In Cincinnati, the Reddest city in Ohio, the red hot campaign for an open Congressional seat has just gotten a lot hotter – and the chance that the seat might flip from Red t0 Blue has been ratcheted up a notch or two.
Jean Schmidt, a Republican political hack, has been nabbed telling a bald face lie while speaking into a camera. Her opponent is Paul Hackett, a Marine who recently returned from a tour of duty in Iraq. It’s been 20 years since a Democrat won the seat in this district.
More about this in a moment but to appreciate how bad Jean Scmidt is you really should watch a bit of this clip from an interview she did with NBC’s David Gregory on “Hardball” last week: Crooks & Liars – Schmidt Interview
Now here’s how Swingstate Project describes Schmidt’s, er, gaffe:
Jean Schmidt is well known for never forgetting a face or a name. Conventional wisdom recognizes her renowned memory to the point where the Cincinnati Enquirer noted (July 31, 2005):
Schmidt knows the district very well, having almost a “file-card” memory to recall details about people, places and issues she’s had experience with on the local level.
Yet on this morning’s CBS 12 “Newsmakers” program, Jean Schmidt lied to the voters on – only two days before the election. In an effort to cover up Jean Schmidt’s involvement in the scandalous culture of corruption, Schmidt said she didn’t know Tom Noe. Schmidt said she’d never met Tom Noe. Schmidt said she had never even heard of Tom Noe. The woman with the “file-card memory” lied.
A Review by PR Contributor VRW“Bill Maher: I’m Swiss” live on HBO from the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall in Portland, Oregon, rocked the packed house of mostly middle-aged, 98 percent white folks, July 30. Maher walked right up to the outrageous edge, kicking clods of muck and mire into the faces of the right, religious, married, parents, obese, beer drinkers, and THE ADMINISTRATION. He blessed only fellow pot smokers, homosexuals, and atheists.
While Bill doesn’t mince words, he avoids scatology. With unerring accuracy he nails his subject on a cross of wit. His funniest bit was his classical interpretation of the lyrics of several rap songs which he translated from bling-bling ebonics into ‘white’ because, he explained, while their kids could get it, the audience would never understand the lyrics as written by the likes of Mr. Snoop-Dog, et al.
Another broad topic was the food Americans eat, which he complains is killing us faster than smoking ever did. He says, ‘we feed cows too sick to stand up to people too fat to walk.’ He also claims he wouldn’t ‘eat a hot dog unless it had a condom on it.’
As for religion, in his opinion, ‘Believing in Jesus is like having an imaginery friend’ and ‘Flying planes into buildings is a faith-based initiative.’ His
conclusion on religion is that it stops people from thinking.
Regarding the President, he said, ‘this guy is so retarded he could be on death row in Texas.’ That was after his big opening on Mr. Bush’s seven minute time-out in that Texas classroom on 9/11. He concluded that any other President would, at least, have gotten up to find out what was going on, having just been told America was under attack. Including even Ronald Reagan and Martin Van Buren.
Maher is a funny man. More than that he is an accomplished, polished satirist who can stand shoulder to shoulder with Mort Sahl and George Carlin. He worked hard Saturday night, and the sweat moons under his arm proved it. Still and yet, Bill Maher is cool.
Figures released by the Ministry of Defence have shown the reasons given by Britain and America for stepping up bombing raids in Iraq in the run-up to war were a sham, writes Michael Smith.
Geoff Hoon, who was then defence secretary, and Donald Rumsfeld, his American counterpart, both claimed that the rise in air attacks was in response to Iraqi attempts to shoot down allied aircraft
However, the minutes of a meeting of Tony Blair’s war cabinet on July 23, 2003, leaked to The Sunday Times, record Hoon saying “the US had begun spikes of activity to put pressure on the regime”.
Ministers have since insisted that the stepped-up attacks, which began in May 2002, were as a result of increased Iraqi activity and were not an attempt to provoke a response that would give the allies an excuse for war.
The figures do not support those claims. In the first seven months of 2001 the allies recorded a total of 370 “provocations” by the Iraqis against allied aircraft. But in the seven months between October 2001 and May 2002 there were just 32.
Sir Menzies Campbell, the Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman, who obtained the MoD data in a Commons written answer, said it reinforced the need for an inquiry into ministers’ conduct in the run-up to war.
Finally, signs the frenzy over so-called “sex offenders” might be abating. A Florida official was recently brave enough to stick his neck out and interject some reason into the fear-based hysteria.
City Commissioner Alan Bildz said he is pushing for a resolution that would urge state legislators to “do their job.”
Bildz wants to add a third category that would separate sex offenders whose partners were willing from offenders who forced themselves on someone.
“I don’t want to change the definition of the sexual predator,” Bildz said. “But I think that the lesser one, the sexual offender, should be broken into two categories: those that consented and those that didn’t.”
Recent legislation in Florida, such as the Lunsford Act, is burdening public budgets with elaborate background checks and resident notifications, including demanding schools fingerprint and clear every visitor – even district school employees, food service vendors, and UPS drivers.
But the city council member cited here, who proposed making a distinction between 19-year-olds having teen sex with 17-year-olds, and 44-year-olds raping and torturing 10-year-olds, found some fellow commissioners opposed. These idiots want
…to mandate the number of times law enforcement officials go door to door informing residents of the presence of sexual offenders and predators in Treasure Island. The law requires law enforcement agencies to inform residents of the presence of sexual predators. Currently, the Treasure Island Police Department notifies the fewer than 10,000 residents of sexual offenders as a courtesy, on a case-by-case basis.
[Knee-Jerker] Collins said that is “totally unacceptable.” He wants police to go out at least three times a year to inform residents of sexual offenders in the neighborhood.
So far, the loonies are winning, and untold dollars are being spent to further fortress-ize schools (even though Jessica Lunsford was kidnapped from her home), and stigmatize for life people who aren’t perverts at all.
I’m glad my parents dated in the ‘50s. At the time they eloped, my dad was 20 and my mom 18. They started seeing each other over a year earlier so it’s quite possible, had they been caught, that the police would now have to knock on neighbors’ doors to inform them the man who celebrated his 49th wedding anniversary two weeks ago is a sex offender.
Florida Sen. Bill Nelson (D) is taking heat from Republicans for being – dare I say it? – a Democrat.
AP is reporting that the Hypocrisy Party is hitting hard and early at Nelson, against whom they will run Paragon of Virtue Katherine Harris if they must, but preferably anyone, and we mean ANYONE, else.
Nelson said he has been expecting low blows…
But even Nelson was caught off guard when told a Republican group was questioning whether he would be easy on sexual predators because he appeared with Illinois Sen. Barack Obama in historically black Eatonville.
After the appearance, the National Republican Senatorial Committee posted items on its Web site asking “Nelson Campaigns With Obama – Does He Agree With Obama’s Record Of Lenience On Sexual Predators?” and “Does Nelson Agree With Obama’s Refusal To Support Commonsense Measures To Keep Children Safe?” The site then listed votes Obama made as a state senator on issues such as sex offenders, pornography and adult businesses near schools.
Eatonville, for those of you not from around here, is near Orlando, and is famous as the hometown of author Zora Neale Hurston.
Republicans used Nelson’s record to show he is an aberration in the Senate, what with being a Democrat and all.
[A Republican strategist] says Nelson voted against the president’s tax cuts, opposed abortion restrictions such as parental notification and a late-term procedure foes call “partial-birth abortion” and was against limiting civil lawsuit awards.
Uh, yes. You got us there. It indeed appears that Nelson is not a Republican. For his part, Nelson is aware that this race will be dirty and not necessarily reality-based.
Florida voters “are looking for somebody that they perceive in the mainstream. That’s where Florida is politically. And so naturally your political enemies paint you as someone that is not in the political mainstream,” Nelson said.
Despite this rather glowing report from the local paper, the organizers of the Freedom FilmFest – an event that was hastily organized to protest the Traverse City Film Festival and its founder, Oscar-winning filmmaker Michael Moore – found themselves in hot water yesterday.
At least one “values voter” reportedy walked out of the Freedom Filmfest’s screening of “Michael Moore Hates America” in protest over the film’s excessive use of profanity. Apparently, Red-staters who are interviewed in the documentary-style film repeatedly describe Michael Moore as a “fucker” and a “motherfucker.”
Because of the outcry, festival organizers shut the screening down before the film was over.
While larger venues at TCFF screenings have consistently been sold out, reports say the rightwing event has been sparsely attended – one screening had 50 people, another had only 15.
A person on the scene commented, “What if they gave a war and nobody came?”
Among prizes awarded at the festival, “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” won “scariest film.”
Update: Crooks & Liars has a clip of Jean Schmidt’s interview with David Gregory on MSNBC. What a nut job!
Earlier this week, we wrote about the upcoming special election for a House seat in Ohio’s predominantly Republican 2nd District next week. The Democratic candidate is Paul Hackett, an Iraqi War vet.
Now we learn that Hackett’s opponent, Jean Schmidt, a rightwing political hack who once served in the state assembly, has played a role in one of the many Republican political scandals roiling Columbus these days.
In 2001, Roger Ach II, the CEO of Ohio-based Games Inc., developed a system for operating the state’s lottery on the Internet. What is key here is that Ach had undertaken this project on his own initiative. The state had not ordered a web lottery system. In fact, selling lottery tickets online was illegal in Ohio.
Coincidentally (or not), Games Inc. found itself in some financial difficulty, and Ach became desperate for face time with Gov. Robert Taft in order to lobby him about the Games Inc. Internet lottery system. To grease the way into the governor’s offiice, Ach slipped cash to GOP operatives and politicians in the form of stock in Games Inc. and donations to campaigns.
Schmidt, who was then a state legislator, was one of the GOP pols who took a donation from Ach. And now we have a record of the fact that she lobbied the governor on Ach’s behalf. From the Toledo Blade:
Jean Schmidt … also appealed to the governor’s office on behalf of a Web-based lottery… In a November, 2001, e-mail, Jon Allison, a staff member for Governor Taft, complained that Ms. Schmidt “continues to bug me on Internet lottery.”
One year later, her state representative re-election campaign garnered a $1,000 donation from Mr. Ach.
Ms. Schmidt said [she doesn’t recall the incident].
“The documents indicate that she is lobbying the governor on behalf of Roger Ach,” said her opponent, Mr. Hackett. “After doing their bidding, she takes a $1,000 donation. That is the culture of corruption – documented.”
When Ach finally did get into see the governor, Taft took a pass on the web lottery system.
It is notable that Schmidt obviously places little value on her own virtue. Or maybe she thinks a thousand bucks for a few lousy phone calls is a pretty good day’s work.
Finally, this scandal also has a dash of liberal Hollywood glitz: One of the investors in Games Inc. is a notable Democrat, Jerry Springer.
An Unsmart American, writing after Wonkette pointed out the President Bush’s hand gestures are often very nelly, suggested that la pundette’s musings might sap homophobic servicemembers of their will to fight:
It is JUST like the one time when That Wonkete accused Our President George W. Bush of being a homosexual because of the way he was holding his hand in a “nelly” way…what if Our Soldiers who are fighting so bravely out there find out what Wonkette is saying and think that is true!!? Well what if they believed her and stopped following orders from Our President because he is a gay!? If even one service man (or woman just so you know I’m not so called SEXIST!!) dies because of those things that Wonkette and dems have been saying then that is ONE TOO MANY.
In response, the always decorous Wonkette writes:
First of all, we think the brave men (and women!) of the armed forces would probably still fight even if the President were gay. (Some of them might even fight a little harder.) Second: We didn’t accuse George Bush of being gay because he holds his hand in a “nelly way.”
We accused him of being gay because he likes *%#k.
To hear Trump talk, he’s the only one
Who’s ever stood trial for crimes he’s done.
But instead of courtroom drama,
We get Trump in his pajamas,
That’s how he earned his new nickname: Don Snoreleone.
