Thursday, October 19, 2006
Republican Ad Calls Black Women "Ho's"
No one can criticize the GOP for failing to produce sophisticated propaganda that successfully exploits the hopes and fears of white middle Americans. But can the great Republican distraction factory ever woo minorities? Check out the following transcript of a new Republican ad targeting black voters in 10 battleground states this year and you be the judge:
This ad was financed by J. Patrick Rooney, a white billionaire known for funding misleading anti-Kerry ads that ran on urban radio stations in 2004. The money for Rooney's newest ad flowed through a little-known group called America's PAC, which was founded by Richard Nadler, an ornery Republican consultant who has pushed Intelligent Design in Kansas public schools, declaring, "Darwin is bunk."
Nadler has an apparently dim view of the minorities he hopes to court. In 2000, he produced an ad in 2000 for school vouchers in which a white parent declared that his child's public school "was a bit more diversity than he could handle." The Republican National Committee flatly described that ad as "racist."
But about Rooney and Nadler's latest creation, which portrays black men as promiscuous misogynists and black women as submissive "ho's," the RNC is silent.
No one can criticize the GOP for failing to produce sophisticated propaganda that successfully exploits the hopes and fears of white middle Americans. But can the great Republican distraction factory ever woo minorities? Check out the following transcript of a new Republican ad targeting black voters in 10 battleground states this year and you be the judge:
BLACK MAN #1: "If you make a little mistake with one of your ‘hos,' you'll want to dispose of that problem tout suite, no questions asked."
BLACK MAN #2: "That's too cold. I don't snuff my own seed."
BLACK MAN #1: "Maybe you do have a reason to vote Republican."
This ad was financed by J. Patrick Rooney, a white billionaire known for funding misleading anti-Kerry ads that ran on urban radio stations in 2004. The money for Rooney's newest ad flowed through a little-known group called America's PAC, which was founded by Richard Nadler, an ornery Republican consultant who has pushed Intelligent Design in Kansas public schools, declaring, "Darwin is bunk."
Nadler has an apparently dim view of the minorities he hopes to court. In 2000, he produced an ad in 2000 for school vouchers in which a white parent declared that his child's public school "was a bit more diversity than he could handle." The Republican National Committee flatly described that ad as "racist."
But about Rooney and Nadler's latest creation, which portrays black men as promiscuous misogynists and black women as submissive "ho's," the RNC is silent.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
The Coming Gay GOP Purge
I spoke to the American Family Association's Don Wildmon on Tuesday and asked him if he thought gay Republicans should be purged as punishment for any role they might have played in Foleygate. He is now the first Christian right leader of note to call for such a purge. So here's my latest for the Nation featuring Wildmon's comments:
Immediately after the Mark Foley scandal broke, some anti-Republican gay-rights activists composed a memo containing the names of closeted gay Republican Congressional staffers and sent it to leading Christian-right advocacy groups. The founder and chairman of one of those groups, the Rev. Don Wildmon of the American Family Association, told me he has received that memo, which he referred to simply as "The List." Based on The List's contents, Wildmon is convinced that a secretive gay "clique" boring within the Republican-controlled Congress is responsible for covering up Foley's sexual predation toward teenage male House pages. Moreover, Wildmon calls on the Republican Party leadership to promptly purge the "subversive" gay staffers.
"They oughtta fire every one of 'em," Wildmon told me in his trademark Mississippi drawl. "I don't care if they're heterosexual or homosexual or whatever they are. If you've got that going on, that subverts the will of the people; that subverts the voters. That is subversive activity. There should be no organization among staffers in Washington of that nature, and if they find out that they're there and they're a member, they oughtta be dismissed el pronto."
Wildmon claimed that an investigation by Congressional Republican leaders into the gay menace lurking in their midst will clear House Speaker Dennis Hastert of allegations that he repeatedly ignored warnings about Foley's behavior. "I think the identification of the members of the homosexual clique is going to come out," Wildmon declared. "I think it's going to come out whether or not Hastert knew what he says, and at this point I'm inclined to believe he's telling the truth. I'm beginning to think that the homosexuals shielded their former Congressman Foley and that Denny Hastert did not know the depth of what's going on up there."
Wildmon's defense of Hastert dovetails loosely with Hastert's own explanation for his actions, or lack thereof. Hastert did nothing after being warned last spring by House majority leader John Boehner and Representative Tom Reynolds about Foley's explicit exchanges with House pages. Yet during an October 10 press conference, Hastert deflected blame onto his own staffers, who he said may have engaged in a "cover-up." (In an interview with the Chicago Tribune, Hastert also blamed his woes on "ABC News and a lot of Democratic operatives, people funded by [liberal billionaire philanthropist] George Soros.")
While Hastert has never suggested his staffers were part of any gay Republican "clique," openly gay Hill staffers who had contact with Hastert's staff and his Congressional allies have become subjects of a House Ethics Committee and FBI investigation into Foleygate. One of the gay staffers, Kirk Fordham, former chief of staff to Foley, was serving as Reynolds's chief of staff when the news broke of Foley's activities. Another, Jeff Trandahl, served as House Clerk from 1999 to 2005 and oversaw the page program.
Hastert's chief of staff, Scott Palmer, has confirmed he was informed by Fordham of Foley's lurid IMs in 2005. Fordham, however, alleges that Palmer knew of Foley's behavior much earlier than 2005. Trandahl, for his part, was presented with Foley's IMs in 2003 and, together with Illinois Republican Representative John Shimkus, told Foley to break contact with the teen.
Even though Fordham and Trandahl are key figures in the Foley scandal, the disclosure of their actions does not absolve House Republican leaders of their own roles in keeping Foley's licentious and possibly illegal behavior from the public. Yet Fordham and Trandahl are tempting targets for the gay-obsessed Christian right. In their desperate effort to stave off a Democratic takeover of Congress and preserve their political agenda, Wildmon and his allies have volunteered as Hastert's surrogates, casting him as the victim of a gay Republican cabal.
Family Research Council president Tony Perkins first laid out the strategy on October 9, writing in FRC's newsletter : "Has the social agenda of the GOP been stalled by homosexual members and or staffers? When we look over events of this Congress, we have to wonder." Perkins continued: "Does the [Republican] party want to represent values voters or Mark Foley and friends?" Though a portrait of Trandahl appeared beside Perkins's missive, Perkins stopped just short of calling for a purge of gay GOP staffers.
Focus on the Family founder James Dobson, a co-founder of the FRC and a close ally of Wildmon, has taken a different tack. During the October 6 broadcast of his radio show, syndicated on more than 3,000 stations worldwide, Dobson dismissed Foley's explicit e-mail exchanges with a former House page as "sort of a joke by the boy and some of the other pages." Dobson then suggested that the liberal media concocted the entire scandal in order to depress turnout by so-called "values voters."
Five days later, Dobson returned to the airwaves to give the liberal media another tongue-lashing. After accusing Media Matters for America and the Huffington Post of "spinning" his earlier comments downplaying the Foley scandal--"These folks can always be counted on to give the most extreme liberal interpretation of everything," Dobson exclaimed--he recounted an upsetting inquiry from a reporter from the St. Petersburg Times.
"She [the reporter] said, 'I heard late yesterday that Dr. Dobson had asked House leadership to fire all gay staffers,'" Dobson recalled in a voice brimming with indignation. "That's crazy too. That, first of all, would be flat-out illegal. You can't fire people just because somebody says so, and they're certainly not going to do it because James Dobson says so. That's crazy! They're trying to make us look like extremists and people who do ridiculous things, and there's absolutely no basis in this."
With Wildmon brandishing The List and demanding a gay purge, which in Dobson's words would be a "crazy," "flat-out illegal," "ridiculous thing," the chaos and panic among the House leadership has spread to the Christian right. As Election Day draws nearer, the movement's most influential leaders are markedly off-message, contradicting one another, and on the defensive. And their rhetorical fusillades have made gay Republican House staffers, some about to testify before the Ethics Committee and the FBI, fear for their careers.
Meanwhile, the so-called "values voters," cultivated to propel the Republicans into control of the White House and Congress, appear to have lost the faith. An October 5 poll by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center found that 57 percent of white evangelicals plan to vote for Republican Congressional candidates in the midterms--a twenty-one-point drop in support from 2004. With such a large portion of the GOP's core constituency likely to stay home on November 6, the results could be devastating.
Yet Wildmon remains confident that the Christian right can somehow snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. "This [scandal] might backfire in that if the 'values voters' see the methodology being used here, that could irritate them more than ever and motivate them to vote," Wildmon assured me. "George Soros and his wrecking crew might have made a tactical mistake."
I spoke to the American Family Association's Don Wildmon on Tuesday and asked him if he thought gay Republicans should be purged as punishment for any role they might have played in Foleygate. He is now the first Christian right leader of note to call for such a purge. So here's my latest for the Nation featuring Wildmon's comments:
Immediately after the Mark Foley scandal broke, some anti-Republican gay-rights activists composed a memo containing the names of closeted gay Republican Congressional staffers and sent it to leading Christian-right advocacy groups. The founder and chairman of one of those groups, the Rev. Don Wildmon of the American Family Association, told me he has received that memo, which he referred to simply as "The List." Based on The List's contents, Wildmon is convinced that a secretive gay "clique" boring within the Republican-controlled Congress is responsible for covering up Foley's sexual predation toward teenage male House pages. Moreover, Wildmon calls on the Republican Party leadership to promptly purge the "subversive" gay staffers.
"They oughtta fire every one of 'em," Wildmon told me in his trademark Mississippi drawl. "I don't care if they're heterosexual or homosexual or whatever they are. If you've got that going on, that subverts the will of the people; that subverts the voters. That is subversive activity. There should be no organization among staffers in Washington of that nature, and if they find out that they're there and they're a member, they oughtta be dismissed el pronto."
Wildmon claimed that an investigation by Congressional Republican leaders into the gay menace lurking in their midst will clear House Speaker Dennis Hastert of allegations that he repeatedly ignored warnings about Foley's behavior. "I think the identification of the members of the homosexual clique is going to come out," Wildmon declared. "I think it's going to come out whether or not Hastert knew what he says, and at this point I'm inclined to believe he's telling the truth. I'm beginning to think that the homosexuals shielded their former Congressman Foley and that Denny Hastert did not know the depth of what's going on up there."
Wildmon's defense of Hastert dovetails loosely with Hastert's own explanation for his actions, or lack thereof. Hastert did nothing after being warned last spring by House majority leader John Boehner and Representative Tom Reynolds about Foley's explicit exchanges with House pages. Yet during an October 10 press conference, Hastert deflected blame onto his own staffers, who he said may have engaged in a "cover-up." (In an interview with the Chicago Tribune, Hastert also blamed his woes on "ABC News and a lot of Democratic operatives, people funded by [liberal billionaire philanthropist] George Soros.")
While Hastert has never suggested his staffers were part of any gay Republican "clique," openly gay Hill staffers who had contact with Hastert's staff and his Congressional allies have become subjects of a House Ethics Committee and FBI investigation into Foleygate. One of the gay staffers, Kirk Fordham, former chief of staff to Foley, was serving as Reynolds's chief of staff when the news broke of Foley's activities. Another, Jeff Trandahl, served as House Clerk from 1999 to 2005 and oversaw the page program.
Hastert's chief of staff, Scott Palmer, has confirmed he was informed by Fordham of Foley's lurid IMs in 2005. Fordham, however, alleges that Palmer knew of Foley's behavior much earlier than 2005. Trandahl, for his part, was presented with Foley's IMs in 2003 and, together with Illinois Republican Representative John Shimkus, told Foley to break contact with the teen.
Even though Fordham and Trandahl are key figures in the Foley scandal, the disclosure of their actions does not absolve House Republican leaders of their own roles in keeping Foley's licentious and possibly illegal behavior from the public. Yet Fordham and Trandahl are tempting targets for the gay-obsessed Christian right. In their desperate effort to stave off a Democratic takeover of Congress and preserve their political agenda, Wildmon and his allies have volunteered as Hastert's surrogates, casting him as the victim of a gay Republican cabal.
Family Research Council president Tony Perkins first laid out the strategy on October 9, writing in FRC's newsletter : "Has the social agenda of the GOP been stalled by homosexual members and or staffers? When we look over events of this Congress, we have to wonder." Perkins continued: "Does the [Republican] party want to represent values voters or Mark Foley and friends?" Though a portrait of Trandahl appeared beside Perkins's missive, Perkins stopped just short of calling for a purge of gay GOP staffers.
Focus on the Family founder James Dobson, a co-founder of the FRC and a close ally of Wildmon, has taken a different tack. During the October 6 broadcast of his radio show, syndicated on more than 3,000 stations worldwide, Dobson dismissed Foley's explicit e-mail exchanges with a former House page as "sort of a joke by the boy and some of the other pages." Dobson then suggested that the liberal media concocted the entire scandal in order to depress turnout by so-called "values voters."
Five days later, Dobson returned to the airwaves to give the liberal media another tongue-lashing. After accusing Media Matters for America and the Huffington Post of "spinning" his earlier comments downplaying the Foley scandal--"These folks can always be counted on to give the most extreme liberal interpretation of everything," Dobson exclaimed--he recounted an upsetting inquiry from a reporter from the St. Petersburg Times.
"She [the reporter] said, 'I heard late yesterday that Dr. Dobson had asked House leadership to fire all gay staffers,'" Dobson recalled in a voice brimming with indignation. "That's crazy too. That, first of all, would be flat-out illegal. You can't fire people just because somebody says so, and they're certainly not going to do it because James Dobson says so. That's crazy! They're trying to make us look like extremists and people who do ridiculous things, and there's absolutely no basis in this."
With Wildmon brandishing The List and demanding a gay purge, which in Dobson's words would be a "crazy," "flat-out illegal," "ridiculous thing," the chaos and panic among the House leadership has spread to the Christian right. As Election Day draws nearer, the movement's most influential leaders are markedly off-message, contradicting one another, and on the defensive. And their rhetorical fusillades have made gay Republican House staffers, some about to testify before the Ethics Committee and the FBI, fear for their careers.
Meanwhile, the so-called "values voters," cultivated to propel the Republicans into control of the White House and Congress, appear to have lost the faith. An October 5 poll by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center found that 57 percent of white evangelicals plan to vote for Republican Congressional candidates in the midterms--a twenty-one-point drop in support from 2004. With such a large portion of the GOP's core constituency likely to stay home on November 6, the results could be devastating.
Yet Wildmon remains confident that the Christian right can somehow snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. "This [scandal] might backfire in that if the 'values voters' see the methodology being used here, that could irritate them more than ever and motivate them to vote," Wildmon assured me. "George Soros and his wrecking crew might have made a tactical mistake."
A Minuteman Retreats
Tough guy Minuteman founder Jim Gilchrist stormed off the set of Democracy Now! yesterday after being asked about his ties to the neo-Nazi National Alliance by Karina Garcia of Columbia University's Chicano Caucus. Here's Garcia on Gilchrist after his retreat:
I'm not sure if the Columbia students' protest played well in Peoria, but who the hell cares? They now have the opportunity to provoke a national discussion on the white nationalist underpinnings of the Minutemen and that, in my mind, is a tactical victory. The question is whether the students can move the discussion towards the Minutemen and their racist links and away from themselves and their protest. Another question is whether resistance to nativist politicking will spread to other campuses with sizeable immigrant student presences. Certainly if it does it will take on different incarnations that what occured at Columbia.
Tough guy Minuteman founder Jim Gilchrist stormed off the set of Democracy Now! yesterday after being asked about his ties to the neo-Nazi National Alliance by Karina Garcia of Columbia University's Chicano Caucus. Here's Garcia on Gilchrist after his retreat:
He’s a coward. He is very tough when he has a shotgun and he's in the middle of a desert intimidating defenseless immigrant families, but when it comes to being challenged by peaceful protesters and by people who understand this man and his organization for what they are, he runs away, and I think that was evident right now.
I'm not sure if the Columbia students' protest played well in Peoria, but who the hell cares? They now have the opportunity to provoke a national discussion on the white nationalist underpinnings of the Minutemen and that, in my mind, is a tactical victory. The question is whether the students can move the discussion towards the Minutemen and their racist links and away from themselves and their protest. Another question is whether resistance to nativist politicking will spread to other campuses with sizeable immigrant student presences. Certainly if it does it will take on different incarnations that what occured at Columbia.
Using Evangelicals
According to former White House Office of Faith Based and Community Initiatives Director David Kuo, Karl Rove and Ken Mehlman held people of faith in high regard -- as political tools. Olbermann is doing a segment on Kuo's forthcoming book about his time in the White House tonight, but for now, here's MSNBC's preview:
Of course, this is nothing new. Everyone and they momma knew the faith-based initiative was a Tammany Hall-style racket with a religious patina. That's why a Christian Reconstructionist purist-type like Marvin Olasky broke out as soon as the operation was up and running. He at least had principles. The real issue that is not resolved is Bush's faith. I have always contended that despite all the reports of Bush believing in Armageddon and cozying up to the Christian right, he, like Reagan, wears his religion on his sleeve. Evangelical Christianity helped him overcome alcoholism and offered a convenient and simplistic framework for understanding a complex world. But mainly faith has been a political device for Bush. (That's why I focus most of my reporting on the movement that guides Bush's political agenda, and not Bush.) It will be interesting to read Kuo's thoughts on Bush's religious convictions. Is Bush really one of the "nuts?" Kuo's insight could be definitive.
According to former White House Office of Faith Based and Community Initiatives Director David Kuo, Karl Rove and Ken Mehlman held people of faith in high regard -- as political tools. Olbermann is doing a segment on Kuo's forthcoming book about his time in the White House tonight, but for now, here's MSNBC's preview:
Kuo, who has complained publicly in the past about the funding shortfalls, goes several steps further in his new book.
He says some of the nation’s most prominent evangelical leaders were known in the office of presidential political strategist Karl Rove as “the nuts.”
“National Christian leaders received hugs and smiles in person and then were dismissed behind their backs and described as ‘ridiculous,’ ‘out of control,’ and just plain ‘goofy,’” Kuo writes.
More seriously, Kuo alleges that then-White House political affairs director Ken Mehlman knowingly participated in a scheme to use the office, and taxpayer funds, to mount ostensibly “nonpartisan” events that were, in reality, designed with the intent of mobilizing religious voters in 20 targeted races.
According to Kuo, “Ken loved the idea and gave us our marching orders.”
Of course, this is nothing new. Everyone and they momma knew the faith-based initiative was a Tammany Hall-style racket with a religious patina. That's why a Christian Reconstructionist purist-type like Marvin Olasky broke out as soon as the operation was up and running. He at least had principles. The real issue that is not resolved is Bush's faith. I have always contended that despite all the reports of Bush believing in Armageddon and cozying up to the Christian right, he, like Reagan, wears his religion on his sleeve. Evangelical Christianity helped him overcome alcoholism and offered a convenient and simplistic framework for understanding a complex world. But mainly faith has been a political device for Bush. (That's why I focus most of my reporting on the movement that guides Bush's political agenda, and not Bush.) It will be interesting to read Kuo's thoughts on Bush's religious convictions. Is Bush really one of the "nuts?" Kuo's insight could be definitive.
Mark Foley's back online and he's ready to chat. So sit back, relax, slip off your shorts and t-shirt, take out a ruler and say hi to the swinginest member of the GOP.
Separated at Birth?
Monday, October 09, 2006
I'm watching the Tester-Burns debate now. The X-factor is Stan Jones, a Libertarian third party candidate who nobody is going to vote for and who has nothing to lose. He sounds like an insane backlasher, which is sort of a good thing in this case, and he's using his time to bludgeon Bush, and Burns by extension, on the Patriot Act. Burns actually responded directly to Jones, who nobody is going to vote for. Then Jones used his concluding statement to warn of a global conspiracy to bring the United States under the control of "world communism... the worst terrorism of the worst kind." Again, Burns actually responded: "I'm sure glad you got such a rosy future for our kids." Why is Burns acknowledging a nut who makes LaRouche look sensible. It's nut and nuttier. And Tester doesn't even have to do anything.
Here's a money quote from Burns on global warming: "We've been warming since the Ice Age. And that's a fact." Jones used his turn to essentially repeat Burns' answer.
Here's a money quote from Burns on global warming: "We've been warming since the Ice Age. And that's a fact." Jones used his turn to essentially repeat Burns' answer.
In case you're not up on Foleygate, here is a convenient finger-pointing chart. As a testament to the Republican House leadership's deft push-back strategy, George Soros' name somehow appears on it.
The Sum of All Christian Right Fears
I expected Focus on the Family's Foleygate broadcast to be surreal, but I wasn't ready for what top Dobson flack Tom Minnery's revealed:
Apparently Minnery has something to hide. Or he just thinks holding people accountable for hypocrisy is dangerous. That would inevitably lead to -- gasp! -- condemning sexual predators who happen to be leading members of the Republican party. And that's a task the pantheon of the Christian right doesn't seem to be up to. In fact, Tony Perkins has hinted that he was aware Foley was preying on House pages for years and did absolutely nothing.
Bruce Wilson at Talk2Action has much more, including a comprehensive transcript of the FoF broadcast.
I expected Focus on the Family's Foleygate broadcast to be surreal, but I wasn't ready for what top Dobson flack Tom Minnery's revealed:
"I fear that we're in a society in which you will be held to the standards which you claim."
Apparently Minnery has something to hide. Or he just thinks holding people accountable for hypocrisy is dangerous. That would inevitably lead to -- gasp! -- condemning sexual predators who happen to be leading members of the Republican party. And that's a task the pantheon of the Christian right doesn't seem to be up to. In fact, Tony Perkins has hinted that he was aware Foley was preying on House pages for years and did absolutely nothing.
Bruce Wilson at Talk2Action has much more, including a comprehensive transcript of the FoF broadcast.
Over ten years ago, David Frum hinted that the GOP was exploiting the voting bloc now strangely referred to as "values voters:"
Pretty damn revealing. And it looks like some white evangelicals could be waking up to the fact that they're being used.
"Churchgoers occupy the same place in the conservative intellectual’s imagination that the proletariat once did in the imagination of the revolutionary intellectual: a mass that will muscle the intellectual’s theories into power. But like the proletariat, American churchgoers will almost certainly disappoint the intellectuals who trust them... If fundamentalist America is too poor and weak to bear out secularist fears, it shares too many of the sins of secular America to sustain conservative hopes. Fundamentalists will go on giving conservative Republicans their votes, but it is not from them that the conservative movement of the future will draw its ideas." [Dead Right, 1994, Basic Books, pp. 172-3]
Pretty damn revealing. And it looks like some white evangelicals could be waking up to the fact that they're being used.
I'm watching the Allen/Webb debate on C-Span. So far, Webb has appeared only remotely animated or energized when explaining his fervent opposition to affirmative action. So much for offering an alternative to Allen's stated views on race.
Saturday, October 07, 2006
"Take out a ruler and measure it."Friday, October 06, 2006
Sort of a Joke
What does America's leading "pro-family" activist, James Dobson, have to say about Foleygate? Not only has Dobson defended Denny Hastert from those calling for his resignation, today he had this to say:
Dobson has plunged headfirst into party politics, casting his lot with Karl Rove at the expense of his constituency of so-called "values voters" He doesn't know that the joke is on him.
What does America's leading "pro-family" activist, James Dobson, have to say about Foleygate? Not only has Dobson defended Denny Hastert from those calling for his resignation, today he had this to say:
As it turns out, Mr. Foley has had illicit sex with no one that we know of, and the whole thing turned out to be what some people are now saying was a -- sort of a joke by the boy and some of the other pages.
Dobson has plunged headfirst into party politics, casting his lot with Karl Rove at the expense of his constituency of so-called "values voters" He doesn't know that the joke is on him.
Yesterday I went up against the Washington Times editorial regime's surrogate apologist, US News and World Report executive editor Brian Kelly. I should have expected his dismissive attitude about the racism and sexism I described in my article on the Times; US News publisher Mort Zuckerman is a good buddy of Wes Pruden's. At the end of the broadcast, Fran Coombs' wife, Marian Coombs, called up to claim that despite everything she has ever written, she is not a white supremacist. She really is a treasure. And together, the Coombses give new meaning to the term "white wedding." Check out the broadcast here.
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
Resign, Mr. Editor
For years, the Washington Times has been a haven for sexual harassers and pederasts. Now, the paper is calling for "Coach" Hastert's resignation for his role in covering-up Foleygate. With his satirical mock-up of the Times' editorial, former Times lead investigative correspondent George Archibald highlights the irony of the paper's indignant posture:
Editorials/Op-Ed
Resign, Mr. Editor
TODAY'S EDITORIAL
October 3, 2006
The facts of the disgrace of Wesley Pruden Jr. and
Francis B. Coombs Jr., who are editor-in-chief and
managing editor respectively of The Washington Times,
constitutes a disgrace for every staff member of the
newspaper. Red flags emerged in mid-2004 at the
Republican National Convention in New York City, when
Coombs made inappropriate sexual advances upon Melissa
Hopkins and actually physically groped and kissed her
in a cab against her will. The matter was referred by
Mrs. Hopkins in an official complaint to The
Washington Times human resources director, Randall
Casseday, recently indicted for wholly inappropriate
and illegal predatory sexual e-mail messages to who he
believed to be an underage female, but actually an
undercover police officer. Mr Combs’ and Mr.
Casseday’s aberrant, predatory -- and criminal --
behavior was an open secret among the staff of The
Washington Times who were aware of their sexual
deviance. The evidence was strong enough long enough
ago that the editor-in-chief and other senior managers
of The Washington Times should have relieved Messrs.
Coombs and Casseday of their respective
responsibilities contingent on a full investigation to
learn what had taken place, whether any laws had been
violated and what action, up to and including
prosecution, were warranted by the facts. This never
happened.
Wesley Pruden Jr. learned about the Coombs and
Casseday incidents as they occurred, but did nothing
for the victims and covered up the sexual abuse
incidents. The matters were not pursued at all.
Moreover, all available evidence suggests that the
newspaper’s leadership did not share anything related
to these matters with anyone in a position to provide
help to the victims.
Now the scandal should unfold on the front pages of
the newspaper and on television screens, and
transcripts of internal Washington Times documents
regarding these matters should emerge and doubts are
rightly raised about the forthrightness of the
newspaper’s stewards. Some staff members who have been
treated badly by Coombs and Pruden are attempting to
make this "a Washington Times scandal," and they
shouldn't; the newspaper has contributed more than its
share of characters in the tawdry history of its
editorial and sexual scandals. We had Tapscott as we
had Barney Frank, Hallow and Batista, Pruden and
Fields, all is fun in love and war. Sexual predators
come in all shapes, sizes and partisan hues, in
institutions within and without government. When
predators are found they must be dealt with,
forcefully and swiftly. This time the offender is a
managing editor, and the newspaper can't simply "get
ahead" of the scandal by competing to make the most
noise in calls for a full investigation. The time for
that is long past.
Editors Wesley Pruden and Fran Coombs must do the only
right thing, and resign their positions at once.
Either they were grossly negligent for not taking the
red flags fully into account and ordering a swift
investigation, for not even remembering the order of
events leading up to the 2004 revelations -- or they
deliberately looked the other way in hopes that a
brewing scandal would simply blow away. They gave
phony answers to the old and ever-relevant questions
of what did they know and when did they know it?
Messrs. Pruden and Coombs have forfeited the
confidence of the newspare, its readers and
advertisers, and they cannot preside over the
necessary coming investigation, an investigation that
must examine their own inept performance.
The chief executive office or the newspaper’s parent
company, News World Communications, should choose
successors. We nominate Arnaud de Borchgrave of
Washington, D.C., whose prior distinguished service to
The Washington Times ensures that he has no dog in
this fight. He has a long and principled career, and
is respected on all sides. Mr. de Borchgrave would
preside over the remaining life of The Washington
Times in a manner best suited for a full and
exhaustive investigation until a new editor-in-chief
is selected and a new managing and deputy manging
editors to run the newspaper effectively.
For years, the Washington Times has been a haven for sexual harassers and pederasts. Now, the paper is calling for "Coach" Hastert's resignation for his role in covering-up Foleygate. With his satirical mock-up of the Times' editorial, former Times lead investigative correspondent George Archibald highlights the irony of the paper's indignant posture:
Editorials/Op-Ed
Resign, Mr. Editor
TODAY'S EDITORIAL
October 3, 2006
The facts of the disgrace of Wesley Pruden Jr. and
Francis B. Coombs Jr., who are editor-in-chief and
managing editor respectively of The Washington Times,
constitutes a disgrace for every staff member of the
newspaper. Red flags emerged in mid-2004 at the
Republican National Convention in New York City, when
Coombs made inappropriate sexual advances upon Melissa
Hopkins and actually physically groped and kissed her
in a cab against her will. The matter was referred by
Mrs. Hopkins in an official complaint to The
Washington Times human resources director, Randall
Casseday, recently indicted for wholly inappropriate
and illegal predatory sexual e-mail messages to who he
believed to be an underage female, but actually an
undercover police officer. Mr Combs’ and Mr.
Casseday’s aberrant, predatory -- and criminal --
behavior was an open secret among the staff of The
Washington Times who were aware of their sexual
deviance. The evidence was strong enough long enough
ago that the editor-in-chief and other senior managers
of The Washington Times should have relieved Messrs.
Coombs and Casseday of their respective
responsibilities contingent on a full investigation to
learn what had taken place, whether any laws had been
violated and what action, up to and including
prosecution, were warranted by the facts. This never
happened.
Wesley Pruden Jr. learned about the Coombs and
Casseday incidents as they occurred, but did nothing
for the victims and covered up the sexual abuse
incidents. The matters were not pursued at all.
Moreover, all available evidence suggests that the
newspaper’s leadership did not share anything related
to these matters with anyone in a position to provide
help to the victims.
Now the scandal should unfold on the front pages of
the newspaper and on television screens, and
transcripts of internal Washington Times documents
regarding these matters should emerge and doubts are
rightly raised about the forthrightness of the
newspaper’s stewards. Some staff members who have been
treated badly by Coombs and Pruden are attempting to
make this "a Washington Times scandal," and they
shouldn't; the newspaper has contributed more than its
share of characters in the tawdry history of its
editorial and sexual scandals. We had Tapscott as we
had Barney Frank, Hallow and Batista, Pruden and
Fields, all is fun in love and war. Sexual predators
come in all shapes, sizes and partisan hues, in
institutions within and without government. When
predators are found they must be dealt with,
forcefully and swiftly. This time the offender is a
managing editor, and the newspaper can't simply "get
ahead" of the scandal by competing to make the most
noise in calls for a full investigation. The time for
that is long past.
Editors Wesley Pruden and Fran Coombs must do the only
right thing, and resign their positions at once.
Either they were grossly negligent for not taking the
red flags fully into account and ordering a swift
investigation, for not even remembering the order of
events leading up to the 2004 revelations -- or they
deliberately looked the other way in hopes that a
brewing scandal would simply blow away. They gave
phony answers to the old and ever-relevant questions
of what did they know and when did they know it?
Messrs. Pruden and Coombs have forfeited the
confidence of the newspare, its readers and
advertisers, and they cannot preside over the
necessary coming investigation, an investigation that
must examine their own inept performance.
The chief executive office or the newspaper’s parent
company, News World Communications, should choose
successors. We nominate Arnaud de Borchgrave of
Washington, D.C., whose prior distinguished service to
The Washington Times ensures that he has no dog in
this fight. He has a long and principled career, and
is respected on all sides. Mr. de Borchgrave would
preside over the remaining life of The Washington
Times in a manner best suited for a full and
exhaustive investigation until a new editor-in-chief
is selected and a new managing and deputy manging
editors to run the newspaper effectively.
Monday, October 02, 2006
Telling Reactions to Foleygate
The Washington Times is calling for "Coach" Denny Hastert to resign for his role in covering up Foleygate. Meanwhile, the Times has yet to acknowledge the role of its former human relations department director, an indicted pederast named Randall Casseday, in covering up managing editor Fran Coombs' racist and sexually harassing behavior. (Just scroll down on this blog for the full story.) The Times' "Resign, Mr. Speaker" editorial is a naked attempt at brand rehabilitation.
Meanwhile, Foley is getting the gentle treatment from strict father stereotype and unofficial chairman of the Republican Party, "Dr." James Dobson. Here's what the top flack of what former Republican Dick Armey called "Dobson's band of thugs," Tom Minnery, had to say about Foley in an
official FoF statement:
Notice that there is no mention of Hastert, John Boehner, or Tom Reynolds' connection to the scandal. And despite the fact that the nauseating content of Foley's IM's have been broadcast on every major network, according to Minnery, he may not even be guilty of what he is accused of. It should have been apparent ten years ago that Dobson cares more about defending his political surrogates than about "defending the family." He's even stampeded principled conservative Christian leaders, like Rev. Tony Evans, to push the GOP to the hard right. Now he's gone so far, he's running interference for a sex predator.
One more thought. The completely disparate reactions from right-wing organizations and Republican leaders to Foleygate shows how dangerous the scandal is to the Republicans. The Republican National Commitee has been absolutely unable, if not unwilling, to impose message control. It's almost as if Ken Mehlman has something to hide.
The Washington Times is calling for "Coach" Denny Hastert to resign for his role in covering up Foleygate. Meanwhile, the Times has yet to acknowledge the role of its former human relations department director, an indicted pederast named Randall Casseday, in covering up managing editor Fran Coombs' racist and sexually harassing behavior. (Just scroll down on this blog for the full story.) The Times' "Resign, Mr. Speaker" editorial is a naked attempt at brand rehabilitation.
Meanwhile, Foley is getting the gentle treatment from strict father stereotype and unofficial chairman of the Republican Party, "Dr." James Dobson. Here's what the top flack of what former Republican Dick Armey called "Dobson's band of thugs," Tom Minnery, had to say about Foley in an
official FoF statement:
"This is not a time to be talking about politics, but about the well-being of those boys who appear to have been victimized by Rep. Foley. If he is indeed guilty of what he is accused of, it is right that he resigned and that authorities are looking into whether criminal charges are warranted.
"This is yet another sad example of our society's oversexualization, especially as it affects the Internet, and the damage it does to all who get caught in its grasp."
Notice that there is no mention of Hastert, John Boehner, or Tom Reynolds' connection to the scandal. And despite the fact that the nauseating content of Foley's IM's have been broadcast on every major network, according to Minnery, he may not even be guilty of what he is accused of. It should have been apparent ten years ago that Dobson cares more about defending his political surrogates than about "defending the family." He's even stampeded principled conservative Christian leaders, like Rev. Tony Evans, to push the GOP to the hard right. Now he's gone so far, he's running interference for a sex predator.
One more thought. The completely disparate reactions from right-wing organizations and Republican leaders to Foleygate shows how dangerous the scandal is to the Republicans. The Republican National Commitee has been absolutely unable, if not unwilling, to impose message control. It's almost as if Ken Mehlman has something to hide.
