Josh Marshall Gets It (mostly)

Talking Points Memo has a piece up about Dick Wadhams' bad string of luck lately. But Josh misses the mark here:

Our best guess is that Schaffer basically missed the Abramoff scandal, at least compared to how people experienced it in Washington. Schaffer was elected in 1996 and term-limited himself after the end of his third term, leaving DC in early 2003. He then tried and failed to get the Republican senate nomination in 2004. There is something called newspapers and the internet. But it just doesn't seem to have registered with him how radioactive Abramoff and his clients had become.

This is not about Abramoff, it's about Schaffer's moral failings. We imagine Schaffer would have blindly supported the sweatshop industry even if Abramoff weren't the intermediary.

Schaffer either genuinely thinks sweatshops are A-OK and he wasn't influenced by the thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from sweatshop moguls, or he doesn't think thay are A-OK but is willing to say so because he got thousands in campaign contributions from sweatshop moguls.

Who cares if Abramoff was the middleman (even though the evidence that he was is about as convincing as the evidence that water is wet). The fact that Schaffer is, as Rep. George Miller put it so eloquently yesterday, one of the few people who would defend the exploitative system in the CNMI is really telling.

Either Schaffer is a principled sweatshop proponent or an unprincipled sweatshop proponent. Is one better or worse than the other?

Abramoff is just the icing. Schaffer's extremism and corruption is the cake.

Another Day, Another Sweatshop Schaffer Shocker

Last night, Talking Points Memo posted a story documenting Schaffer's long ties to Jack Abramoff's sweatshop industry clients that began with a Jack Abromoff-sponsored trip paid for by money funneled through supposedly Christian front-group Traditional Values Coalition.

This morning, the Denver Post piles on:

The two instances, in which Schaffer endorsed Fitial in ads in island newspapers, show that Schaffer has had close and enduring ties with key politicians on the American protectorate, extending relationships he developed while on a fact-finding mission there in August 1999. They also show that Schaffer was part of a concerted and public campaign by Republicans on the House Committee on Natural Resources to boost Fitial's public career when he became key to extending a multimillion-dollar lobbying contract for Abramoff from the island's government.

It strains credulity for anyone to claim Schaffer didn't know who Abramoff was, had never met him, or that Preston Gates was "just another lawfirm." Schaffer has still not denied any of the charges. In fact, Schaffer has yet to say one word about the controversy.

Dick Wadhams, on the other hand, is beside himself and can't seem to cough up a lucid quote. To the Post, his only response was that the Post was performing a "character assassination." We have news for Wadhams: you can't assassinate a character that is already dead. Schaffer committed character suicide by getting in bed with the sweatshop industry 10 years ago.

Not a Good Day for U.S. Senate Candidate Bob Schaffer

Last evening, smelling blood in the water, Talking Points Memo's Josh Marshall picked up on the Denver Post's earlier reporting of Bob Schaffer holding the immigration system in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands out as a model for how he thinks the U.S. immigration system should work, and provided some background on how that really worked--women "getting beaten, raped or coerced into having abortions."

This morning, the Denver Post reported in a front page story about Bob Schaffer's Jack Abramoff ties and his so-called "fact-finding mission." Among the facts that Bob apparently found were that he looks really bad in shorts, parasailing is fun, and "palm-studded beach resort[s]" are more fun when his stay in one is free thanks to Jack Abramoff. The wife thought so too.

The Post can't drop a bombshell like that without the whole universe picking it up. It is literally a blogswarm of epic proportion. Later in the morning, TPM came out with this video as a brush-up on some of the history of the Abramoff scandal:



Then, outdoing themselves, TPM revealed further background on the implicit Abramoff-Schaffer connection via the explicit and very public connection between Schaffer and sweatshop executive and Abramoff crony Ben Fitial.

The story comes out more and more by the hour, and Schaffer has yet to say one word in his own defense. Things are not looking good for Bob Schaffer. Not good at all--nor should they; he's created a big mess for himself. Schaffer once commented that he was the Dr. Phil of the Republican Party.

Heal thyself, Dr. Phil.

Update: We almost missed the AP coverage with this gem from Dick Wadhams who (literally) sounds like a broken record:

"We do look forward to when Boulder liberal Udall has Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to Colorado for Boulder liberal Udall to defend Sen. Reid's involvement with Abramoff," he said.

Poor Dick sounds like he's just about over the edge.

Schaffer Shocker: New Revelations in Bob Schaffer/Jack Abramoff Scandal Story

And we thought investigative journalism was dead.

Intrepid Denver Post reporter Mike Riley has apparently been a busy bee. He snagged this picture of Schaffer parasailingfact-finding in Saipan. He's managed to blow open Bob Schaffer's ties to Jack Abramoff, and Schaffer has essentially no defense other than to claim what will very likely be disproven, and may have been already:

Opponents "are trying to leave the impression that Bob went gallivanting off to the Mariana Islands with Jack Abramoff, who Bob has never met, never talked to and wasn't even aware was around back then," [Schaffer Campaign Manager] Wadhams said.

But just below that in the article:

At the time, Schaffer's staff also flagged the role of Abramoff's firm in the Marianas trip. In an August 1999 memo, Schaffer was told that travel arrangements to the Mariana Islands had been made by Preston-Gates. Handwritten notes on the agenda point out that a lunch meeting was with several current or former clients of the firm, including the Saipan Garment Manufacturers Association and the Western Pacific Economic Council.

How long do you suppose it is before Riley or another intrepid reporter or blogger turns up evidence to refute Wadhams' claims?

But let's keep our eyes on the meaning of this story. As commenter JohnSmith noted on the story:

Schaffer was there, the abuses were well-documented before he went and in the ten years since, and he still thinks it's a "model" system. Either he's still on the take from sweatshop owners in Saipan or he's completely in denial.

This is not a "Big Labor" dispute, this is an ongoing investigation by the federal government under both the Clinton and Bush administrations spanning over ten years, with mountains of documentary evidence. Ignorance is no excuse, so Schaffer's position must either be genuine or paid for. Either way, this story deserves further scrutiny.

Schaffer's Jack Abramoff Ties

ColoradoPols is beginning the blogswarm on what seems at this early juncture to be a big story:

We can't believe he brought up the Northern Marianas experience with immigrant labor as a good thing. Seriously, we're floored by this. You may not understand exactly what we're talking about yet, but by the time Democrats get through reminding you of the whole sordid story featuring Jack Abramoff, Tom DeLay, and forced abortions (you read that correctly) you will--everybody will.

We referenced the Denver Post story that led this off this morning, noting that Schaffer's immiigration stance has been all over the map in the last few weeks. But at the bottom of the story was the true nugget, his admiration for the Northern Mariana Islands and their system of immigration. A system, it turns out, that he got a look at first-hand:

And guess who went along in 1999 to 'check out the situation?' That would be Rep. Bob Schaffer, who has also taken thousands of dollars in campaign money from Saipan politicians linked to this same congressional squashing of human rights reforms. There are literally hundreds of stories out there on the Saipan labor rights issue, which subsequently emerged a key part of the Abramoff scandal.

What's really, really amazing to us is that we spent about 5 easy minutes searching up gobs of damaging information linking the Northern Marianas, Jack Abramoff, and Bob Schaffer.

Indeed. It will be interesting to see what unfolds from this little slip of the tongue.