George Bush is an incredible combination of deluded messianic ambition and pure political slimeballery.
During the trial of Bush political operative James Tobin who was convicted of a phone jamming scheme on election day 2002 in New Hampshire that was directed at the get out the vote phone efforts of the New Hampshire Democratic Pary, Tobin made as many as two dozen calls to the same number at the White House on and before election day. From the AP story in the Minneapolis Tribune.
The records show that Bush campaign operative James Tobin, who recently was convicted in the case, made two dozen calls to the White House within a three-day period around Election Day 2002 — as the phone jamming operation was finalized, carried out and then abruptly shut down.
Even though the prosecutors in the case didn’t use these calls to gain the conviction, Democrats plan to ask the judge to issue a court order forcing GOP and White House officials to answer questions about the scheme and White House involvement in it.
Besides the conviction of Tobin, the Republicans’ New England regional director, prosecutors negotiated two plea bargains: one with a New Hampshire Republican Party official and another with the owner of a telemarketing firm involved in the scheme. The owner of the subcontractor firm whose employees made the hang-up calls is under indictment.
The phone records show that most calls to the White House were from Tobin, who became President Bush’s presidential campaign chairman for the New England region in 2004. Other calls from New Hampshire senatorial campaign offices to the White House could have been made by a number of people.
A GOP campaign consultant in 2002, Jayne Millerick, made a 17-minute call to the White House on Election Day, but said in an interview she did not recall the subject. Millerick, who later became the New Hampshire GOP chairwoman, said in an interview she did not learn of the jamming until after the election.
A Democratic analysis of phone records introduced at Tobin’s criminal trial show he made 115 outgoing calls — mostly to the same number in the White House political affairs office — between Sept. 17 and Nov. 22, 2002. Two dozen of the calls were made from 9:28 a.m. the day before the election through 2:17 a.m. the night after the voting.
There also were other calls between Republican officials during the period that the scheme was hatched and canceled.
Prosecutors did not need the White House calls to convict Tobin and negotiate the two guilty pleas.
I think it’s interesting to note who was in the White House office that received these calls: none other than Ken Mehlman who was rewarded for this illegal voter tampering with the Chair of the National Republican Party. Ah yes, the Party of personal responsiblility and the rule of law.
By Nov. 4, 2002, the Monday before the election, an Idaho firm was hired to make the hang-up calls. The Republican state chairman at the time, John Dowd, said in an interview he learned of the scheme that day and tried to stop it.
Dowd, who blamed an aide for devising the scheme without his knowledge, contended that the jamming began on Election Day despite his efforts. A police report confirmed the Manchester Professional Fire Fighters Association reported the hang-up calls began about 7:15 a.m. and continued for about two hours. The association was offering rides to the polls.
Virtually all the calls to the White House went to the same number, which currently rings inside the political affairs office. In 2002, White House political affairs was led by now-RNC chairman Ken Mehlman. The White House declined to say which staffer was assigned that phone number in 2002.
Let’s let this be the last word.
Democratic National Committee spokesman Damien LaVera said Monday: “With every development in this case, there are new questions about the extent to which key national Republicans had knowledge of or were involved in a criminal scheme to keep New Hampshire voters from getting to the polls. The American people have a right to know whether the White House political director, who today sits as chairman of the national Republican Party, had any hand in it.”
OK, so this will be the last word. Mehlman, Bush, Cheney, Libby, Rove, (I know I’m forgetting somebody), apparently in order to be a Republican Party luminary, you have to be a criminal. Puh-lease, let’s get blow jobs back in the Oval Office.
