(Note to media, not all 527 groups are the same. And not telling her about the real concept for the story is so not cool. – promoted by Julia Rosen)

Man, Lance Williams of the SF Chronicle just can’t catch a break. He tries to take down Barry Bonds, but almost goes to jail himself for obtaining documents illegally. Then on the day he tries to go after another Barry (Barry Obama) and another African American community leader (Steve Phillips) in a hit piece on Vote Hope, Bonds hits 756 and completely overshadows all other news.

But seriously, this story today is a real gem, complete with comparisons to Swift Boat Veterans and shadowy unnamed sources. What’s worse, I didn’t get the chance to refute much of what Lance alleges in the story because he didn’t tell me he was writing a front-page, above-the-fold hit piece. I still have the message on my machine in which he says he noticed Vote Hope had started fundraising and wanted to “note that in a story.” Join me on the flip for more…

California supporters of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama are using a controversial political committee to rake in donations in excess of what is allowed under tough federal campaign finance laws.

Exploiting a legal loophole, the Obama supporters have set up a so-called 527 group – an unregulated committee of the type deployed by Republican Swift Boat Veterans in the 2004 presidential campaign – as a centerpiece of political fundraising for the California Democratic primary in February.

So far, wealthy donors have written checks in the amounts of $90,000 and $50,000 to “Vote Hope 2008,” the Obama supporters’ 527 group, federal records show. The group is led by San Francisco lawyer Steve Phillips, son-in-law of wealthy financier and Democratic political donor Herbert Sandler.

Media Matters already debunked a similar New York Times story from the day before — as well as an MSNBC story from a month ago — but that did not stop the Chron from irresponsibly repeating the mischaracterizations on the front page of the paper (perhaps laying off all those editors is taking its toll.)

But hey, Barry Bonds is the Swing King. At least we’re in good company.

We will be putting forward a piece for the Chronicle today that gives people the actual full story about what we’re doing and why. The bottom line: no amount of baseless attacks from our friends in the mainstream media is going to steer us off of our long-term goal of expanding the electorate in California by bringing more young people and people of color into the political process through a positive, grass-roots campaign.

Let’s see if they run a front-page story on that.