RNC Chief Ken Mehlman accepted political contributions from gay porn king?
Last week, you'll remember, the RNC, headed by Ken Mehlman, was running that race-baiting 'bimbo' ad against Rep. Harold Ford (D) down in Tennessee. One of the barbs in that ad was the claim that Ford had taken political contributions 
from "porn movie producers."
But it seems there is plenty of porn movie producer money to go around.
It turns out that the Republican National Committee is a regular recipient of political contributions from Nicholas T. Boyias, the owner and CEO of Marina Pacific Distributors, one of the largest producers and distributors of gay porn in the United States. This recent article on Marina Pacific's new marketing campaign form XBiz, a porn industry trade sheet, notes that, in addition to producing its own material, the "company acts as a distribution house to hundreds of lines, mostly gay, 40 of which can be purchased only through MPD."
The company actually seems to be a trendsetter in the industry. As Boyias recently noted, "We have always modeled ourselves after a Fortune-style company. They are the models of exceptional customer service. We have formed strategic alliances with our vendors and customers alike, offering them tools and marketing to assist them in succeeding with their business models. Our one-on-one interpersonal relationships have never been duplicated in the distribution industry."
Some recent releases include "Fire in the Hole", "Flesh and Boners", even a "Velvet Mafia" series.
FEC.gov lists Boyias as contributing to the RNC three times in 2004 and two times in 2005. The NRCC got a little too. But only $250.
The FEC records list Boyias as either "self employed" or as owner and CEO of NTB Inc. But the California Secretary of State's website lists Boyias' NTB, Inc as located at 7077 Vineland Ave, which turns out to be the same address where Marina Pacific is located. So I'm pretty sure we're dealing with the same guy.
So, Ken Mehlman, for porn producer money before he was against it, I guess.
(ed.note: Let me say, for the record, that I consider pornography not only a legal but a morally unobjectionable product. People in that industry have as much right to participate in the political process as anyone else. And it's difficult for the head of a political committee or a candidate in a political campaign to know the background of every contributor. But hypocrisy blows. And on this issue, as on others, Ken Mehlman's a hypocrite.)
--Josh Marshall
Jim Webb speaks at the launch of his GOTV effort and addresses Sen. Allen's new interest in literary criticism ...
This one's going to be down to the wire.
--Josh Marshall
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette ...
U.S. Rep. Tim Murphy, who is seeking his third term in Congress, has mixed campaign activities and official government work in a manner that present and former staffers consider unethical or in violation of House rules, according to interviews with a half-dozen of them.Some of those interviewed described the practices as routine, others as sporadic, but all said they were disturbed by the conduct. The allegations primarily concern the use of taxpayer-funded congressional staff and resources to do work they viewed as part of Mr. Murphy's political campaign.
Standard operating procedure apparently.
--Josh Marshall
Good enough for Webb but not for Allen?
Greg Sargent has a run down here of the aspects of Sen. Allen's personal background he's not releasing records on -- the arrest records from the early seventies and the sealed divorce records down in Albemale County. Following the Allen campaign, the Post today devoted a full length article to scenes in Webb's novels -- stuff that's been in print for years and only became a story when the Allen campaign released a press release. They've tried on the Allen divorce stuff, even had a reporter out West on it for week or more. But apparently they won't discuss it since they can't get access to the records.
So there's that. The arrests records and the land deal story. The Allen campaign has opened the gates. Will anyone walk through?
The normal progression in a campaign is that when one campaign digs something up on the other and opens the debate up on new territory, once that story dies down the press scrutinizes the other candidate on related matters. What the Allen campaign figures here is that there's only time enough left in the campaign for this novel nonesense. By the time stuff cycles back to Allen we'll be past election day.
--Josh Marshall
Today I got an email from the RNC (I'm on their list) asking me to send in a text message to get my mobile phone on their alert list. I actually have a friend who has a company who provides this sort of service for some progressive organizations. But I'm wondering, Are the Dems doing this?
--Josh Marshall
We're darn near six years into this nonsense, but still the White House can beat the press corps like a drum. I'm referring to Cheney's comment that waterboarding detainees was a "no brainer," which the White House has managed to turn into a story about what Cheney really said or what he really meant by what he said.
There's no legitimate doubt about what Cheney said and what he meant. Cheney knows it. The President knows it. So do Tony Snow and the whole White House press corps. Yet we have this spectacularly silly dance--clever people being too clever by half: Snow and Cheney's staff cleverly parsing the interview, and the press cleverly trying to trip up the parsers.
The whole episode has been converted from a story about torture to another in the endless series of stories about the strange relationship between the press and this White House.
The Vice President's comments came in a radio interview on Tuesday. Jonathan Landay of McClatchy Newspapers was the first to report its significance in a story late Wednesday that was straightforward and direct, unburdened by the clever word games that would come later.
The Washington Post didn't run its first story on the interview until its Friday edition. Its follow-up piece today is headlined "Cheney Defends 'Dunk the Water' Comment." I don't know how denying he meant what he said constitutes defending his own comment, unless running fast and far in the opposite direction no longer constitutes a retreat. The story also describes what it calls "ambiguities in the waterboarding debate." The "debate" referred to is not about whether torture is moral or lawful, but whether Cheney actually meant waterboarding or merely a "dunk in the water."
The New York Times' first report on the interview didn't appear until today, in a story that deals almost exclusively with Snow's Friday press conference and the fallout associated with Cheney's remarks. It's a story about the White House "fending off" questions, as if the center of gravity in this historic departure from democratic norms were the White House press room instead of the dank corners of secret prisons or the solemn enclaves of our courts.
No thinking person believes Cheney was referring to anything other than waterboarding. The White House is unable to explain what else Cheney could have been referring to. Yet the leading papers are unable to cut through the malarkey.
I suppose the only thing we work harder at being in denial about than Cheney's comments is the fact that we have used waterboarding and other forms of torture. Every thinking person knows that to be true, too, and it shouldn't take Cheney's slip of the tongue to convince us.
--David Kurtz
No Foley report before the election--even though all witnesses have now testified before the House Ethics Committee.
--David Kurtz
Did Israel use weapons containing enriched uranium during this summer's Lebanon War?
Update: More here.
--David Kurtz
Rep. Jon Porter (R-NV) has finally released his schedule and phone records in response to allegations from a former aide that Porter illegally made campaign fundraising calls from his Washington and district offices.
Funny thing is the records don't exactly disprove the allegation. If anything, they seem to support the allegations, at least in part:
The records show that on one day, Porter made calls to donors and others at a time when his schedule says he was in his district office.But Porter said he wasn't actually at the office the entire time. At times, he would step out of the office to make the calls or leave to go to lunch or for other reasons, he said. He provided a receipt from a restaurant called Sweet Tomatoes where he said he and his chief of staff, Mike Hesse, had lunch during the hours in question.
. . .
The call time on April 18 is from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Porter's call records indicate he called seven people during those hours, including his daughter, his brother and several friends and donors. He said fundraising may have been discussed in some of those calls but, if so, he was not in the office; it was that day he says he dined at Sweet Tomatoes.
The Sweet Tomatoes defense? A new addition to the political scandal lexicon.
--David Kurtz
I caught the tail end of the O'Reilly v. Letterman slugfest last night. Pretty entertaining. Crooks and Liars has the whole segment.
--David Kurtz
How 'bout them Cards!
Update: We have some sour Tigers fans out there. From a TPM reader:
I don't want to hear about the Cards or any other baseball team on TPM. Let's keep the topics related to politics and skip your sports boosterism. It's annoying and guaranteed to bother all the Tiger fans, like me. I'll tune into a sports website for stuff like this. Thanks.
--David Kurtz
Always interesting poking through the FEC independent expenditure reports filed late on Fridays.
The NRCC, spending like a drunk sailor, reported laying out another $7 million.
Let me hit some of the highlights. These aren't the biggest buys from that $7 million pot, but the NRCC is spending money in places you don't expect to see the GOP having to marshall its resources:
CO-5: The NRCC has made what appears to be its first expenditure in this race, almost $150,000 for a seat which Democrats have never held. A SurveyUSA poll released October 19 showed Democrat Jay Fawcett down by 13 percentage points, but a Mason-Dixon poll released October 10 showed him tied with Republican candidate Doug Lamborn. If the spread were still 13, you wouldn't see the NRCC spending that kind of money here. The race is to fill the seat by the retiring moderate Republican Joel Hefley, who has refused to endorse Lamborn.NV-3: In yet another sign that GOP incumbent Jon Porter is in trouble, the NRCC has just put almost $400,000 into this race to attack Tessa Hafen.
NV-2: For every dime the GOP spends here, say a little prayer for Chrissy Mazzeo, the cocktail waitress who has accused Jim Gibbons, the GOP incumbent, of propositioning/accosting her in a Vegas parking garage on Friday the 13th. Gibbons is running for governor of Nevada, but before the Mazzeo encounter, the NRCC had not spent a cent on this open-seat race. Since then, it just spent almost half a million dollars, about $230,000 of that coming in the last couple of days.
Wyoming: Yes, Wyoming! Friday the NRCC made its first foray into the race for the lone House seat in blood-red Wyoming, with a $241,000 ad buy against Democrat Gary Trauner, who is challenging Rep. Barbara Cubin. A Mason-Dixon poll about 10 days ago showed Cubin up by 7 percentage points. But that was before she threatened to slap a man in a wheelchair. Shoot a man in the face. Threaten to slap a wheelchair-bound man in the face. It's been a tough year for Wyoming Republicans.
One other race that is reported to be tightening is the Nebraska 3rd in western Nebraska, where Coach Tom Osborne is retiring. The Dems have not held a congressional seat in central or western Nebraska since 1958, but there are indications that the NRCC is poised to put money into this race.
TPM readers on the ground in any of these districts, let us hear from you.
--David Kurtz
More outside money is flowing into the NV-03, where Tessa Hafen is mounting an unexpectedly stiff challenge to Republican incumbent Jon Porter. The Democratic 527 group, VoteVets, whose ads this year include this one about insufficient body armor in Iraq, spent a quarter of a million dollars this week for attack ads on Porter, according to FEC reports filed yesterday.
--David Kurtz
The fight is on in New Jersey. The RNC yesterday dropped $3 million into the Senate race for attack ads on Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ).
--David Kurtz
Did Shelley Sekula-Gibbs, the GOP's write-in candidate for Tom Delay's old seat, break Texas election laws by campaigning inside a polling station this week?
Poll watcher Jane Borden Matcha said Sekula-Gibbs entered the polling place inside the First Colony Conference Center on Thursday."I was dumbfounded because she marched right up to me and said ‘Hi, I’m Shelley Sekula-Gibbs’ …and it was my understanding that candidates are not allowed in the polling place unless they're voting," Borden Matcha said.
. . .
"I had gone inside to go the bathroom," said Sekula-Gibbs. "I was definitely not campaigning."
Who can blame her for hanging out at polling stations? The poor woman has about the worst name imaginable for a write-in candidate. Actually, what I think she said was, "Hi, I'm S-H-E-L-L-E-Y space S-E-K-U-L-A hyphen G-I-B-B-S."
--David Kurtz
The current budget deficit? Clinton's fault.
So says Rep. John "Animal House" Sweeney (R-NY):
The deficit is actually a result of a recession that began in his administration. We are exponentially paying down the deficit in an accelerated time frame.
Mark Foley started trying to diddle pages during Clinton's administration, so I guess we should blame Clinton for that, too.
--David Kurtz
That splashing sound is the rats jumping overboard:
Corporate America is already thinking beyond Election Day, increasing its share of last-minute donations to Democratic candidates and quietly devising strategies for how to work with Democrats if they win control of Congress.The shift in political giving, for the first 18 days of October, has not been this pronounced in the final stages of a campaign since 1994, when Republicans swept control of the House for the first time in four decades.
. . .
An analysis by The New York Times of contributions from Oct. 1 to 18, the latest data available, shows that donations to Republicans from corporate political action committees dropped by 11 percentage points in favor of Democratic candidates, compared with corporate giving from January through September.
Republicans still received 57 percent of contributions, compared with 43 percent for Democrats, but it was the first double-digit October switch since 1994.
Hedging time.
--David Kurtz
Wal-Mart cuts ties with GOP hatchet man Terry Nelson, who helped produce RNC's bimbo ad in Tennessee Senate race.
--David Kurtz
Here, for those interested in sleuthing on the previous post, is the quotation from Rep. Hyde (R-IL) on the day in question from the Congressional Record.
Mr. HYDE. Mr. Chairman, it is kind of a sad day for me, and I will tell the Members why. Earlier in the day, standing back there I heard a dear friend of mine, a great Republican, say `I trust Hamas more than I trust my own government.' Those words hurt. That is a very tragic situation, because our Government is made up of a lot of people, including me and you, a lot of good judges, honest judges with families.
What Republican member of the 109th Congress would have said such a thing?
A week later (3/21/96) Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) said Hyde should reveal the name of the congressman who trusted Hamas more than the US government ...
Mr. LEWIS of Georgia. Madam Speaker, the entire world has been shocked, appalled, and reviled by the latest wave of terrorist attacks by Hamas in Israel. More than 50 innocent men, women, and children have been killed by suicide bombings in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.So I was similarly shocked and reviled to hear a comment made on the House floor last week in the course of debate on the so-called antiterrorist bill. The gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hyde ], the chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary, said this: `Early in the day standing back there, I heard a dear friend of mine, a great Republican say, `I trust Hamas more than I trust my own Government.'
He went on to say those words hurt. Those words do hurt indeed. But who, Madam Speaker, who, Mr. Hyde , who on the Republican side really believed they could trust Hamas more than our own Government? Who among my colleagues truly believes they can trust a terrorist organization that sends suicide bombers to rob innocent children more than the U.S. Government?
Madam Speaker, the American people have a right to know who among their elected Representatives trusts Hamas more than the United States. Until that person steps forward, or is identified, a cloud hangs over each and every Republican Member of this House.
Lewis returned to the House floor the next day and said ...
Mr. LEWIS of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, there is a Member of this Congress, a Republican, who has told one of his colleagues that he `trusts Hamas more than he trusts our own Government.' That is an outrageous and morally repugnant statement, Mr. Speaker.Hamas is a terrorist organization that targets, maims, and kills innocent men, women, and children. Which Member of Congress thinks they can trust that sick and twisted group more than our own Government. Whoever believes this doesn't deserve the right and privilege to serve in this Congress.
Mr. Speaker, this anonymous Republican Member has disgraced him or herself and cast a cloud over the entire Congress. The Members and the American people deserve an explanation and an apology.
Who among you? Who among you believes such a thing? Step forward and explain yourself. The American people are watching and waiting. For shame, Mr. Speaker, for shame.
The congressman never stepped forward.
--Josh Marshall
Let's have a little fun.
Anyone remember this? Let's go back to 1996 and a March 13th AP article on the passage of a new anti-crime and anti-terrorism bill.
Here's one choice passage ...
Rep. Henry Hyde, R-Ill., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, seemed incensed at the prevailing mood on the House floor. "I heard a dear friend of mine, a great Republican, say, 'I trust Hamas more than I trust my own government,' Hyde said in a reference to the terrorist group that has claimed responsibility for the recent wave of suicide bombings in Israel.He did not identify the other lawmaker by name.
Trusts Hamas more than the US government. A Republican member of Congress. Who could that be?
Any guesses? He's still in Congress. And his race is on the DCCC's Red to Blue list.
--Josh Marshall
You have to look long and hard for race ratings moving in a Republican direction. But here's one: Charlie Cook just moved the Maryland senate race from Leans Dem to Toss Up.
--Josh Marshall
Looks like PoliticalWire.com is hearing more about Sen. Allen's sealed records.
--Josh Marshall
If there's one thing you can say about the Corker-Ford race it's that it's really, really close. Five polls have come out in the last week. Two have Ford up, though one is a DSCC poll. Three have Corker up. Four of the five are either tied or have a one or two point spread.
--Josh Marshall
It must be contagious: Duke Cunningham's replacement, Brian Bilbray, has a Grand Jury investigating him over whether he falsified residency docs.
--Josh Marshall
More evidence of a Gibbons cover-up in Nevada.
What is it they always say, not the attempted sexual assault but the cover-up? Maybe that'll become the updated cliche.
--Josh Marshall
GOP candidate Roskam said he was for phasing out Social Security. Now he says he'll never cut it.
--Josh Marshall
The Allen campaign refuses to return our calls asking whether Sen. Allen will release his sealed divorce records. We're not the only news outlet asking, just the only one telling you how the Allen campaign is responding. Heck, one major national daily had a reporter out in LA for at least week trying to nail down the story. It's what every Washington insider is talking about: what's inside those sealed records down in Albemarle County. Now that the Allen campaign is about to go on the airwaves about sex scenes in Jim Webb's books, maybe you should know about this too.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader DF is seeing the same thing in Indiana ...
To echo your point on "the closer"Here in the hotly contested IN 9th, I received a slick, heavy card-stock letter-sized mailing from the DCCC accusing Sodrel (the Republican) of attempting to raise taxes on the working man. I was flabbergasted at how weak and ineffectual this expensive mailing was. Sodrel is a rubber stamp for Bush. He is a “stay the course” guy. He hemmed and hawed on Social Security reform. Did I mention he’s a rubber stamp for Bush? Even if the DCCC mailer is technically correct, who freaking cares? It was beyond lame. It physically hurt me.
The Republicans have a hematoma under their right eye called Iraq, and one under the left called Bush. Keep punching those damn things!
It is a little painful.
--Josh Marshall
Yep, they should be asking. Why haven't any of the major networks or national newspapers pressed the White House on why they scheduled the sentencing of Saddam Hussein two days before the US's midterm elections.
--Josh Marshall
This really is pretty unbelievable: NBC won't run ads for the Dixie Chicks documentary because, in the words of the NBC's commercial clearance department, "they are disparaging to President Bush."
Networks usually at least go to the length of coming up with a phony 'we don't run ads with a political message' excuse. But I'm not sure I've ever seen one say something like this. I would have thought that with the president's popularity so low some of the network's usual supineness and cowardice would be a little less evident. Would they not run political ads either?
--Josh Marshall
TPM reader TCB responds to TPM Reader DR.
The DCCC has 2 negative ads up in this market, one hitting Roskam for being in favor of banning books by Laura Ingalls Wilder and Martin Luther King and one for voting with the NRA in favor of guns in schools.They’re both quite negative.
Why positive? Well, there are 8 candidates who are up in this market trashing each other. The positive stuff breaks through.
Here's the thing on negative ads. It's time for the closer to come in on this campaign. There's no question this campaign has been effectively nationalized. Both sides are playing on that terrain. But it's time for the closer to come in. And from the numbers I've seen from various states and districts, this is all about President Bush and Iraq -- with the awfulness of the Republican Congress, its irrelevance and corruption sort of second-tier, atmospheric issue. If I'm programming the negative ads, I front the disaster of Iraq and that voting for Republican X is another rubber stamp for President Bush. Another free pass to let the disasters keep coming. That's the deal closer.
Is book-banning like on anyone's radar? Maybe we get some ads about evolution too. A few good ad runs about driving the speed limit could put this one away.
Says another TPM Reader: "I have been watching the RNCC ads for Peter Roskam. They are, to say the least, distorted and blatant lies. What I can't figure out is why the DNCC isn't countering with ads as to how the RNCC treats our veterans. Ms. Duckworth lost both legs in Iraq and these ads are the thanks she gets from the Republicans. Democrats need to drill home the point 'Why does Peter Roskam and the RNCC chose to smear one of our decorated Iraq veterans?'"
--Josh Marshall
White House: Cheney didn't endorse water-boarding when he endorsed water-boarding.
Here's the best line though. Tony Snow: "You know as a matter of common sense that the vice president of the United States is not going to be talking about water boarding. Never would, never does, never will. You think Dick Cheney's going to slip up on something like this? No, come on."
You mean, Dick Cheney totally muff something out of mix of arrogance and incompetence?
Who could ever imagine that?
Late Update: Here are the exact words Cheney said. You decide whether to believe Tony Snow or your own lying eyes.
Even Later Update from TPM Reader EL: "In regards to Cheney slipping up, lets not forget we're talking about the guy who shot his friend in the face and was caught calling a reporter a "major league a$$hole" on tape and that's just what comes to mind, I'm sure there are a couple dozen other Cheney slip up's out there." I was thinking of some of the weightier screw-ups like, say, Iraq or some of these examples. (Do we forget that Cheney's the bumbler who headed up the pre-9/11 terrorism task force that forgot to meet until something like a week before 9/11? Doh!) But, hey, more bonehead screw-ups the merrier.
--Josh Marshall
What lengths have those connected to Rep. Jim Gibbons (R-NV) gone to cover up his cocktail waitress incident?
Justin Rood gives a rundown here.
--Paul Kiel
TPM Reader DR from Duckworthland ...
I live in the Chicagoland Area. Last week, I saw two ads that for some reason a station played back to back. First was a Tammy Duckworth ad that was all about Tammy Duckworth. Then came a Peter Roskam ad that was all about Tammy Duckworth.Positive ads come off as fluff. Negative ads give people a reason to vote a certain way. In the ad I saw, the reason was that Tammy Duckworth is going to give social security money to illegal aliens.
Are Democrats afraid to go negative? Do the people making the ads realize how unpopular the Republican Party is right now? Here in Illinois, we are about to reelect a corrupt Governor. The only thing he has going for him is that he is not a Republican. In this environment, negative ads against Republicans will work. What are we waiting for?
People are already voting. The last-second blitzes should be going on now.
Roskam is really the worst of the worst this year. Do they let him squeak through?
--Josh Marshall
New "stay the course" ad -- special Joe Lieberman addition. It's a good one.
--Greg Sargent
WaPo's Grunwald: Pretty much all the sleaze advertising is from the GOP.
Michael can tell it like it is, why can't Howie?
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader KS writes in in distress from Count Chocola country ...
The comments on TPM today about Social Security bamboolzement reminded me of a flyer I received in the mail from Chris Chocola's campaign last week. I am paraphrasing somewhat, but this is very close. It said, "Who Should Receive Social Security Benefits? A. American Citizens. B. Illegal Immigrants. C. Both.Joe Donnelly says 'C', which will cost Americans millions of dollars. Chris Chocola says 'A'! "
Of course we all know the real answer for Chocola is secret answer "D", none of the above. I am frustrated
that both the local media and Donnelly's campaign have seen silent on this. If Donnelly used Chocola's
phase-out words against him, I am sure it would have an impact on voters in my district.
As far as I can see, most every Dem campaign is missing the boat on this.
And of course the boat is sailing.
--Josh Marshall
I don't know whether others are noticing this. But in every election there's one big disconnect between the 'issues' that are getting the big play in tv shows and pundit commentary and the ones getting hammered on in flyers, tv ads and radio spots. And there's no question that this year, for the GOP, that 'issue' is race tinged ads about Democrats wanting to give free dollars to hordes of Mexican illegals. Scratch the surface of any competitive race out there. You'll find it.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader KH on Fox and Specter ...
Michael J. Fox did a campaign ad for Arlen Specter in 2004. I'd think that he owes Michael something now. I'm thinking that someone should attempt to get him on the record and demand that he speak up now. I've called Specter's Pittsburgh office, as I live here, and they say he has no plan to speak out that they are aware of. That is just plain wrong. Would you be willing to call his offices and try to find out if you can get an on the record statement?
Sounds like a good idea.
--Josh Marshall
More on the Reynolds race in New York from TPM Reader AJV ...
Josh, I live in Reynolds district and the reason I think he has pulled ahead is his Social Security bamboozlement TV commercials. He claims he wants to save social security and uses out of context comments from his opponent. They have Jack Davis saying "We need to increase the retirement age" and "those may need to be reduced down" referring to SS benefits. These commercials are everywhere. And Davis has not had a response ad to counter the claim. It's classic SS bamboozlement. And in our district, it plays big time. Also some background- last election the race was again Davis(D) vs Reynolds(R) and it was very close. So I thought the Foley thing would be the tipping point.
This is actually a big issue. And I've seen it in this race, the Roskam-Duckworth race in Illinois and other places. Roskam seems by far the worst offender. But I'm more than a little disheartened that the Dems haven't pushed back harder on this. The local press is entirely complicit in transparent lying from GOP candidates like Reynolds and especially Roskam.
Remember, Roskam is a strong supporter of phasing out Social Security and replacing it with private accounts. Is anyone hearing that in the Roskam-Duckworth race?
--Josh Marshall
On the rebound? I'd like to see some numbers from another polling firm to be certain. But it looks at least like Rep. Tom Reynolds (R-NY), head of the NRCC, is pulling off something of a comeback after getting knocked out cold over the Foley fiasco. The two most recent polls, both by SurveysUSA, have him back on top by small margins after falling as much as ten points behind in several recent polls.
And following up on yesterday's post about how top of the ticket blow-outs in New York and Pennsylvania might help House candidates down-ticket, TPM Reader BY says the following ...
I think NY and PA are two different animals. In PA, you've got a Senate candidate running a full campaign with a lot of money. He's losing, but he's running. And Swann ... well, he's a classic "seemed like a good idea at the time" candidate. Great bio, well-spoken, but utterly clueless. But at least he's high-profile. So, I don't think PA GOP candidates will be totally on their own.NY, though ... the NY GOP has completely melted down. Imploded. I work for a Democratic candidate, and I can tell you that Republicans are just completely demoralized. There aren't too many signs out, almost no volunteers knocking on doors ... nothing. There's no cohesion in anything they do. I think what you'll see is that GOP reps who are running strong campaigns and have a long history in the district (Walsh, Sweeney, maybe King) will not under-perform too badly. But Kuhl will have trouble, Meier will get blasted, Kelly isn't the favorite even though she's the incumbent ... those folks will have trouble. And Walsh, Sweeney, et all really have to roll the rock up the hill all by their lonesome.
That sounds right to me. New York seems unique this cycle. Pennsylvania and Ohio may turn out to be blow-outs at the top of the ticket. But you've definitely got GOP senate incumbents in both states that really don't want to lose their jobs and are putting up a real fight. So they're going to push for wild GOTV on the ground.
--Josh Marshall
In the runup to election day, the administration panders to tax cheats. Is this what they call shoring up your base? That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Justin Rood
Want to go on the record with your predictions for election day and discuss them with other TPM Readers? If so, click here.
--Josh Marshall
So now the Allen campaign has resorted to mining Jim Webb's novels for sex scenes.
If Allen really wants to play rough, maybe it's time for some Democrats to start going on the shows and asking about that sealed divorce records of Allen's. All those reporters have a pretty good idea of what's in there. But Sen. Allen (R-VA) just won't agree to let them see it.
It's almost like he's spitting in their face.
--Josh Marshall
There's a fight brewing behind the scenes at the House intel committee that deserves your attention. It kicked into high gear last week when ranking member Jane Harman (D-CA) released the summary of the committee's investigation into the corrupt practices of former committee member Rep. Duke Cunningham. As payback, Chairman Hoekstra (R-MI) yanked the clearances of one of the Democratic committee staffers and accused him of having leaked the Iraq NIE to the New York Times.
The accusation is one for which Hoekstra's staff now reportedly concedes the chairman has no evidence. Rep. LaHood (R-IL), who first leveled the accusation, went so far as to tell Fox News that the accusation was payback for Cunningham.
This has been kicking around for a few days. The staffer in question, Larry Hanauer, swore out an affidavit, stating that he played no role in the leak.
Then yesterday Chairman Hoekstra told the Democrats he wants to convene an investigation in which the Republicans alone choose an investigator and that investigator gets to look through the Democratic staff's phone logs, email, and review all other 'relevant' records all with a broad breach to uncover any "improper" conduct.
In other words, it's a witch hunt. You can see the Democrats' response below -- click the images for the full page.
The back story here is important. The Republicans are looking like they're going to sustain heavy losses on November 7th. One of the reasons is that the public is starting to get a clear view of the disaster they've created in Iraq and the broad sweep over corruption that pervades the entire Capitol. Hoekstra didn't like any of the Duke findings going public. He wanted Harman to agree to keep it secret. But she wouldn't. And there wasn't any legitimate reason why it shouldn't be made public. This is payback.
Most of what is happening to the Republicans right now is happening because too many facts -- about Iraq, about the corruption, and all the rest -- started to leak out. Some people wouldn't roll over anymore.
Keep an eye on this. It's a good prism into what we'll see over the next two weeks.
We will be bringing you more on this soon.
--Josh Marshall
Here's one of those questions I always wonder about.
If the Democrats have a big night on November 7th, two states where they could rack up a lot of House seats are New York and Pennsylvania.
Now, in both of those states you have Democratic gubernatorial and senate candidates who appear to be on track to score solid victories. In New York, Spitzer and Clinton look like they will crush their opponents. Perhaps getting as much two thirds of the vote. In Pennsylvania the margins won't be that great. But it looks like Casey and Rendell will win solidly.
So as we look at the polls for the individual House races how should we, or should we at all, factor in the fact that on the same day clear majorities of voters will likely vote Democratic at the top of the ticket.
Thoughts?
Late Update: Now that I think about it, I should have included Ohio in the tally. The senate race is still a going concern, though there's a poll out today that has a twenty point spread. But the governor's race looks like another blowout. And there are several House seats up for grabs.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader JT ...
I have to chime in here. I’m a neurologist and I work with patients like MJF every day. Neurodegenerative illnesses like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s are not only devastating – they’re ugly to look at. Consequently, one of the biggest problems my patients face is isolation. Society does not like to see them. We especially don’t like to see it in good-looking young people like MJF. But I’m sorry folks –it’s real. Not only that, but you better get used to seeing it. While about 3 million people in this country are affected by neurodegenerative illness today, these diseases are age-related and the numbers of affected people will rise many times over in coming years as the U.S. population ages.
--Josh Marshall
What's Bob Corker's deal with Harold Ford's sex life? All Corker's ads seem to be about it. And just now when I went to Corker's website I couldn't help but notice how in the context of bashing Ford he has this Foleyesque reference to Harold as "an attractive young man."
--Josh Marshall
And while we're on the subject of counting... By our count, nine Republicans have called for Donald Rumsfeld's resignation.
--Paul Kiel
How many members of the 109th Congress are under federal investigation? Hint: you can't count them on two (or even three) hands.
--Paul Kiel
Corker Camp pushes back on Jungle Drums.
Jungle Drums today, Jungle Drums Tomorrah, Jungle Drums Forevah ...
--Josh Marshall
Another stem cell research ad.
This one by Majority Action and aimed at Rep. Don Sherwood (R-PA), the one who's running on the strangle-your-mistress platform ...
They've got it running against Sherwood, Drake (R-VA), Walsh (R-NY) and of course, how could we forget, Rep. Chris "the Count" Chocola (R-Land of Two Terms).
--Josh Marshall
Sign of the times watch. Embattled GOPer Clay Shaw is running a radio ad bragging on how well he got along with Bill Clinton.
--Josh Marshall
The anonymous source who first posted excerpts of the emails that got Foleygate rolling has been revealed -- and fired.
--Paul Kiel
I've always wondered whether Jean Schmidt (R-OH) might eventually be kicked out of the House just for being too stupid. Not likely given the general level of excellence in the body. But here's another good Schmidt story along those lines.
Schmidt's opponent Victoria Wulsin (D) just went on the air with an ad lambasting Schmidt's notorious statement from the House floor where she called congressman and Marine corps veteran John Murtha a coward. Didn't go over that well, if you remember. And after making up a few lies about it, Schmidt had to apologize.
Apparently the ad has the Schmidt camp worried. So they hit back hard by pointing out that the ad breaks House Rule V, which prohibits recordings of House proceedings from being used in political advertisements. "Her continued violation will land her in serious trouble with the House Ethics Committee," barked Schmidt spokesman Matt Perin.
Only, as the Wulsin camp pointed out, House Rules don't apply to people who aren't members of the House.
Doh!
Back to the drawing board for Schmidt.
--Josh Marshall
So let's see. John Kerry has ponied up $500,000. What about Evan Bayh? He's sitting on a ton of cash. Have we heard from him yet?
It's hard to imagine any Democrat taking a presidential contender seriously next year when they left the whole team hanging at the clutch moment.
Thoughts?
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader PK checks in from Rhode Island ...
For the last week or so, Republican Senator Linc Chafee has been trying to turn the tide of his race by attacking Democrat opponent Sheldon Whitehouse as being soft on public corruption during his tenure as US Attorney and the state's Attorney General.It hasn't really been sticking, so yesterday, Chafee went for the Hail Mary. He held a press conference in front of the business owned by Antonio Freitas, the guy who wore a wire and worked undercover for the feds in 1998, eventually helping to bring down corrupt Providence Mayor Buddy Cianci. Chafee tried to paint Whitehouse as a crony of Cianci, saying that Freitas had told the feds not to let Whitehouse know he was working for them to get Cianci because Freitas didn't trust Whitehouse not to give him up.
Freitas went on to hold his own impromptu presser, peddling a tale about an unnamed "informant" in the Mayor's office who told Freitas that in 2001, Whitehouse had cut a deal with Cianci to send Freitas to jail in exchange for having Cianci appoint one of Whitehouse's pals as the new Chief of Police in Providence.
The problem with all of this is that Freitas has a bit of an axe to grind with Whitehouse. Freitas was convicted of domestic abuse on two separate occasions when Whitehouse was AG. In 2000, Freitas pleaded no contest to domestic assault after being charged with hitting his wife. In 2001, Freitas was arrested again for hitting his girlfriend. The arrest violated his probation and he was sentenced to four months in prison.
Here's the story.
Whitehouse came back strong in response, holding his own press conference in the afternoon, denouncing Freitas' statements as "utter nonsense" and blasting Chafee for standing with a repeat batterer and trying to minize his crimes in an effort to bolster his campaign.
This is going to hurt Chafee, who really looks like he's climbing into the gutter and hoping to toss enough dirt around to save his campaign. Whitehouse has run a series of very effective ads pushing the message that we must change the make-up of the Senate to stop Bush's policies.
Chafee's claims to be an independent voice who has voted against Bush are looking mighty hollow in light of the $500,000 the RNC dumped into his recent primary to help him win that tough contest. And Whitehouse has effectively reminded people of that through his ads.
For those who voted for Chafee because of his "good guy" demeanor, which I believe was an important factor in the support he received from independent voters, this latest attack is going to do more harm than good.
Have on an on-the-ground update from your neck of the woods? Let us know.
--Josh Marshall
What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas -- if you can afford the hush money? That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Justin Rood
TPM Reader HL also isn't crazy about Rush ...
I found the post-apology "Okay-he-wasn't-faking-it-but-he's-exploiting-his-medical condition" even more insulting to people with Parkinson's--and more dangerous--than his original faking conjecture. The faking suggestion (besides displaying ignorance, willful or not) merely insulted Michael J. Fox, not everyone with Parkinson's. The claim of exploitation is an attempt to shut up people with Parkinson's: anyone else can express their opinion about stem cell research, but if a person afflicted with Parkinson's shows their face in public to do the same, s/he's a shameless exploiter. According to Limbaugh's logic, the actual sufferers should just hide in their rooms and not freak us out with their unsightly condition. Do you see what I mean?
Yeah, I do. The man's a blight. As I said below, making fun of people suffering from a debilitating disease would send most folks into a career crisis. As TPM Reader DC says, "He's vile; a real pig and a terrible terrible commentary on the state of our national life."
--Josh Marshall
Kerry and Kennedy do the right thing ...
Senators Edward Kennedy and John Kerry are tapping their sizable campaign warchests in an effort to elect a Democratic Congress.The Massachusetts Democrats donated 500-thousand dollars apiece, half to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and half to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
I would have liked to have seen a million a piece. But that ain't bad.
And another point is important to make. Kerry has taken a lot of grief because he's sitting on a big pile of money and he's a very high-profile person in the Democratic party. But there a whole lot more money out there in campaign warchests of folks who aren't in anything like a serious campaign. So who else is going to put money on the table? We're under two weeks to go before the election and in only a few more days it'll be too late. Late money goes for ads. And the day before the election is just too late. So who will match Kerry and Kennedy?
--Josh Marshall
In an otherwise solid run-down of the Republicans' Jungle Fever campaign against Harold Ford, Robin Toner has this passage ...
The furor puts Mr. Mehlman in a difficult position. He has spent considerable time as the national chairman preaching the inclusiveness of the Republican Party and its openness to black candidates and black voters. He said in an interview Wednesday night that he did not believe that this would damage his Republican outreach efforts.Officials with the Republican independent expenditure committee, who include longtime allies of the Bush political circle, did not respond to requests for comment.
Please. It's not a difficult position, just a revealing one.
Like many in his position, on this issue Mehlman is a hypocrite and a liar. I doubt whether he has any strong racist dispositions himself on a personal level. It's just a tool he uses.
Again, let's be honest with ourselves. Racism is one of the key building blocks of Republican politics in the United States. Don't look at me with a straight face and tell me you don't realize that's true. That doesn't mean that all Republicans are racists. Far from it. It doesn't mean that a lot of Republicans don't wish the stain wasn't part of their party's recent political heritage. They do. But racism and race-baiting is the hold card Republicans take into every election. When times are good, guys like Mehlman 'reach out' to blacks and Latinos to try to take the edge off their opposition to the Republican officeholders. But when things get rough the card gets played. And pretty much every time.
This isn't surprising. It's expected.
For years on this site I've been saying that Democrats need to learn the meta-message behind Republican attack ads, especially on issues like terrorism and national security. Begging the refs to throw a flag in response to a vicious ad only telegraphs the message of weakness that was the aim of the attack in the first place. And in recent days not a few of you have written in to say, 'Josh, you always say Dems should not complain but hit back. So why are you turning the sites over to complaining full time about the Tennessee ads against Ford?'
It's a good question. And there's certainly a tension there, if not an outright contradiction. But here's my response.
I see the two cases as fundamentally dissimilar. When it comes to GOP race-baiting, calling them out, revealing them for who they are and what is they do, is fighting back. It's that simple. The dynamics of the issues are fundamentally different.
There are different visions in this country. There's one which for all its faults and shortcomings aspires to a national unity that transcends our many differences of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, etc. and an equal share of dignity for all of us. Then there's the school of division and demonization. (Take a look at the ads GOP campaigns are running across the country. The issue of the day is keeping out the Mexicans.) That's the Ken Mehlman school, the tradition of Willie Horton ads and Jungle Music pasted over Harold Ford because these guys are afraid they may be about to lose an open seat in Tennessee, where they haven't sent a Democrat to the senate for almost two decades. It must be a reality that Mehlman appreciates with some measure of inner tension or conflict since gays have been the whipping boys of choice through much of the Bush years even as he himself has been, successively, White House political director, Bush Campaign Manager and head of the RNC. But then we all make our beds.
The point is that as vile as this race-hucksterism is, for my part I welcome the opportunity that Republican desperation provides, to show these guys for who they really are. Scratch the surface of 'outreach' Mehlman and he's a Southern strategy man after all. So, fine, bring it on. Cut away the veil and the mask. Let everyone come out from under their rock and be who they really are.
Let them lose their majorities and their souls.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader VC on Rush ...
I think that the Rush Limbaugh video clip where he is mocking Michael J Fox's movements in the recent video ad that Fox made, is the most despicable and disgusting political commentary I've ever seen.My mom had Parkinsonism for the last twenty years of her life, and most of those years lived with my husband and me. We watched her slow disintegration from the illness, and saw daily the various tremors and uncontrollable movement which was caused both by the disease and as a side effect of the Parkinson drugs.
Actually Michael J Fox was exhibiting very minimal to moderate symptoms in his ad; the fact is that this illness and the drugs can cause much more spastic and jerky movement than one sees in this ad. At times it got so bad that my mom couldn't even keep her body sitting in a chair; she would virtually explode off the seat and then have a very difficult time sitting back down because her muscles were virtually in spasm.
For Rush Limbaugh (who I'm sure has never been troubled personally with this dreadful illness) to decide that this was "exaggerated, and totally an act" is beyond arrogance. It is a cruel and unspeakably hateful thing he has done not only to Michael J Fox, a heroic and beloved public figure, but to all the thousands of people who suffer with this disease. I think his punishment should be not only the loss of his radio show (I can't believe anyone would listen to him on any subject after this) but that he should have to spend some time in a hospital ward that has Parkinson patients. He might learn something about the illness, and perhaps acquire a little humility along the way.
The comments, painfully, speak for themselves. The guy's beneath contempt and shows a lot about what his movement has become. We have no Joseph Welches.
--Josh Marshall
Demonstration effect (from the Post) ...
Horror at the bloodshed accompanying the U.S. effort to bring democracy to Iraq has accomplished what human rights activists, analysts and others say Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had been unable to do by himself: silence public demands for democratic reforms here.The idea of the government as a bulwark of stability and security has long been the watchword of Syrian bureaucrats and village elders. But since Iraq's descent into sectarian and ethnic war -- and after Israel's war with Hezbollah in Lebanon, on the other side of Syria -- even Syrian activists concede that the country's feeble rights movement is moribund.
Advocates of democracy are equated now with supporters of America, even "traitors," said Maan Abdul Salam, 36, a Damascus publisher who has coordinated conferences on women's rights and similar topics.
Heckuva job.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader JS ...
Have you seen the video of Limbaugh talking about Fox on his show? Scarborough played it over and over and over again this evening, and it's absolutely grotesque because as he's talking, Limbaugh is jerkily
waving his arms and head around and mocking -- yes, mocking -- Fox's jerky Parkinson movements for all he's worth.I think it may be the most repellent piece of political video I've ever seen. If that gets a little more play, I'd say both Limbaugh and Talent are toast.
Haven't seen it. Someone must have Youtubed though. Anybody have a link?
Late Update: Ask and ye shall receive ... Crooks & Liars has up the Limbaugh tape. He has it from Olberman, there's a minute or so of lead-in. But it's worth it.
--Josh Marshall
I'm not sure how much or if it'll get much play. But there was a great passage in the president's press conference today where he basically speaks on behalf of posterity and speculates about how future generations might look back and wonder how the American people could have been so shortsighted as to ditch President Bush's policies ....
I know it's incumbent upon our government and others who enjoy the blessings of liberty to help those moderates succeed because, otherwise, we're looking at the potential of this kind of world: a world in which radical forms of Islam compete for power; a world in which moderate governments get toppled by people willing to murder the innocent; a world in which oil reserves are controlled by radicals in order to extract blackmail from the West; a world in which Iran has a nuclear weapon. And if that were to occur, people would look back at this day and age and say, what happened to those people in 2006? How come they couldn't see the threat to a future generation of people?
Let's be candid. Go ten, twenty, fifty years, whatever into the future. Which is more likely, that our descendents will marvel at the folly of our adventure in Iraq or marvel that the American people were too impatient to give his policies a chance?
George Bush, a man before his time?
Think about it.
--Josh Marshall
Some days I really have to sit back and marvel at the moral chokehold the big right wing media players have over the mainstream media. Take the Limbaugh episode.
This character goes on the radio and cracks jokes about a man suffering from Parkinsons disease. Says he's faking his symptoms. Playing for the camera. It's right up there with your better jokes about, say, breast cancer or other knee-slappers like pediatric oncology.
In any other context this would be treated as a fatal breach of decency and taste. But he gets respectful coverage in papers like the Post (at least till someone there got wise and yanked the story). And in general the whole imbroglio is treated as Fox and his supposed symptoms and the Limbaugh backlash. And also, hey, Limbaugh said he was sorry for making fun of Fox's condition and now only says he's shamelessly exploiting his medical condition.
All the big names are afraid of him. He'll probably be back on Meet the Press before the end of the year.
--Josh Marshall
Rich Lowry: I dig those race-baiting political ads. But, hey, that's just me.
--Josh Marshall
From floozies to falsehoods at the RNC...
The Republican National Committee has a new ad ready to go in place of that bimbo eruption spot attacking Dem Harold Ford, Jr., which the RNC's finally taking off the air today. The new ad says Ford took gobs of cash from porn moguls and tried to foist abortion pills on kids.
But uh-oh -- now two Tennessee TV stations are refusing to run the new spot if the RNC doesn't cough up some more, you know, actual documentation of its claims.
--Greg Sargent
So Tennessee senate candidate Bob Corker (R) says he's all bent out of shape about that RNC 'Harold Ford's an Uppity Negro' ad. So how does Corker feel about the radio ad his own campaign is running that features rumbling jungle drums every time the narrator mentions Ford's name?
--Josh Marshall
Rep. Porter (R-NV) won't release the phone logs and scheduling records he says will disprove charges he made illegal campaign fundraising calls.
--Josh Marshall
The naysayers didn't believe me, but I said a while ago that trying to strangle your mistress just doesn't play well politically.
Keystone poll: Carney (D) 50%, Sherwood (R) 38%.
--Josh Marshall
Here's the DNC's new ad on Bush and Iraq.
Maybe some incumbents sitting on millions of dollars could pony up some cash to help them run it.
Tell us what you think of it.
Late Update: My take is that it's solid. A really good ad. My only small beef is that the text-overs are a bit too heavy-handed, would be stronger with less hand-holding for the views. But the material speaks for itself.
--Josh Marshall
Look at this headline and article from CNN. The headline is "Michael J. Fox ads for Democrats spark backlash."
The article, though, tells a different story. The article reports the existence of the ads, follows with Limbaugh's criticisms, then quotes doctors saying that Rush is completely full of it. Then the piece goes on to discuss why the ad is powerful and a bit more about Fox's career since going into semi-retirement because of his illness.
The article, which is from the AP, completely belies the message of the headline.
--Josh Marshall
Bush: It's either stay the course or cut and run. But cut and paste might be a third option.
--Josh Marshall
President Bush: "Reconciliation is difficult in a country that has been tortured and divided by a tyrant."
He ain't kiddin'.
--Josh Marshall
Good news about that field staffer from the Tester campaign. Reportedly, he contracted some illness "while working for the Peace Corps in Africa [that] makes him become disoriented." One way or another, he appears to be ill but on the mend. If only every person missing for four days story ended so well.
--Josh Marshall
Gotta love the subtext of President Bush's excuse-making on 'the war'. Every earlier war was easy. Only mine is really tough. Gimme a break.
--Josh Marshall
Bush 8.4, this morning: Stay the Course on Goals, Cut and Run on Methods.
--Josh Marshall
Turns out Bob Corker's ads against Harold Ford are pretty similar to that 'independent expenditure' ad that knocks Ford for diddling white chicks. Mark Schmitt brings us more.
--Josh Marshall
The staffer strikes back: In an admittedly partisan gambit, last week the Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee booted a Democratic staffer, claiming he may have played a role in leaking classified information. Now, the staffer is going public -- and it sounds like he can make a good case for himself. That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Justin Rood
LATimes/Bloomberg polls out on five key senate races.
Ohio: Brown (D) 47%, DeWine (R) 39%.
New Jersey: Menendez (D) 45%, Kean (R) 41%.
Virginia: Webb (D) 47%, Allen (R) 44%.
Missouri: Talent (R) 48%, McCaskill (D) 45%.
Tennesee: Corker (R) 49%, Ford (D) 44%.
The Ohio race is pretty stable and clearly in Brown's favor. I'd rather have seen another poll of Montana.
--Josh Marshall
Hmmm. Not looking too good for Rep. Rick Renzi (R-AZ). Just a short while ago we alerted you to the AP story breaking the news that Renzi is the subject of a federal investigation centering on a shady land deal. We'd been working on that story too. And a short time after the AP story broke, TPMmuckraker.com followed up with more details we have about the transaction and the subsequent investigation.
Because of that we weren't surprised to see the New York Times following on these stories with their own piece about the Renzi probe.
But I got 
a bit more surprised when I read the Times piece by David Johnston and realized that they were reporting an investigation into what appears to be an entirely separate bad act. This one's about an investigation into a piece of legislation Renzi introduced to help what the Times calls a telecom company that happens to employ his Renzi's father.
Also of interest, I just talked to TPMmuckraker's Justin Rood who says the company in question is an intel contractor that apparently had ties to Mitch Wade's MZM. So if you're still looking for the grand unified theory of GOP corruption, hey, the night's still young.
--Josh Marshall
Harold Ford's got a response ad to the Corker/RNC/Mehlman 'Ford's an Uppity Negro' spot ...
Take a look. Not bad.
--Josh Marshall
Okay, finding a pol who had an illegal alien as a nanny hardly makes the front page these days. But not that many made their nannies hide in the basement to make sure no one found out they had an illegal working in the home. Let's thank Rep. Jim Gibbons (R-NV), who's now running for governor, for raising the bar.
--Josh Marshall
More details into the land dealings of Rep. Rick Renzi (R-AZ), which are now the subject of a federal probe.
It seems that when Arizona land companies looking to arrange land swaps with the federal government went to Renzi for help, he kept hitting them up to include in their deals an unrelated parcel owned by one of his key financial backers and business associates.
--Josh Marshall
Okay, looks like the AP was the first to get confirmation on federal investigation into shady land deals by Rep. Rick Renzi (R-AZ). TPMmuckraker and seveal other news organizations have been in the hunt on this one since late last week. We're going to follow up shortly with more information to add to the story.
So many GOP congressmen under federal investigation.
So little time.
Renzi's lawyer told the AP Renzi wasn't aware of any federal investigation. With what we've heard I find that very difficult to believe. Heck, we've been putting in calls to his office about the investigation since Friday. Heck, if he'd have called us back we could have filled him in on the whole thing.
--Josh Marshall
Hmmm. What happened here?
We've been getting emails this afternoon about a piece in the Post by Daniela Deane about the Michael J. Fox/Rush Limbaugh imbroglio. I didn't get a chance to read it. But readers have said they thought it took Limbaugh's claim (that Fox was somehow faking or exaggerating his symptoms in his TV spot) too much at face value.
As of 8:30 PM the link is still on the front page with the byline Daniela Deane and Bill Brubaker. But when you click through the link it's to an article on the same topic by David Montgomery. And the tone seems really different than that described of the Deane article.
Anybody know what's up with that? Could be nothing more than slotting out one article for an updated one. But I'm curious. Anyone know anything?
Late Update: Here's what TPM Reader TT says ...
One thing on that Michael J. Fox article. In the earlier Daniela Deane article, they said they tried to contact spokespeople for Fox but hadn't been able to yet. It sounds like they finally did, and also heard from a source who'd seen him on Boston Legal (that wasn't in the original article either).The basic structure of the two articles is the same.
Even Later Update: My friend Jon Cohn seemed to manage a bit better than the Post.
Really, Really Late Update: Here's what appears to be the text of the original Post story. If this is a faithful copy, you can see why the editors sent it down the memory hole. What were they thinking?
--Josh Marshall
Ahhh, CNN. Frontpage Headline: " One of FBI's 'Most Wanted Terrorists' confirmed dead."
And then "An al Qaeda operative wanted in connection with the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings was killed in April in Pakistan, American officials have confirmed."
Hmmm. Guy involved in the embassy bombings killed in April. And it's October. Okay.
--Josh Marshall
Worrisome, ominous. From the Great Falls Tribune ...
A field director for Jon Tester's U.S. Senate campaign in Butte and Anaconda has been reported missing after failing to meet with volunteers on Saturday in Butte.Robert Hollister Reneau, 26, was last seen in Anaconda Saturday afternoon by volunteers he was supervising. The group decided to meet for dinner in Butte, but Reneau didn't show up.
--Josh Marshall
Your faith in goverment restored!
Turns out the House Intel Committee's scanner was only down for two months, not five.
--Paul Kiel
Some TPM Readers give their verdict on Ken Mehlman's novel campaign finance law interpretation ...
Anonymous TPM Reader A ...
I’m somewhat of an election law expert, although I have not worked specifically on the regs dealing with independent expenditures. But it seems to me that Mehlman’s claim he cannot control the IEs of the RNC is just false. First, remember that the “independent” in IEs is independent *of the candidate*. That is what the FEC’s firewall guidance is supposed to protect. Now Mehlman may be somehow involved in coordinated expenditures with candidates, and he is almost certainly in communication with candidates and their campaigns on a regular basis. So he may be steering clear of discussing information that comes from candidates (“plans, projects, activities or needs”) with the IE operation of the RNC. But it’s a huge leap from that to say that he as the head of the party running the ads can’t instruct the IE operation to take an ad down. If he does that, he’s acting on behalf of the RNC, and he is not communicating material information from the candidate to the IE operation. It’s one thing for a candidate to claim he has no control over a party’s ads. It’s quite another for the head of the party to make that claim. Please.
Anonymous TPM Reader B ...
I'm no lawyer, but reading through the page you linked to, it strikes me that firewalls are supposed to prevent coordinated expenditures. No one is asking Mehlman to spend money on behalf of Corker, or to dictate how that funds are spent - we're asking him to dictate how it is *not* to be spent. That sounds semantic, but I think it cuts to the heart of the matter. The law is designed to prevent the RNC from coordinating with candidates on how money gets spent, but I can't imagine that it was intended to strip organizations of the ability to set and enforce reasonable guidelines as to how their fund are not to be spent. (A thought experiment: A rogue operative puts up an RNC-funded ad that actually supports the Democratic candidate. Are we to believe the RNC couldn't cancel it?)But perhaps the real problem is that Mehlman is trying to have it both ways. He should pull the ad. But if the law really prevents him from stopping the ad, then he ought to be free to publicly condemn it, because his remarks carry no effective weight. It's a simple choice, but Mehlman's trying to weasel out of making it.
And finally TPM Reader MS ...
The firewall excuse is a legal red herring. It makes no sense for a law to prohibit the chairperson of a party to not do something. Our entire system of law is built around someone having a duty, breaching that duty, and in the process harming an innocent party. If this were a civil case and the Democrats were suing for damages because of the ad, Mehlman seems to suggest that his defense would be that he had a duty to not collaborate, because breach of that duty would harm an innocent party, in this case, the opposing Democratic candidate. But how exactly is the Democratic candidate harmed by not running the ad? He isn't. If Mehlman steps in and bars the ad from airing, he is, in a way, helping the opposition. And I guarantee that the firewall law wasn't designed to stop the RNC from helping the DNC. Mehlman can probably hide behind this law long enough to get past Nov. 7, but he's on shaky legal territory in a more theoretical sense.
Finally, at TPM Election Central, Greg Sargent interviewed Public Campaign's David Donnelly for his view of Mehlman's excuse.
--Josh Marshall
Let's discuss a bit more about the RNC bimbo ad Ken Mehlman is running down in Tennessee.
If you watch the ad closely it is clear that the racist appeal -- about Harold Ford having sex with white women -- is the centerpiece, the entire point of the ad.
Here's how you know.
The ad has a number of faux man on the street interviews. Each is a spoof based on GOP policy talking points. So for instance, a hunter is interviewed and he says "Ford's right. I do have too many guns." An older guy says "When I die, Harold Ford will let me pay taxes again."
Not my cup of tea as far as humor goes. And I'd be surprised if Harold Ford is a big gun control man. But pretty standard fair for 'funny' political ads. And each addressed to a question of public policy.
But then you see that one 'man on the street interview' isn't quite like the rest. It's almost like those old Sesame Street segments, one of these things is not like the other.
It's the one spot with the platimum blonde with no visible clothes on, vamping "I met Harold at the Playboy Party."
What policy issue is she talking about? It's not connected to anything. It's just, 'I'm a loose white woman. I hooked up with Harold at the Playboy mansion. And I can't wait for him to do me again.'
Once you watch the ad again after realizing that, it sticks out like a sore thumb. What becomes clear is that the funny man on the street interview clips are padding, filler meant to make the 'Harold does white chicks' blurb appear to fit into a larger whole, just one of a number of 'man on the street' clips.
Mehlman says he doesn't think race is an issue in the ad. But face it, the entire ad was built around this one hot button racist appeal. It's not even close.
Late Update: And one other point, after watching the entire Russert-Mehlman segment now posted at Crooks & Liars, I think Russert handled Mehlman's bamboozlement better than I originally thought. Mehlman's argument is really weak. But it seems possible he was hanging his argument on a technical truth -- about which we'll say more later. And Russert came back at him several times on the issue of the ad's transparently racist content. We're still trying to get to the bottom of the regs. So we'll update as we go.
--Josh Marshall
Crooks & Liars has up the video of Ken Mehlman on the Harold Ford 'bimbo' ad. Take a look.
--Josh Marshall
Okay, more on Mehlman.
It seems what Ken Mehlman is likely referring to is the existence of 'firewalls' within the RNC in which one group or shop within the committee is running the ads and he's not supposed to involve himself in those decisions. Here's a page about how these firewalls work.
But I doubt very much that Mehlman is prohibited from saying, when asked, whether a public ad should be pulled down.
If you're an election law expert, drop us a line and tell us what you know.
--Josh Marshall
Ken Mehlman, against racist appeals before he was for them.
Mehlman, July 14th, 2005: "Some Republicans gave up on winning the African American vote, looking the other way or trying to benefit politically from racial polarization. I am here today as the Republican chairman to tell you we were wrong."
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader TB saw the Russert interview with Ken Mehlman too ...
I saw Tim Russert interview Ken Mehlman. Russert has zero credibility in my mind because he, time and time again, will let the Republicans get away with one outrageous lie and ridiculous statement after another and often turn tougher with Democrats. Why is no one calling Russert out for what he is: minimally, a complete pushover (I’ve fought the urge to use a more accurate, less flattering term here), but more likely, a well-disguised shill for the Republican party?
Shillitude is in the eye of the beholder. But Mehlman said what I think was pretty clearly a demonstrably false, ludicrous statement. Why not call him on it?
In case you don't know what we're talking about, see the post below.
--Josh Marshall
"Simply staying the course in Iraq is not working. We need to take a new direction. We believe these recommendations comprise an effective alternative to the current open-ended commitment which is not producing the progress in Iraq we would all like to see. Thank you for your careful consideration of these suggestions."
That's Nancy Pelosi and the House Democratic leadership laying out in July what appears to be the Bush Republican position in October.
(ed.note: Special note of thanks to TPM Reader PH.)
--Josh Marshall
Is Ken Mehlman kidding?
A short while ago we got this email from TPM Reader AJ ...
I was just watching Tim Russert interview Ken Mehlman about the RNC's anti-Ford ad running in Tennessee. Russert asked him point blank if he would pull the ad given the outcry over racist overtones. He said it was an independent expenditure, so he wrote a check and that was it. He claimed to have no control over the content and no power to pull it. If that's really true, why does the legalese at the end of the ad state: "The Republican National Committee is responsible for the content of this advertisement. Paid for by the Republican National Committee and not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee. www.gop.com"? Wouldn't the legalese imply that Ken Mehlman has the power to pull the ad? If not, then how would anyone ever find out who bears responsibility? Just wondering how this really works.
We had just been trying to confirm Mehlman's statement with NBC, which we haven't been able to do yet directly. But The Hotline just did a post which appears to confirm the key line. That is, when Mehlman says, "I don't have the authority to take it down or put it up. It's called an independent expenditure."
The ad, in case you aren't familiar with it, is a cartoonish spot which might be subtitled, 'Harold Ford is an uppity negro who does the wild thing with white women.' You can see it here.
But back to the issue of the ad. The ad is run by the RNC. Ken Mehlman is chairman of the RNC. He doesn't have the authority to take the ad down? What's he talking about? What exactly does it mean when the blurb at the end says "The Republican National Committee is responsible for the content of this advertisement. Paid for by the Republican National Committee."
We'll see if we can get a comment from Mehlman about whatever the heck it is he's talking about.
--Josh Marshall
Ladies and gentlemen, your United States Congress.
Why didn't members of the House Intelligence Committee see that crucial National Intelligence Estimate on global terrorism for several months? Because there was a problem scanning the document in.
And it's pretty clear that no member of the committee would have ever seen it if The New York Times hadn't come knocking.
--Paul Kiel
Just to bring home that this is the sort of election where no seat is safe, an internal poll by Rep. Ralph Hall's (R-TX) Democratic challenger shows him within striking distance.
Will Hall survive another term? What of all the teenage victims of sex trafficking whose accounts will go unchallenged?
--Paul Kiel
He even fooled Laura?
Laura Bush, when asked on the Today Show (9/18/06) what she tells people when asked about Iraq: "Well, I say the--exactly what the president says, that we need to stay the course."
The wife really is always the last to know.
--Josh Marshall
Hastert before the Ethics Committee? We're getting reports he just snuck over to the committee meeting room. Does this mean he'll have to submit to questions from his toady Rep. "Doc" Hastings (R-WA)?
--Josh Marshall
Last night we told you how Wyoming Rep. Barbara Cubin (R) threatened to slap Thomas Rankin, the wheelchair-bound Libertarian candidate running against her this year. Rankin says Cubin's comment amounted to a "a slur related to his phyiscal disability" (MS).
Now Rankin is saying Cubin should resign. “She is not the type of person Wyoming residents want representing them."
(ed.note: An earlier version of this post incorrectly stated that Rankin had accused Cubin of uttering a slur in addition to the slap comment. In fact, the former was Rankin's way of referring to the latter incident. Thanks to TPM Reader TB for catching my error.)
--Josh Marshall
Ahhh, right on time. The first Nancy Pelosi Barney Frank radical homosexual agenda radio spot from a House Republican nearing forced retirement.
--Josh Marshall
Wow. The senate is really down to the wire. A raft of new Mason-Dixon polls just came out. Corker (R) over Ford (D) by two, Tester (D) over Burns (R) by 3, McCaskill (D) over Talent (R) by three. See them all here.
--Josh Marshall
Majority Leader Boehner (R-OH) says no, the president's wrong. It's one or the other ...
"Look, you have got one of two options. We can pull out, walk away and watch everything that we've worked for and the Iraqis worked for fall apart and watch pure civil war break out, or we can stay the course. . . . As difficult as the problems are on the ground, it is either one of two options."
Dohh! That was from July.
Sorry.
--Josh Marshall
You remember Peter Roskam, the GOP candidate in Illinois' sixth. He recently earned national headlines for suggesting that Dem opponent Tammy Duckworth, the Iraq veteran who lost both her legs in Iraq and opposes the war, wanted to "cut and run" from Iraq.
Now Roskam has brought a high-profile proxy into the district to do the attacking for him, and the Roskam surrogate accuses Duckworth of advocating "retreat."
--Greg Sargent
California Republican caught red-handed in voter suppression scheme. And boy, is his lawyer making a valiant effort to spin his way out.
--Paul Kiel
Facing a federal investigation, a Senate appropriations "cardinal" ponders a day without earmarks. That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Justin Rood
Uh-oh (just off the AP wire)...
Thomas Rankin, the Libertarian running for Wyoming's lone U.S. House seat, said Rep. Barbara Cubin, R-Wyo., threatened to slap him after a televised debate.During a debate Sunday that also included Democrat Gary Trauner, Cubin and Rankin had a testy exchange over campaign contributions Cubin received from former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas.
Rankin, who has multiple sclerosis and uses an electric wheelchair, said Monday night in a telephone interview with The Associated Press that the confrontation occurred immediately after the debate.
"My aide and I were packing up to leave the debate, and Barbara walked over to me and said, 'If you weren't sitting in that chair, I'd slap you across the face.' That's quote-unquote," Rankin said.
It's not easy being corrupt. But the pressure does seem to be getting to them.
Here's Barbara's campaign website.
--Josh Marshall
So, while Democrats look poised to take back at least one house of Congress, we all know that this is in spite of the fact that they're relying on opposition to President Bush rather than on putting forward a positive program of their own, right?
Please.
Seldom has Washington conventional wisdom been a more obedient handmaiden to historical illiteracy.
Let's say this once and for all, after a deep breath and for the record: In US politics, in off-year elections with unpopular incumbents it is always that way. Always. Hear it again, always that way.
Consider a few examples: the 1946 (Truman), 1974 (Nixon) and 1994 (Clinton) mid-terms. There are a few others that come close. But these are the three big wave elections of the New Deal and post-New Deal eras. In each case, the winning party ran overwhelmingly and almost exclusively on opposition to the sitting president of the opposite party and -- in two of the three cases -- the congressional leadership.
The 1946 election came amidst post-war economic adjustments, inflation, labor unrest, rising accusations that Democrats and the Truman administration were 'soft on communism'. Republicans were itching for power after fourteen years in the wilderness and the coutnry was disenchanted. The whole election was anti-Truman, anti-New Deal, anti-Democrats.
The 1974 mid-term, the Watergate election. Speaks for itself. Anti-corruption, secrecy, anti-Imperial presidency. It was all about opposition to President Nixon.
And 1994, finally an election the great majority of us have a living memory of. A positive agenda? Please. The 1994 election was an anti-Clinton election, full-stop. Against Clinton's health care plan, which was already a dead letter, against the tax increase. Against. Against. Against. The Republicans, to their tactical credit, went to great pains to avoid putting forward any substantive agenda. The 'Contract with America' was just a campaign stunt that only really became a big deal after the election.
Remember some of these great broad vision planks from the Contract.
#6 "No U.S. troops under U.N. command and restoration of the essential parts of our national security funding to strengthen our national defense and maintain our credibility around the world."
And who can forget #7 "Raise the Social Security earnings limit which currently forces seniors out of the work force, repeal the 1993 tax hikes on Social Security benefits and provide tax incentives for private long-term care insurance to let Older Americans keep more of what they have earned over the years."
The real heart of the Contract was that it included no mention of any of the major policy positions Republicans favored. No mention of the repeal of the 1993 Clinton tax hike, no mention of health care reform, no mention of Social Security privatization. It obfuscated all the big policy issues in favor of a list of poll-tested bromides.
It was an anti-election as mid-term congressional election always are. This isn't to say that that is good or bad, simply that it is built into the structure of American politics. It's the norm.
--Josh Marshall
My God, it's a bloodbath.
No, not Iraq. That's horror, tragedy. I'm talking about the way the press is turning its hacking, slicing knives on the White House for the pitiful 'stay the course' debacle. The Times and the Post are holding a veritable northeast corridor schadenfreudethon.
Say Ruttenberg and Cloud: "The White House said Monday that President Bush was no longer using the phrase “stay the course” when speaking about the Iraq war, in a new effort to emphasize flexibility in the face of some of the bloodiest violence there since the 2003 invasion."
Flexibility? I thought it was 'stay the course' versus 'cut and run'. One or the other. Who heard of 'flexibility'? That sounds so friggin' John Kerry.
Now let's spend a little more time with Peter Baker in the Post ...
But the White House is cutting and running from "stay the course." A phrase meant to connote steely resolve instead has become a symbol for being out of touch and rigid in the face of a war that seems to grow worse by the week, Republican strategists say. Democrats have now turned "stay the course" into an attack line in campaign commercials, and the Bush team is busy explaining that "stay the course" does not actually mean stay the course.Instead, they have been emphasizing in recent weeks how adaptable the president's Iraq policy actually is. Bush remains steadfast about remaining in Iraq, they say, but constantly shifts tactics and methods in response to an adjusting enemy. "What you have is not 'stay the course' but in fact a study in constant motion by the administration," Snow said yesterday.
Political rhetoric, of course, is often in constant motion as well. But with midterm elections two weeks away, the Bush team is searching for a formula to address public opposition to the war, struggling to appear consistent and flexible at the same time. That was underscored by the reaction to a New York Times report that the administration is drafting a timetable for the Iraqi government to disarm militias and assume a larger security role. The White House initially called the story "inaccurate." But then White House counselor Dan Bartlett went on CNN yesterday morning to call it "a little bit overwritten" because in fact it was something the administration had been doing for months.
Struggling indeed. 'Cut and Run' lacks nuance. And after, what, 18 months of hearing how timetables will embolden the terrorists, it turns out we're giving the Iraqis timetables.
I really hope the Democrats have maybe 20 kids working the Nexis-Lexis accounts tonight digging up quotes from every hapless member of Congress the White House got to walk the plank with this nonsense last summer (if you find a good one, send it in. And for the best two or three entrants we'll send out prized TPM mugs!)
There's a lesson here amid the cackling though, one which may be grimly echoed in our own departure if the country doesn't force the president's hand and prevent his ego from being the guiding force in our policy. Strategic retreats are often the choice of wise leaders, shrewd generals. Having the clarity of vision to see the difference between the possible and the desirable can often allow you to change course early and avoid a debacle later. Here you see the White House which has banged away at 'stay the course' and 'don't question the policy' for like two years now and suddenly at the crunch point they're bailing out. Or trying to bail out -- but now they really can't. The White House political czars look like nothing so much as those panicked embassy workers and refugees on the compound rooftop clamoring to get one of the last seats on those final helicopters out of Saigon. Same amount of planning, about as much dignity.
Like I wrote earlier today, the president has run this war like a confidence game. And as you would expect, that's led to a bubble. The support is tough but brittle. Any move off the absolutes, with us or against us, stay the course vs. cut and run, and the whole thing starts to crack. Once the White House comes out for pragmatism and flexibility, that leaves them perilously close to embracing reality itself. And that, of course, is like the kryptonite of Bush's superherodom. After that, the deluge.
--Josh Marshall
Here's Denny Hastert's Chief of Staff Scott Palmer emerging from almost six and a half hours of testimony before the House Ethics Committee today. That's longer than any other witness who's thus far made the basement pilgrimage in the Foley scandal. And it makes sense, since Palmer seems to be the vortex of the leadership fibbing.
Somhow he doesn't look as happy as the other guys did.
Go figure.
--Josh Marshall
Rep. Pombo (R-CA) so confident of reelection that he's refusing to give any press interviews.
--Josh Marshall
President Bush has screwed up so much already that I understand it's sometimes a bit difficult to devote attention to what new things he might screw up in the next two years, especially if his party still controls both houses of Congress. But remember: He's put us on notice that he wants to try again to phase out Social Security next year.
He said so just today ...
And did I mention Peter Roskam in Illinois 6 still supports the Bush Social Security phase out plan? I didn't? Well, we'll get to that.
--Josh Marshall
Stephen Moore's Free Enterprise Fund: Don't Vote for Goombah Bob Menendez.
--Josh Marshall
Oh, TPM Reader TC, having fun at the president's expense ...
Isn't it interesting that now, just before the elections, Bush is choosing to cut and run from his pat phrase "stay the course?"
Bad TC, bad TC ...
--Josh Marshall
The House ethics committee investigation is plowing ahead with their investigation of the Mark Foley scandal. But there's ample reason to wonder: why should we trust these guys, anyway?
--Justin Rood
You've probably noticed that the GOP likes to proclaim that big things are at stake in this fall's election.
Dem Senator Robert Menendez's new ad offers a bold retort: Yes, big things are indeed at stake in this election, which is exactly why you should vote Democratic.
--Greg Sargent
Stay the course. We never said 'stay the course'. Our Iraq policy is stupid. No, sorry, I didn't mean that. I don't know what I was thinking. As we watch what, in the Star Trek universe, they might refer to as the 'synaptic breakdown' of the president's Iraq policy, it's worth remembering why President Bush, short of being forced kicking and screaming, will never and can never withdraw American forces from Iraq.
Fundamentally, it doesn't have to do with military strategy or ideology. It has to do with coming to grips with the monumental failure he has wrought, which of course he can never do.
Setting aside the vast costs in human life, national treasure and regional stability, I see President Bush's adventure as a failed business venture, a start-up that went bad -- an analogy that, come to think of it, he could probably relate to.
A failed company can lose money for a 
very long time before it makes money and becomes a success. It only really fails when the investors decide that the problems aren't transient but terminal. They decide to stop throwing good money after bad. And then that's it.
If we look at the matter in those icy terms, that moment of reckoning came at least two years ago, certainly before the 2004 election. By then it was depressingly clear the whole matter was never going to come to a good end. But President Bush got the country to reinvest and the country has kept on doing so since then with some factor of lives, money and time.
As long as that's the case President Bush and his supporters can keep up the increasingly ludicrous pretense that Iraq isn't a horrendous failure but simply a work in progress that hasn't been given the necessary time to work.
In fact, I think if you look back over the last two years, President Bush has been engaged in what amounts to a cynical game of chicken with his fellow Americans.
Think of the president as a failed or deadbeat entrepreneur (again, not such a stretch) who's already lost his investors a ton of money. He goes back to them and says, 'Okay, fine. You think I'm a moron and a screw-up who lost you guys a ton of money. Fine. But do you really want to finally, totally, conclusively kiss that $300 billion goodbye. You wanna just totally call it quits? Admit it's a total loss? What about giving me just another $10 billion and maybe somehow I'll actually pull this off? Or, since that's just not gonna happen, a mere $10 billion to put off for six months having to write the whole thing off as a loss, having to come to grips once and for all with the fact that all the money's gone and the whole thing's a bust?'
That's really what this is about. And I think we all know it pretty much across the political spectrum. In this way, paradoxically, the very magnitude of the president's failure has become his tacit ally. It's just such a big thing to come to grips with. And reinvesting in the president's folly, even after any hope of recouping the money is gone, carries the critical fringe benefit of sustaining our own collective and increasingly threadbare denial.
But President Bush's interests are not the same as the country's. He's maxed out, in for 100%. If Iraq is a failure, a mistake, then the same words will be written right after his name in the history books. A country, though, can take missteps and mistakes, course corrections and dead ends, and move on. We've done it before and we'll do it again.
But President Bush can't and won't withdraw from Iraq because when he does, under the current conditions, he'll sign the epitaph, the historical death warrant for his presidency. Unlike in the past there are no family friends to pawn the failure off on and let them take the loss. It's all his. So he'll keep kicking the can down the road forever.
--Josh Marshall
Rep. Ralph "She-wanted-to-do-nude-dancing" Hall (R-TX) shows how not to handle a scandal.
Update: Be sure to check out Hall's explanation for how he was just doing his part to fight the Cold War by visiting the Marianas... in 1996.
--Paul Kiel
Ah well, here's a new way of backing off a lie: "It's probably not the best way to say what he did." That's Jeffrey Black, Rep. Jim Ryun's (R-KS) campaign manager, ahem, clarifying an earlier remark by Ryun that he just had no idea that Mark Foley was his neighbor.
Turns out, of course, he did. And how could he not? Back in May, the two of them held a fundraiser together, during which donors visited both of their houses, which are across the street from one another.
Ryun, TPM readers might remember, has had a scandal-filled year. Back in March, we reported that he got a suspiciously good deal on a townhouse sold to him by the U.S. Family Network, a non-profit front group tied to Jack Abramoff. The group, in a soaring real estate market, somehow managed to lose $19,000 on the sale.
Yet another House Republican who's facing an unexpected fight this election. And no wonder.
--Paul Kiel
Over at TPMmuckraker, we got your steaming Monday morning cup of Abramoff:
-- The FBI has set Jack up with his own desk.
-- Sen. Conrad Burns (R-MT) has spent more than $90,000 in campaign funds this year on a defense lawyer.
--Paul Kiel
Whoopsie. A GOP congressman in the middle of the Foley scandal faces new charges of sexual harrassment against his office. That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Justin Rood
The race in the NV-3rd just keeps getting more interesting:
Rep. Jon Porter, R-Nev., made dozens of campaign fundraising phone calls last spring from his district and Washington, D.C., offices, according to a former Porter staffer and e-mails obtained by the Sun.The former staffer, Jim Shepard, a 10-year veteran of Capitol Hill who worked briefly for Porter this year, said he witnessed Porter making the calls on at least five different dates last spring. Such calls would violate federal election laws and House ethics rules.
Porter's top congressional aide strongly denied that the congressman made such calls.
Porter is being challenged by Democrat Tessa Hafen in a race that appears to have tightened recent days.
--David Kurtz
You haven't truly made a pop cultural impact until you start showing up on eBay.
Mark Foley, come on down! You have achieved eBay status.
Looks like the Mark Foley action figure is drawing some bids.
Thanks to TPM Reader TS for the tip.
--David Kurtz
Katrina has become a post-apocalyptic American nightmare for those living in the disaster zone, or dying there, or neither living nor dying but stumbling through the carnage like zombies.
Chris Rose is a columnist for the New Orleans Times-Picayune. His columns since Katrina and the ensuing flood of New Orleans have been an unblinking look at what passes for life in the Crescent City. At times angry, bitter, and despondent, yet still mustering occassional hopefulness, Rose, through his column, has been a lifeline for those who want to know what is really happening in the city beyond the narrow frame of TV cameras.
The personal toll on those covering the storm and its aftermath has been too little documented. The Times-Pic, whose main office was flooded in the storm, forcing its temporary evacuation, has faced challenges that no modern American newspaper has ever endured. A few weeks ago, one its photographers attempted suicide by cop. Fortunately for all involved, he was well-known and respected by the police, and they showed a level of restraint that was heroic, even as he tried to provoke them into killing him by using his car as a weapon.
Today, Chris Rose has a column that describes in agonizing detail his own descent into depression last fall as the days after the storm turned to weeks and months. Like most of us would, he resisted entreaties from his family and co-workers to get help. He went a year without treatment, 360 straight days of crying. It is, as such things are, a very personal tale. One man. One family. One city.
It breaks your heart. But it also makes me mad as hell. Mad that this slow-motion disaster of broken levees and shattered lives happened in the first place. Mad that the disaster is still happening, a feckless governmental response dragging out the misery and the suffering just as if the fetid water were still pouring through the levee breaches. Mad that in the face of this overwhelming catastrophe at home we are spending by some estimates $246 million a day to create a catastrophe in Iraq. Mad that in light of all of this ineptitude and indifference the party in power has a chance, a very real chance, of retaining some or even all of its power in the first national election since Katrina.
But Chris Rose did not intend for his column today to be a springboard to a political rant. It is just his personal story. You ought to go read it.
--David Kurtz
This guy better get his resume polished up:
A senior U.S. State Department diplomat told Arab satellite network Al Jazeera that there is a strong possibility history will show the United States displayed "arrogance" and "stupidity" in its handling of the Iraq war.Alberto Fernandez, director of the Office of Press and Public Diplomacy in the Bureau of Near East Affairs, made his comments on Saturday to the Qatar-based network.
"History will decide what role the United States played," he told Al Jazeera in Arabic, based on CNN translations. "And God willing, we tried to do our best in Iraq."
"But I think there is a big possibility ... for extreme criticism and because undoubtedly there was arrogance and stupidity from the United States in Iraq," the diplomat told Al Jazeera. . . .
"I can only assume his remarks must have been mistranslated. Those comments obviously don't reflect our policy," a senior Bush administration official said.
Fernandez told CNN that he was "not dissing U.S. policy."
"I know what the policy is and what the red lines are, and nothing I said hasn't been said before by senior officials."
Poor guy. He mistook recent Administration softening of its denials that there is a problem with Iraq as a sign of an American glasnost. What equivalent of Siberia will he be sent to on his next diplomatic posting?
--David Kurtz
The LA Times has a lengthy piece on the use of No Child Left Behind Act funds to buy educational programs from presidential brother Neil Bush's company Ignite!:
Most of Ignite's business has been obtained through sole-source contracts without competitive bidding. Neil Bush has been directly involved in marketing the product.In addition to federal or state funds, foundations and corporations have helped buy Ignite products. The Washington Times Foundation, backed by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, head of the South Korea-based Unification Church, has peppered classrooms throughout Virginia with Ignite's COWs under a $1-million grant.
Oil companies and Middle East interests with long political ties to the Bush family have made similar bequests. Aramco Services Co., an arm of the Saudi-owned oil company, has donated COWs to schools, as have Apache Corp., BP and Shell Oil Co.
Neil Bush said he is a businessman who does not attempt to exert political influence, and he called The Times' inquiries about his venture — made just before the election — "entirely political."
Earlier this year, a TPM reader offered a first-person account of the Neil Bush sales pitch.
--David Kurtz
For TPM readers who enjoy an occasional dose of snark, TPM's Election Central offers "Midterm Roundup," a daily early morning jolt of political caffeine. It's as frothy as steamed milk, as referential as Dennis Miller, and speaks of itself in the third person as often as a pro athlete. Today, Midterm Roundup makes a special weekend appearance.
--David Kurtz
