GOP says, “… Jack Abramoff isn’t a Democrat problem” or, How Truth and Context are Separate Issues.

The Republican Party is trying so hard to become warm and fuzzy with bipartisanship that it is even willing to include Democrats in its dealings with Jack Abramoff. While I for one sincerely appreciate this newfound camaraderie and collegiality on the part of Ken Mehlman and the Grand Old Party, I hope you don’t mind if I look at their invitation with a bit of healthy (or some might say cynical) skepticism.

I remember the GOP.com site in a slightly more hostile mode, as when it created a web of lies during the last Presidential race. I wrote then about some of the twists and convolutions Mehlman and his friends made in their arguments against John Kerry. In true Orwellian fashion, GOP.com would find and article and, like the cherry-picking they did with WMD intelligence, they would pick out pieces and bits which would create the illusion of thorough and honest research. Often, however, what would be plucked would have come from an article whose context was diametrically opposed to the GOP position- but who gives a damn about context anyhow.

With that in mind I thought it might be interesting to follow the same rabbit through the most recent GOP foray into the Orwellian world of smoke and mirrors that they attempt to pass off as reality. Thus Ken Mehlman opens the newest rabbit hole on GOP.com:



The Washington Times is wholly owned by convicted felon, tax-cheat, and neo-conservative religious cult leader Sung Yung Moon. But I digress:


What Seper and Hudson fail to mention is a line from a little further down the article: “An Abramoff spokesman said: ‘Each tribe has its own protocol for approving political contributions made by the tribe. Mr. Abramoff and his team provided recommendations on where a tribe should spend its political dollars, but ultimately the tribal council made the final decision on what political contributions to make.’”


Certainly “…Abramoff-controlled…” but MCI owned the skybox. Additionally, Semper and Hudson once again fail to use information, this time found in the very next paragraph: “A spokesman for Dorgan now says the senator thought the box belonged to the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians. ‘He doesn't know Jack Abramoff, has never met Jack Abramoff,’ the spokesman told BusinessWeek Online. Dorgan's PAC reported its use of the box in IRS disclosures as an $1,800 in-kind contribution from the Choctaws.” [Emphasis added]
Seems odd that something as important as Dorgan reporting the contribution was somehow omitted from the story… again, I digress.


Reading down a few lines, one reads, “[Harkin spokesperson Allison] Dobson said a recent audit found Harkin should have reimbursed for the skybox, and he did so this fall [of 2004].” [Emphasis added] The article also lists those who did contribute to Harkin’s campaign, and Abramoff’s name is not among them. As Wolf Blitzer was reminded by Howard Dean, no Democrat has ever received any contribution from Jack Abramoff. The question then would be: Why would any Democrat concern themselves with returning contributions that do not actually come from Abramoff? And Abramoff’s clients are not Abramoff, are they.
But in this case, it’s not just the omission of important information that distorts the actual message- essentially making the statement a lie- it completely distorts the context of the entire AP article, from the time it was written until GOP.com posted it.
Reading the following lines from “Fear and Loathing” does more to put the entire article in its proper context: “Abramoff has admitted errors of judgment but denies that he misled or double-crossed any of his Native American clients.” Since we now know this to be a falsehood for certain, and that Abramoff’s scam was to shake down Indian tribes by pitting one against another for gambling hegemony, it would be less of a stretch to believe Harkin was acting on behalf of a constituent tribe that was being scammed. Whether or not that is true is irrelevant: there was no quid pro quo. The article makes abundantly clear that the tribe in question donated to Harkin’s campaign long after he had sought assistance for their petition.

I have to apologize for not continuing on from here with a comparative critique. The AP and Arkansas Democrat-Gazette article are archived; retrieving them costs money. If this were my profession, I’d spring the money, but this is a little diversion- not worth anything more than the time. Commentary is none the less important however…

Mehlman is taking a page right out of Joe McCarthy’s playbook: guilt by association. Notice that the GOP never says that Abramoff donated to Democrats, only people who are not under indictment or conviction. According to Republicans, anyone who knew Jack or was a client of Jack, or even knew someone who knew a client of Jack’s should be painted in the same broad brushstrokes of Abramoff himself. I would venture a guess that many of Abramoff’s clients had other lobbyists for other petitions, and according to their own promotional literature the firms for which Abramoff worked had both Democratic and Republican employees. But none of them was Abramoff, and only Abramoff’s stench is on the money that passed through and by his hands.
Which leads me to the finale of Mehlman’s GOP contortionism:

While it is, or at least may be, “… mostly a bipartisan scandal," said Alex Knott, an analyst at the non-partisan Center for Public Integrity, he says that, “it touches more Republicans than Democrats,” because, as Knight-Ridder notes first and foremost, “Republicans are in power and thus more likely to be lobbied,” and second, “Republicans courted closer financial and political ties with lobbyists through their ‘K Street Project,’ a concerted GOP effort to press D.C. lobbying firms to hire Republican loyalists if they wanted to be effective on Capitol Hill.”

Just goes to show you that even liberal publications like The Nation can sometimes get their facts wrong. Reid, Senator from Nevada, got money from an Indian tribe; one could only guess that it would be for something other than gambling. Never got a dime from Jack- to repeat, no Democrat got a nickel from Jack.

At least one voice was certain in the absolute bipartisanship of the scandal, however. "’When you look at this scandal, there's no question both Democrats and Republicans received money. ... We shouldn't be pointing fingers,’ said Republican National Committee chairman Ken Mehlman.” No Ken, you shouldn’t be pointing fingers, at least at anyone but yourself.