New Hampshire’s own little election scandal is heating up, and it’s not looking good for the GOP.
A quick recap: back on election day of 2002, a telemarketing group hired by James Tobin, regional director of the Republican National Senate Committee repeatedly called up the Democratic phone lines, jamming them and preventing them from calling out or arranging rides for voters. Several officials have been convicted and sentenced, and now Tobin’s trial is going on.
Tobin’s lawyers now want to make sure that the jury doesn’t hear the slightest hint that the National Republican Committee might have paid for the jamming. They’re afraid that if the subject comes up, even in the form of a denial, that it would taint the jury.
What would really frost the jury, though, I suspect, is if it came out that the GOP National Committee has, at last count, forked over at least a quarter of a million dollars to defend this “rogue operation” and its “mastermind.” (Correction: at least three quarters of a million dollars.)
I hammer Democrats on a regular basis, and I don’t regret it in the least. But the Republicans are doing something so heinous here in New Hampshire that it would almost put Ted Kennedy to shame. There was a serious attempt to illegally manipulate an election back in 2002, and the party is piling on the money to keep the admitted organizer out of jail.
As I said before, folks, this stinks. And those of you with ties to the Republican party (something I decidedly lack) need to start asking why they’re putting so much money to keep this scumbag out of jail.
Their investment in the scumbag’s defense only makes me wonder what else beyond the phone bank scam they are paying to hide.
Since too a long time I did not hear any more terms like political, ideal convictions or other social changes…
What becomes America?
Jean, http://www.artvideo.free.fr
Bush in his radio address today “In this new century we must continue to welcome legal immigrants and help them learn the customs and values that unite all Americans, including liberty and civic responsibility” that would appear to be all Americans but those on the RNC. Perhaps those officials should take a ethics refresher course as well, or a new citizenship test. A nod to Jay Tea for affirming that ‘let the people decide’ demcoracy(should) begin at home in the bell-weather state.
This is a reflection of our society and political process, one not confined by geography or political nomenclature. If we studied history, we would realize such behavior has been part of our political process, and that of every democratic society on record. That certainly does not make it right. But with that perspective, we might be able to see past the labels of Democrat and Republican and recognize that only when a majority of folks participating in the process follow a code of ethics will corruption receed. Weeding out each corrupt member is a distraction from putting in place folks who are not corrupt. In general, each time there is a scandal, and media circus, and outcry, the result is to replace the offender with another offender just a little more skilled at concealment of their corruption.
Both parties are corrupt. They only look after themselves and not the people who have put them into office. A pox on both their houses!
They only look after themselves and not the people who have put them into office. A pox on both their houses!
A pox? No, a plague — of constituents watching everything they do and smacking upside the head when they do wrong.
They’re not there to look after us, but to have us look after them and keep them on the straight and narrow every minute of every day. If we fail to do this, and they become corrupt, it is only our own fault.
Our Founding Fathers gave us a republic “if we could keep it.” We haven’t been doing our jobs.
I second the McGeheeotion.
Steve,
It’s bell wether, not bell weather. It refers to a goat.
“What would really frost the jury, though, I suspect, is if it came out that the GOP National Committee has, at last count, forked over at least a quarter of a million dollars to defend this “rogue operation” and its “mastermind.” (Correction: at least three quarters of a million dollars.)”
Among the reasons why I don’t contribute not even a single dime to the RNC.