If George Allen is a real man, he'll step forward, hold a press conference, fire Dick Wadhams. Never in the history of campaigns has a paid staffer said negative things about another candidate. This is the first time. Dick Wadhams is the first to cross that threshhold. He opened a pandora's box, and I'm "outraged"!
I'm going to post about this every day, because that's what my netroots masters tell me to do.
And then there are intimidation tactics of 20-year-olds (something that Wadhams is alleged to have done in South Dakota) and the two-faced apologies issue.
I do think this second issue in particular is especially serious. Allen's handling of the Breaks, VA incident reveals a great deal about his class, character, and beliefs.
Innocuous Wadhamsism--two that I've noticed . . .
1. On the AFL-CIO endorsement . . .
"The endorsement was "perfectly predictable," said Dick Wadhams, campaign manager for incumbent Sen. George Allen, a Republican. Allen "will enjoy the support of hundreds of thousands of union members," he asserted, but union leadership is "very liberal and Democratic."
In an off-handed manner the VA Pilot notes:
"The AFL-CIO's unions have about 80,000 members in the state, less than 3 percent of a work force that tops 3.4 million"
In other words, Wadhams either doesn't know what he's talking about or he simply doesn't care about "baseline" facts. No harm, no foul.
2. In reference to George Allen's Hollywood ties
"Wadhams said Webb can't hide from the fact that "he has been a Hollywood movie producer for the past 20 years."
Twenty years ago Jim Webb was assistant secretary of defense for veterans' affairs. In other words, Wadhams is conflating service to our veterans with Hollywood movie making. Once again, the man either doesn't care about his credibility or he's lazy with his facts.
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And then, there's the other side of this issue . . .
Waldo wrote about this one--it's a Bob Gibson story that I would class under the category "deeply troubling".
The Washington Post:
http://www.washingto...
Via J.C. Wilmore. I would note that Jeff Schapiro's RTD op-ed piece doesn't pull any punches or defer responsibility to Wadhams. This is squarely on Allen--as this ultimately should be. He's the guy writing the checks.
P.S. Just for the record, I don't know "monkey" or "banana" and had never heard of them before they appeared in Staunton a couple weeks ago. Like anyone else, they are perfectly free to post diaries here at RK, or over at Daily Kos, which they are doing. And RK administrators/editors are perfectly capable of promoting any diary they like, including those they think are funny or clever or whatever. That's all there is to this; most people I know think that the "monkey" and "banana" - whoever they are - happen to be hilarious. Perhaps Dick Wadhams and his right-wing bloggers don't have a sense of humor?
Wadhams pays bloggers and he is definitely on the dark side. He loved trashing Daschle.
Wadhams thought Sioux City was in South Dakota. OOOPS, give him a geography lesson quick Allen!!
He is use to squeaker campaigns, really into packaging and spinning.
Wadhams loves FLASH MOBS, and uses the terms people vs judges all the time.
Wadhams loves to distract from the facts or the issues (Allen needs to give him another lesson about facts not fiction). One technique was revisiting tax returns.
And that is just the tip of it. But you know, I think Webb is getting ready for everything that is going to be thrown, to include the kitchen sink or the toaster oven that Allen wrote an amendment on (maybe he stole that one too.)