Lord knows I’ve uttered a critical word or two about Christine O’Donnell in the past. But as far back as December, I expressed doubt that anything significant would come from FBI and Federal Election Commission investigations into O’Donnell’s campaign finances. Now one of the two probes has ended, with the FEC dismissing a complaint filed by the Delaware Republican party that the O’Donnell campaign was coordinating with the Tea Party Express. We will see how the other investigation goes, but obviously there’s been no indication of charges being assembled in the past six months. So far, O’Donnell can claim some vindication on these matters.
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Partial Vindication, So Far, for Christine O’Donnell
It is quite possible that absolutely nothing will come of the reported FBI investigation of Christine O’Donnell’s campaign finances . We have a recent, quite comparable example, in a neighboring state. Back in spring of 2009, almost immediately after Michael Steele became chairman of the Republican National Committee, the Washington Post hit him with a page one story stating that the FBI was examining unverified claims from the finance chairman of his Senate campaign, alleging payments to his sister, Monica Turner, for work that wasn’t performed. As you noticed, Steele was never indicted, nor was there ever any word of prosecutors taking the case before a grand jury. To briefly summarize, the allegation would require us to believe that Steele schemed to divert $37,000 in campaign funds to his sister, a pediatrician who had considerable income and assets from her divorce settlement from boxer Mike Tyson, the sale of a mansion for $4.1 million, and a business consulting firm, Brown Sugar Unlimited. The payment to her company occurred in February 2007; so if the aim of the alleged scheme was to shift Steele’s campaign funds to his own pocket through his sister, the unusual allegation would contend that a figure with a full-time job and Fox News compensation, heading up a prominent Republican 527, with ambitions to run for political office again, allegedly engaging in fraud to divert about $37,000 – an extraordinary risk for a relatively meager reward. The claims came from a dubious source, the finance chair of Steele’s 2006 run, Alan B. Fabian, who offered the allegations to federal prosecutors in an effort to get leniency in sentencing for fraud charges in an unrelated case. Despite the information, Fabian’s sentence was unchanged. In April 2009, I spent quite a bit of time trying to nail down how far the FBI investigation had moved, probably irking RNC figures quite a bit in the process. Ultimately, there was little evidence that the Bureau’s investigation gathered anything of substance. At the time, I asked RNC spokesman Trevor Francis whether Steele had received a target or subject letter, whether he talked to the FBI, or hired a lawyer to handle any potential inquiry. Francis emailed in response, “the premise and the rumors are piles of [excrement]. There is no truth to any of it.” Francis later added that the answer to each of the inquiries was “no.” Special Agent Richard Wolf, the FBI’s Baltimore field office’s media coordinator, told me at the time he wouldn’t characterize the state of any investigation with Steele, but said, “A lot of times these things don’t wind down quickly and easily . . .
It may not have won her the election, but Yale University's associate librarian has deemed the opening line of Christine O'Donnell's first television ad the most memorable quote of the year. She and Sarah Palin made the top four : 1. (TIE) “I'm not a witch.” Christine O'Donnell, television advertisement, Oct. 4. 1. (TIE) “I'd like my life back.” Tony Hayward, comment to reporters, May 30. 3. “If you touch my junk, I'm gonna have you arrested.” airline passenger John Tyner, remark to Transportation Security Administration worker at San Diego airport, Nov. 13, 2010 4. “Don't retreat. Instead — reload!” Sarah Palin, Tweet, March 23. Jim Geraghty
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Get Ready For One More Round of ‘I’m Not a Witch’ Stories
Was it all a heist? A candidate who had persistent financial problems pulls off a surprise upset in the primary, and the conservative grassroots open their wallets wide and often in order to help ensure the campaign’s competitiveness – only to see the candidate end the campaign with nearly $1 million in unspent funds. Is this how Christine O’Donnell wanted it? Politico reported, “O’Donnell reported having $924,800 in the bank after the election was over, according to her post-general election campaign fundraising report, filed Thursday.” The explanation from O’Donnell spokesman Matthew Moran is that O’Donnell was advised by her attorney to reserve “several hundred thousand dollars” for after Election Day to use for legal challenges resulting from her campaign
This is what I wanted to see from the Christine O'Donnell campaign: The campaign is debuting a special site, CoonsTheTaxMan.com . UPDATE: Many readers say they notice a subtle allusion to the infamous “Bed Intruder song” in the slogan, “Hide your will.
I liked Christine O'Donnell's opening ad line of “I'm not a witch,” for lumping all of the criticism of O'Donnell together and labeling it with the wackiest and most ridiculous one. Here's the follow-up, which . . . well, decide for yourself. Fred “Demonsheep” Davis is an ad genius, so I'll defer to his judgment. But I don't know if I would have continued to parry the criticism; I might have gone straight to the kitchen-table issues. Instead, O'Donnell begins, “I didn't go to Yale.” Er, no, but she's been accused of serially misrepresenting her education record. She continues, “I didn't inherit millions, like my opponent.” Besides the slight dollop of envy it suggests, it's a poor defense to the accusations of stiffing former employees. Again, if the aim is to make the race about what's happening in Washington or what Chris Coons would do in office, turn to those issues a bit quicker — Election Day is in less than four weeks! Finally, the slogan “I'm you” recurs again, twice, and I'm not sure how far that will carry her. It's clear what they were going for, but perhaps, “I'm not the establishment” or “I'm not Washington,” or “I'm the only candidate that's as angry as you are about what's going on in Washington.” I find it too easy to imagine a voter saying, “You're not me.” For starters, if you went to Yale, she's explicitly saying she's not you. Maybe folks will love this ad, but to me it feels like a misstep. Jim Geraghty
The rest is here:
Christine O’Donnell’s Second Ad Debuts
From the Jolt : No, Really: This Christine O’Donnell Ad is Great. Ask, and you shall receive; nearly three weeks after winning the primary, Christine O’Donnell’s campaign is up on the air in Delaware. As you may have sensed, I was beginning to think her ads were going to come too late to make a difference. You all know I’m a Ruling Class RINO who thinks that if Christine O’Donnell will stiff her former employees, she’ll turn her back on anyone, right? So I’m inclined to be very, very skeptical. I still think she’s got to climb Everest and she’s trying to do it without oxygen masks. But this is a great ad . Intensely personal, perhaps the only approach that could cut through the noise that has surrounded her bid since she stepped into the spotlight. There’s almost a bit of vulnerability or awkwardness, and that almost becomes charming. I hope her campaign is getting this ad into heavy rotation. If it does, and the numbers don’t move, it’s effectively over; her image in the electorate’s mind is set and they won’t give her a chance to change it. But if it does, it means she’s broken through and refocused their minds on the question that can win her the race: Are you happy with what you’re getting from Washington? You cannot protest what Obama, Reid, and Pelosi are doing by sending Chris Coons, no matter what his ads seem to suggest. It must be Opposite Day; I’m nodding to this ad, while the kind-hearted Anchoress is underwhelmed: “Well, I like the playful 'I’m not a witch.' and the 'I’m nothing you’ve heard.' After that, I wanted to hear what she IS, and 'I’m you' didn’t tell me that. In fact, forgive me, but when I heard 'I’m you,' all I could think of was Linda Tripp’s disastrously-received 'I’m you' statement during the Clinton/Lewinsky debacle. Given her good looks, perhaps others will like 'I’m you,' but I also didn’t love the droning, 'none of us are perfect, but we all can agree . . .' No, it’s not working for me.” This morning adds two more odd wrinkles to a Delaware race. First, notice Coons's response in classifying himself ideologically : Two readers asked Coons whether he would “be willing to hold your head up high, and say, 'I'm a liberal and proud of it.' ” “There are areas where I'm solidly progressive, but I am also a fiscal conservative and don't think you can consistently label my positions with either liberal or conservative,” Coons responded. If he doesn't want to be identified as a liberal, that's what O'Donnell needs to do. Second, the officeholder coming to help Chris Coons persuade Delawareans not to vote for the candidate who has said wacky things on TV in the past is . . . Al Franken . Jim Geraghty
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The Once-Bearded Marxist Doesn’t Want to Be Called a Liberal.
On September 25, Christine O’Donnell Tweeted that her campaign had raised nearly $2.5 million since the primary, an astounding total. We are a month away from Election Day, and so far, the O’Donnell campaign has yet to air a television ad. I am informed by those close to the campaign that the ads should be going up “soon,” with the precise launch date still being determined by those producing the ads. Campaign strategists will argue whether it’s wiser to start airing ads early or to wait until the final weeks or days, when voters are presumably paying the most attention. This cycle has seen two Republican candidates take each approach, with each one enjoying the fruits of some success from it. Earlier this cycle, Florida Republican Marco Rubio’s campaign stopped television advertising once Gov. Charlie Crist departed the GOP primary. They ran no ads from May 1 to August 25; during that time, Charlie Crist enjoyed a poll surge, probably driven by his prominence in preparing the state’s response to the Gulf oil spill. But Rubio didn’t do too badly, and once Rubio ads went up on the air, his poll numbers popped up and his lead has grown steadily since then. In Nevada, Harry Reid greeted Sharron Angle’s primary victory with an avalanche of negative ads. Angle had led hypothetical match-ups, but as the general election began, Reid began to lead and Angle’s favorable numbers dropped. At one point the Mason-Dixon poll put Reid up by 7 percentage points. Angle went up on the air, pouring enormous amounts of money — about $575,000
No write-in bid for Mike Castle . His impact as a write-in candidate was looking pretty limited in that Rasmussen poll . But now Christine O'Donnell has to, for all extents and purposes, beat Chris Coons one-on-one. Robert Stacy McCain recently showcased how she's hitting Coons on taxes. Jim Geraghty
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It’s a One-on-One Race in Delaware
