August 16, 2009 - August 22, 2009

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August 16, 2009 - August 22, 2009

AZ Assault Rifle-Wielding Man And Gun-Toter In NH Belong To Same Right-Wing Group

Justin Elliott | August 21, 2009, 5:45PM

Chris Broughton, the man who brought an assault rifle to an Obama event in Arizona earlier this week, and William Kostric, who protested outside a presidential forum in New Hampshire armed with a handgun last week, are both listed as "team members" of the Arizona chapter of the We The People organization.

The group is committed to "restoring Freedom and Constitutional Order through the exercise of popular sovereignty by all possible non-violent means."

Kostric, whose residence on the chapter page is listed as Scottsdale, AZ, has reportedly moved to New Hampshire because he thought Arizona's gun laws were becoming too strict.

Broughton, whose full name was reported today by the Arizona Republic, told the newspaper he "wasn't seeking a personal spotlight by arming himself and strolling through crowds of Obama supporters."

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Topics: Barack Obama, Chris Broughton

Bush

Fran Townsend: We Discussed If Raising The Terror Alert Would Hurt Bush

Versha Sharma | August 21, 2009, 10:44AM

Fran Townsend, Bush's Homeland Security adviser and CNN contributor, appeared on the network again this morning to refute Tom Ridge's new claim that he was pushed to raise the terror alert on Election Eve 2004 for political reasons.

She repeated much of what she said on The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer last night - namely, that "there was no discussion of politics whatsoever," but she added some new contradictory information about "discussion on the margins."

"The only discussions I recall were on the margin - there was concern that if the intelligence supported raising the threat level, it might actually [be] to the detriment of President Bush because people might perceive it as being political," said Townsend.

Here's the video:

PERMALINK | COMMENTS | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (7)
Topics: Bush, Tom Ridge, War on Terror

Tom DeLay

Reporters Who Know DeLay Best: Quadriplegic Tale Is New To Us

Justin Elliott | August 20, 2009, 6:46PM

Two journalists who've covered Tom DeLay extensively over the years tell TPMmuckraker they've never heard of his story about protesters at a health care town hall in the 80s who "brought in quadriplegics on gurneys and dumped them on the floor in front of my podium."

"Jan Reid and I (and a researcher) spent a full year, reading clips and running down sources. Nowhere did I see any mention of quadriplegics brought in on gurneys," Lou Dubose, co-author of The Hammer: God, Money, and the Rise of the Republican Congress, tells TPMmuckraker in an e-mail. "We would have used if we had it."

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Topics: Tom DeLay

Tom Ridge

Tom Ridge: I Fought Against Raising Security Threat Level On The Eve Of 2004 Election

Versha Sharma | August 20, 2009, 5:10PM

In his new tell-all book, former Secretary Of Homeland Security Tom Ridge reveals that he was under intense political pressure to raise the national security threat level on the eve of the 2004 presidential election.

In The Test of Our Times: America Under Siege...and How We Can Be Safe Again, to be released September 1st, Ridge says that he fought against changing the terror alert and wondered at the time whether the Ashcroft- and Rumsfeld-backed request was about "security or politics," because while there was "nothing to indicate a specific threat and no reason to cause undue public alarm...Post-election analysis demonstrated a significant increase in the president's approval rating in the days after the raising of the threat level."

From the book:

On Friday, October 29, 2004, Osama bin Laden delivered a new videotape message that aired on the Arab language network Al Jazeera. The presidential election scheduled for the following Tuesday was tightening. The most recent polls had Bush leading Kerry by no more than two or three points. Having won my first congressional election by 729 votes and experienced the volatility of the election cycle during several campaigns, this race was literally a dead heat going into the final seventy-two hours.
...

We huddled that Friday night. Next morning we met early at the department's headquarters. The country was unaware that all levels of government had quietly ramped up security several weeks before the election, although not to the level that would have been required had we actually gone to a higher public threat level (orange). The timing of the tape may have been a surprise; the content was not. Within the department no one felt it necessary to consider additional security measures or to call the Homeland Security Council into session.

In a conference call with members of the Bush administration's national security and counter-terrorism team, Ridge pushed back against the request, which Attorney General John Ashcroft and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld were eagerly promoting.

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Topics: Bush, Tom Ridge, War on Terror

Tom DeLay

Does DeLay's Angry Quadriplegic Town Hall Protesters Tale Add Up?

Justin Elliott | August 20, 2009, 4:25PM

Last night on Hardball, Chris Matthews asked an exuberant Tom DeLay about the Tea Party/Birther agitation bubbling up around the country.

DeLay gave this response, which piqued our interest:

Chris, you shouldn't be surprised about this. This has been going on forever. When I did my town hall meetings, I'll never forget one back in the '80s -- on health care, by the way. They brought in quadriplegics on gurneys and dumped them on the floor in front of my podium. I mean, this is not new. What's new is, the people that came into disrupt my town meetings, we just let them go on because it usually turned off the people that were there. What's happening here is the American people are on their side.

Wild stuff. Sounds like the town hall protest of the decade -- but did it actually happen?

Here at TPMmuckraker, we scoured news archives for such an incident -- and called around, including to DeLay's spokeswoman, who has not responded to questions about the episode.

Then we got a look at a May 1996 article from the Houston Chronicle about a series of protests by the disabilities advocacy group ADAPT, brought to our attention by Democratic consultant Peter Lindstrom.

It begins like this:

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Topics: Tom DeLay

John Ensign

Sen. Ensign's Dad Withdraws Kansas Casino Bid

Rachel Slajda | August 19, 2009, 4:50PM

Mike Ensign, casino magnate and the father of Sen. John Ensign (R-NV), has reportedly dropped a casino proposal in Kansas.

The Associated Press reports that the group Ensign was working with, South Central Gaming Partners, decided to drop their proposal and instead back one by Foxwoods. The two firms had originally submitted competing proposals; now, Foxwoods' will go forward, along with that of a third developer.

An attorney for the Kansas Lottery, which is reviewing the proposals, said it was a business decision and that the lottery was not involved.

Mike Ensign and his wife were recently caught up in their son's scandal, admitting that they paid $96,000 to Sen. Ensign's mistress and her husband, both of whom worked for the senator. Mike Ensign earned around $300 million in the early 2000s when he sold his shares of the Mandalay Bay Group, which owned Mandalay Bay Casino in Las Vegas.

A few weeks ago, lottery officials said there'd be an ethics investigation into Mike Ensign before his proposal could be approved.

But now, an official says it wasn't a concern for the Lottery.

"That's not an issue to us at all. There hasn't been any allegation of wrongdoing at all," said executive director Ed Van Petten.

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Topics: John Ensign

Viper Militia

Heavily-Armed '90s Militia, Linked To Anti-Obama Activist, Resisted 'New World Order'

Justin Elliott | August 19, 2009, 2:35PM

Let's delve a little bit deeper into the black helicopter-infested world of the Viper Militia -- the 90's era group whose members ended up in federal prison and whose most prominent friend and defender, Ernest Hancock, staged the show of arms-bearing at an Obama event Monday.

A portrait of a feckless group of paranoid, right-wing, minimum wage-earning weapons enthusiasts -- 10 men and two women -- emerges from press accounts at the time.

Take Dean Pleasant, the Viper member whom Hancock called his good friend in an interview with TPMmuckraker yesterday. Pleasant couldn't hold onto jobs at Kathy's Donut Farm (too "lackadaisical," even though he always brought his Glock to work) or a part-time gig at military supply store Allied Surplus (where he was caught stealing "inexpensive items").

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Topics: Ernest Hancock, Viper Militia

Viper Militia

Activist Who Staged Gun Interview At Obama Event Was Prominent Defender Of '90s Militia

Justin Elliott | August 18, 2009, 6:47PM

Ernest Hancock, the online radio host who staged an interview with an assault rifle-wielding associate at the Obama event in Arizona yesterday -- and was himself armed with a 9 millimeter pistol -- was a vocal supporter and friend of right-wing anti-government militia members who were convicted of conspiracy and weapons charges in the 90s.

And in an interview today with TPMmuckraker, Hancock said he still believes the Viper Militia case was "manufactured" by the same government that manufactured Waco and lied to its people about 9/11.

The federal government initially accused the Arizona Viper Militia of plotting to blow up federal buildings, which the twelve-member group cased on videotape.

In July 1996, after a grand jury indicted the suspects, federal agents "seized about 90 high-powered rifles and hundreds of pounds of a bomb-making compound from the shabby bungalow of a man whom officials identified as the ordnance specialist of a local paramilitary group," the New York Times reported at the time.

Hancock, who in recent years designed the famous "Ron Paul rEVOLution" graphic, was an oft-quoted defender of the militia members. The tapes of the government buildings, he said at the time, were purely "educational."

"They don't have criminal records," another press account quoted Hancock, who knew all twelve militia members, as saying. "They just like their guns. And in Arizona, gosh darn it, that's normal."

PERMALINK | COMMENTS | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (45)
Topics: Chris Broughton, Ernest Hancock, Viper Militia

Jack Bonner

More Forged Letters: Astroturf Firm Invoked Struggling Seniors To Argue Against Climate Bill

Justin Elliott | August 18, 2009, 4:35PM

We're now getting a look at some more of those forged letters sent to members of Congress by D.C.-based astroturf specialists Bonner & Associates.

And these new letters plumb the depths of sleaziness.

The letters, written under the names of local senior centers, urged Reps. Kathy Dahlkemper (D-PA), Christopher Carney (D-PA), and Tom Perriello (D-VA), to make changes in the Waxman-Markey climate change bill because fixed-income seniors were worried about energy price hikes.