause and effect. We are approaching the tipping point (the Left certainly sees B. Hussein Obama as the vessel through which they achieve final consummation of their ends). If we don’t start engaging in a resistance movement now, it’ll be over soon, and we’re not going to like living within the “progressive paradise.”

  • Jack_Savage

    One other thing:

    “The Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation was established in 1936 as a memorial
    to the youngest son of the founder of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company.”

    What do they call people who will take money from anyone for their services….hmmm…thinking….

  • Jack_Savage

    The first thing anyone who lives in NC should do is email the foundation, then tell all their friends about what these radical anti-American groups are up to.

  • MiamiDave

    This should be taken very, very seriously. The left-wing hate machine turned Colorado blue with a similar strategy. We tend to take for granted now that CO leans left, but this wasn’t always the case– it went from red to blue, and it went fast, because of left-wing groups and their media allies who created an echo chamber for them. It happened in Colorado; if we are not vigilant and proactive, it can happen in North Carolina.

  • sta46

    and they announced a couple of months ago that they currently have a similar plan in place to turn Texas and all its big, fat, juicy electoral votes blue as well

  • lineholder

    Already working on it, Jack.

  • http://www.theprecinctproject.wordpress.com ColdWarrior

    For those who want to try to “do something,” a good place to start is where you live.

    The Democrat Party and the Progressives that infest it must be defeated, no?

    Might, possibly, a good adversary of the Democrat Party be the Republican Party?

    There’s the Republican National Committee. Not very conservative.

    There are the Republican committees of the states and territories. Do you know how conservative yours is? That is, do you know how many of the committee slots are filled by conservatives?

    Each state has county committees. Do you know the name of your county committee chairman? Is he a conservative? Did you vote for him?

    Some counties have “lower level” committees. Those committees have a chairman and officers. Did you vote for your officers?

    Have you ever attended your local Republican committee monthly meeting?

    Do you know when and where it meets?

    Might you want to attend and find out how many of its committee member slots are filled and how many are vacant? And how many of the filled slots are filled by conservatives?

    Can you afford a couple of hours a month to do this? Can you afford not to?

    If you’ve never done so, why not give it a try and report back here in a Diary about what you’ve discovered about the state of your Republican Party committee where you live?

    Thank you.

    ColdWarrior
    http://theprecinctproject.wordpress.com

  • joshinca

    I think a radical solution is needed to kill these parasites.

    Mine is too strip them, and the ‘foundations’ that fund them, of their tax exempt status and tax the hell out of these greedy 1%er bastards.

  • gunnyg2002

    Liberals are like a deadly virus, spreading their nastiness and leaving nothing but pain and suffering in their wake. Separating US from THEM is the only recourse left as they’ve populated like rats since the 60′s.

  • gunnyg2002

    I cold not agree more. THEY started the Balkinization of America, we should finish the job.

  • gunnyg2002

    If you see him, give him one for me. Wait, make that two or five.

  • Ann_W

    They actually don’t populate that prolifically, conservatives are better at that. But they have control of the schools and they ‘convert’ our children, and scoop up the new immigrant arrivals.

  • cheesycon

    I’m a little concerned that this post is almost a mirror of the conspiracy theories on the left, about Koch Brothers and Clinton’s “VRWC”. Why is it bad or ominous if these groups want to form legal entities and spend money? How is it any different from what Rove did in 2012?

    This should be treated as a strategic threat but it’s hardly illegal or even suspicious. It’s what we should expect.

  • neolib

    What exactly is the story here? Republicans try to turn states red, democrats try to turn them blue. We have the same kind of groups doing this kind of work, very effectively. NC is a purple state nationally, but republicans have managed to take the state house, senate, and governorship over the last two election cycles. We’re winning in NC.

  • Jack_Savage

    “We’re”?
    You must have not seen the sign on the door.

    But since you weren’t able to get farther than the title of the post, the issue is really not that liberals want to tear down any semblance of a normal society – we all know that. The story is how they are funded through a non-profit foundation.

  • Jack_Savage

    I’ll tell him “howdy” from the both of us. And ask him to shag ass back to Michigan.

  • gwalt

    One— get Young Republicans that can’t find work to infiltrate the groups. Think O’Keefe times ten thousand. They could make believe they are doing the work and get nothing done. There are now pens, glasses and thumb drives that record video and audio.
    Two— start an Ad campaign with news anchors names and faces on them. Fr a few thou we could get Stepphie and Lauer embarrassed and on the defense. All they do is offense, offense, offense—-all we do is defense. This has to change starting in 2009 ( when I first asked at RS Gathering— what is r media plan against the media?)
    Three- — form our own union to enjoy the protection SEIU and others enjoy. Could be a small business union? One Brotherhood All Motherhood Association……or O.B.A.M.A.
    For short.

  • DerKrieger

    I think we are thinking of different definitions of “fighting back”. I mean a violent revolution.

    I like to think I’m already fighting back within your definition.

  • WmCraig

    I have been saying, since the election, that what we are facing is a modern incarnation of a coordinated effort by Democrats to attack Republicans, and suppress voter turnout. This hardly differs from the tactics used to suppress Republican votes 100 years ago.

    And although I don’t have the smoking gun, if you read and understand what they want to do in NC, you will understand what is happening in the big blue cities and blue states.We have all of these groups and the LGBT leaders in this area are prejudiced, aggressive and vindictive. Is it surprising that independents and republicans in these targeted areas think that there is no hope. We got cheerleaders for support, they got money, power and legal and political protection for their aggression.

    It isn’t wrong, it is just politics.

    It is time to stop bellyaching about the nasty progressives and build out own network of competitive political organizations. We can’t suppress this activity through exposure. We have to compete with it in the mud puddle of street level politics with our own organizing plan.

    This should be an award winning expose from a Front Page contributor known for outstanding work uncovering the secret links and coordinated activities of the progressive movement. Lets start it up!

  • earlgrey

    You k ow there is also a guy on Freedon Connector who is trying to mobilize Precinct committeeman. Also weirdly got an email from our county GOP advertising the precinct elections. Last time I had to dig to find out.

  • ncfamilyman

    We are SO ready for these guys here. We are so organized and ready. They are just going to burn money.

  • fredflintlock

    Don’t send him back here. We have too many radical collectivists already. Send him to the western regions of The People’s Republic of China. Once there he can get a good schooling in what applied Socialist principles produce in the way of fairness and opportunity. I’m sure he’ll get a warm, loving reception from those evolved, forward thinking proletariat agrarian collectivists too.

  • fredflintlock

    So could we call the Blueprint NC project CO2?

  • carolina

    Thank you for the good news!

  • carolina

    Here is another write-up with additional details:

    http://www.wral.com/liberal-group-lays-out-blueprint-for-attack-on-state-leaders/12136669/

  • carolina

    short link: http://tinyurl.com/attxkpa

  • WmCraig

    You seem to miss the point of this article. If anyone as an individual
    were to make any efforts without substantial support from secure
    conservative areas a whole boat load of effluent waste will come down on
    their head, on the heads of their family members and anyone they
    associate with including church, civic groups, even business people.
    Quite bluntly in the blue state and throughout the Delaware Valley
    region the “gangs” are in control. Political gangs, criminal gangs,
    activist gangs and these gangs are willing to use intimidation it in a
    coordinated way to undermine the financial, social and physical security
    of anyone that “get’s uppity”.

    As for what I have discovered,
    it is in sad shape and can’t win mostly due to a redistricting decision.
    The reason it is in bad shape? Intimidation with legal and political
    cover. And NO support from outside the region that can use distance for
    protection.

  • bgintn

    Question Jack_Savage Sir,

    “Crippl(e) their leaders (McCrory, Tillis, Berger etc.)”

    I do not know how NC. law reads but, could this be a threat of physical harm to affect their ability to govern in NC.?

  • WmCraig

    Now that we understand what the “FOWARD” stands for, we need to “DO RIGHT”

  • WmCraig

    A little concerned? You don’t want to be seen by the moderators as a troll.

    It is an expose on why democrats run the blue states, and own the votes of the big blue cities. It is a serious threat to our liberty. And it is simply truth. If you see this as a conspiracy theory and not an analysis of how Democrats have gained power you could not have read the draft. It is a conspiracy, not a theory, described by democrats in there words.

    It is not illegal. The only thing wrong with BluePrintNC is that Republcans do not have an effective counter. This is simple tactics for isolating targets and cutting them out of the herd for ingestion.

  • WmCraig

    I don;t thing the right way to approach this is to get young Republicans. We What we need to do is fund organizations to hire recent college graduates in target minority constituencies. We need to build success delivering market friendly alternative social solutions. Then we will get broad republican support.

    - People want to educate there children. (we should own this)
    - People want jobs, not just clean air, cottage industry and small manufacturing jobs that pay high wages to non-college graduates. (We should own this)
    -People want care for their senior family members. (PACE programs for seniors should be our program)
    - Seniors want medicare advantage, which is a free market solution (we should own this, especially now that it is going away)

    These are a number of family values issues that cut across all ethic lines, but resonate very well in the Hispanic and Asian communities. Cut those constituencies from the democrat herd and the lay of the land changes for the BluePrintNC crowd.

  • bgintn

    NCfamilyman sir,

    I ask you as well,

    “Crippl(e) their leaders (McCrory, Tillis, Berger etc.)”

    I do not know how NC. law reads but, could this be a threat of physical harm to affect their ability to govern in NC.?

  • gyakuzuki

    photo?

  • rawlsian

    You have your finger on the points that conservatives can use to win over many people. But the problem is that the existing concrete (and proposed) solutions to these problems cost money. For example, medicare advantage costs the government more than medicare. It is a free market solution only if well-funded medicare exists (because the providers cherry-pick). Also they get a greater subsidy from the government. Are conservatives committed to pay for that? Education is another example. How can we square educational opportunity for everyone and free(er) market principles? Make individual families pay directly? That changes education into a privilege not a right. No sane American conservative can be an advocate of that — it is as anti-liberty and personal freedom as one could be.

    To own these issues we need credible policy proposals that fit with the larger conservative principles. These are hard problems that require creative thinking and tests against their likelihood of success in the real world.

  • Jack_Savage

    http://www.bilerico.com/contributors/sean_kosofsky/

    One more thing – and this is rich:

    “Kosofsky has received numerous awards… including the Spirit of Detroit Award from the Detroit City Council.”

    But he couldn’t be bothered to stick around and fix that sewerhole, could he.

  • Jack_Savage

    I don’t really know either, but my guess is that they will hide behind the skirt of the 1st Amendment. They like the Constitution – when it suits them.

  • Bill S

    He’s just seen by the moderators as a moron.

  • Bill S

    Food for thought: next time you think about implying that one of the contributing editors is peddling a conspiracy theory, resist the temptation. Because next time you even breathe the wrong way here, you’re toast.

  • Bill S

    Fix it? His ilk is responsible for it.

  • cheesycon

    well, if I cross a line, I’ll pay the price. Thanks for the heads up.

  • cheesycon

    well, I did say “almost a mirror of” which was not “is a mirror of” but I’ve shot my mouth off without thinking before, so I accept the rebuke.

  • Jack_Savage

    It is amazing that these people are put in charge of fixing windows that they themselves broke.

  • PowerToThePeople

    You would never have to worry about it or worry about ticking folks off if you simply learned a few things and these things are not in any particular order:

    1) Realize you are a kid ( we know that because you stated you live at home and your mom is buying some gaming console for you and a sibling) and most here are adults, show the proper respect.

    2) Stop acting as if you have gained enough Biblical and Political experience in your few years that you are entitled to lecture adults who have been around both for more years than you have been alive.

    3) Stop talking so much. You love to throw out the Bible, but you seem never to apply to it to yourself. A great verse you should learn and put into practice is the whole ” Even a fool is thought wise when they stay silent.”

    4) Stop acting like you are superior in knowledge and in morality, you are not.

    Simple as that. Glad you vote or will vote with us, but you need to have a number of more years under your belt before you start talking to adults as if they are your argument buddy at high school. You would greatly benefit from learning from us than running your mouth, it would make you a better man.

  • cheesycon

    1. I haven’t made myself out to be an equal, nor denied I am young (in fact I admitted it up front many times). I’m old enough to vote but not to get CCW. I’m in college at a liberal school, far from my home town, but still in my home state (which is Wisconsin, though I guess that much was obvious).

    2. I haven’t to my knowledge lectured anyone. I’ve expressed my opinion and as my parents taught me, to only deliver that opinion with benefit of facts and knowledge I have, and always been open to being taught or changing my mind. I’ve learned a lot here at RedState which is really pretty much the only website I visit regularly outside facebook.

    2a. I think if you think I’ve been lecturing you you are mistaknng my expression of my opinion as a judgement and I have never judged anyone. Maybe I havent been clear and I certainly haven’t always thought before I spoke, but I dont see whats wrong with having an opinion and expressing it.

    2b. Yes I have quoted the Bible, maybe twice? three times? I’ve also asked questions, I’ve stood up for my beliefs, and I’ve challenged people who I think are wrong to do the same with their own facts. I think I’ve held my own but if you have evidence I’ve been disrespectful than show me and I will apologize.

    3. I can’t help it. If I stay silent I will remain a fool; if I speak, then maybe you will know me for a fool, but then someone will know what to teach me. “he who knows not and knows he knows not is a child, teach him.” <– not a bible quote!! lol

    4. I do not believe I am superior to anyone on this earth. Not in morality and not in knowledge.

    4a. i do believe that my beliefs – religious, political – are superior to many of my fellow citizens. And I will make no apologies for expressing that opinion – yes. But I do so in desire to better myself in their defense.

    I'm never going to stop having room to be a better man. But as I'm no one's better here, neither am I the less of anyone here.

  • cheesycon

    there are Young Republicans at my school and they are a joke. They don’t want to win elections, they want to spend all their time fighting and “rocking the boat”. These are the most Beltway politics type people you will ever find, and they stand out like a sore thumb among the regular folk conservatives and Republicans here in my state. We don’t need warriors, we need preachers.

  • PowerToThePeople

    Well it is obvious you know better than everyone, hence as warned by Bill your time will be short here. The folly of youth, what a waste.

  • bgintn

    Agree Sir, very true, but,

    A lot of factors both involved and evolved.

    The fact that it was a targeted memo with a target.

    The nature of the memo was to generate responses.

    It only takes one individual, one brick shy of a full load, to take it literal.

    The known history of violent responses by the Left.

    Have they crossed the line, yelling ‘FIRE’ in the crowded theater?

    To my violence I go……….The Race!

    NASCAR that is!

  • http://www.laborunionreport.com LaborUnionReport

    Coming into this conversation late, cheesycon, but, as an FYI only: I really don’t buy into conspiracy theories. There are people who have different views of what America should become, or look like (some spell their America with a ‘k’, but that’s another topic).

    Some of those people form groups to push their agenda–some, like unions and other left-wing legacy groups, do it openly; others do it more quietly.

    Blueprint NC is one of those more quiet ones that is serving as a hub for a lot of more open ones. That is all.

    More specifically, like cockroaches, when they have a light shed on them, they tend to scatter to another dark corner and start laying eggs again. It’s a vicious cycle, really…Shine light, scatter, lay eggs…shine light, scatter, lay eggs…etc…Until one day, they either infest your whole house, or you fumigate the crap out of them.

    This post is nothing more than light shining.

    I’ll leave it to the North Carolinians to fumigate their own state.

  • longhawl

    They forgot the Organization to Ban Styrofoam and Mothers Against 2-liter Drinks.