Campaign 2006 Archive

So, I was reading TPM today and found myself chuckling with the Federal probe completed today commenting on the fact that Lieberman’s website was not hacked, rather that the takedown of the site during the day before the primary election was due to “misconfiguration”. From TPM (by way of the Stanford Advocate):

A federal investigation has concluded that U.S. Sen. Joseph Lieberman’s 2006 re-election campaign was to blame for the crash of its Web site the day before Connecticut’s heated Aug. 8 Democratic primary.

The FBI office in New Haven found no evidence supporting the Lieberman campaign’s allegations that supporters of primary challenger Ned Lamont of Greenwich were to blame for the Web site crash.

Lieberman, who was fighting for his political life against the anti-Iraq war candidate Lamont, implied that joe2006.com was hacked by Lamont supporters.

“The server that hosted the joe2006.com Web site failed because it was overutilized and misconfigured. There was no evidence of (an) attack,” according to the e-mail.

And the shame of it all was the negative publicity and slander on Lamont Internet Director, Tim Tagaris. At least in some circles, he finds some relief.

Hey Tim, I know how you feel.

And, one comment - I think I said something to this effect back in August of 2006 where I assumed the site was overloaded based on the facts form the blogosphere. From that post:

My guess is that the server was having problems because shared servers are reknowned for having limited number of web clients to handle traffic. No amount of bandwidth can address not enough web server processes to handle the enormity of requests.

Tim - more power to you.

The following is a joint statement that Eric Massa and I have collaborated on drafting which follows the libel complaint described in this post.

Emphasis is mine.

Read the rest of this entry »

Update March 6th, 2008: As of this afternoon, the libel suit is settled and a joint statement for the press will be released in due time.

Arbitration Hearings Cancelled
With just 96 hours left until the arbitration hearings were to begin, Eric Massa conceded that the campaign was responsible for upholding my contract, which was the original reason for this arbitration. Eric Massa also withdrew with prejudice (meaning he can not try to bring them up again) the counterclaims that he had made against me in the arbitration.

While I am pleased about being vindicated against Eric Massa’s efforts not to pay my wages and finally getting paid the money I was owed, it came at a high cost of six months and close to $50K in legal bills, whereas Eric Massa was able to use some of his campaign funds (see [1], [2]) and free legal staff/services to support him through this process. Meanwhile, my political professional life was damaged beyond repair due to his false and empty allegations.

While this is a significant battle to have won, the war for my good name is not over yet. Unfortunately, Eric Massa did not retract or concede the false and inflammatory accusations he made about me that hit the press during the 2006 campaign. The impact of these unfounded accusations still reverberate in my personal and professional life long after the campaign ended.

Ongoing Lawsuit against Eric Massa
I filed the libel complaint (on Nov 2nd, 2006) against Eric Massa to get back my good name
by either winning the lawsuit in open court or getting Eric to publicly concede his false accusations (see this post) as part of a settlement.

While I could have filed the lawsuit before that date (because of his libelous emails), due to the nature of these allegations and the major story of the day regarding Rep. Mark Foley, I knew that any action of this nature could seriously impact the success Democrats were having in taking back the House. By waiting until after the story broke in the national news, I was demonstrating my resolve not to hurt the Democrats in reclaiming my reputation, regardless of whether he won the seat or lost.

Instead of settling, Eric Massa filed a motion in NY State Supreme Court in New York City to dismiss these charges on a technicality. Eric Massa’s lawyers, Dealy and Silberstein, strongly believed the dismissal would succeed. I disagreed.

I could go on with more detail, but if you want to know more, contact Eric Massa at emassa@massaforcongress.com for his response to this ongoing lawsuit. I am moving forward with my life, and this post is simply a way to update the people who have been asking as to where things stand at present.

Thank you again for your support, and I look forward to updating you with more positive news soon.

Tags: Eric Massa, Massa v. Dickert, Eric Massa Arbitration, Eric Massa Lawsuit

It is 12:15am and I have been up watching the returns. I am thrilled that the Dems have won the House - and maybe will win the Senate, but I will find out tomorrow morning. Jim Davis in Florida did not survive the Charlie onslaught - had so much feeling like the Kerry-Bush debates.

I am tired and want to move forward, clearing my name and resolving the issues. I have, and will continue to defend myself - and will do so in a way of integrity and honor. I am still a life-long Democrat, and I will still support Democrats whenever asked or given the opportunity. I look forward to 2008 and what will happen in the coming years.

While my work may be focused elsewhere, I still feel that you should go out and vote whenever and wherever you can. Today, if you have come to the site for my coverage on the Florida’s Governor race, you should go to the following sites for information on polling sites:

• Jim Davis’ site - this page has all of the links to each of the Election Supervisors - and their websites.
• Florida Division of Elections - Crist redirects you here, as does Davis, but neither make it easy to find your polling place.

If you are here for the NY-29th, then you should use the following to find your polling place:

• Vote411.org - a terrific site which has ALL of the polling locations (which the earlier links do not provide)

Whatever you do, make sure you get out and vote this cycle - it is about make a change happen in the country, and while it does not have the glamour of a Presidential election, it is still a very important one. Go out and create a great country.

Tags: Election 2006, Florida Governors Race 2006, Campaign 2006

Well - very interesting - all I can say is that I am glad Chris Matthews made it a better debate that the sterile debates I have seen in the past. His presence and persistence in getting answers form the candidates (Attorney General Charlie Crist and Congressman Jim Davis), handling the surprise appearance of Reform Party candidate Mark Linn, and managing the meandering of the political rhetoric was a breath of fresh air. A quick run down of some of the better reporting:

• Mark Hollis gives a terrific run-thru of the debate for the Sun-Sentinel (and thanks for the video feed!)
• Laura Fiorilli from TBO has a terrific spin on the debate - including a much meater way of looking at what was said.
• Adam Smith of the St. Pete Times also talks about the impact the debate had on Crist.

I also just went reading the blog posts suggested by Laura but was kind of underwhelmed by the commentary (except for Interstate4Jamming’s.

As I have in the past, I will give a blow by blow on each of the issues questioned by Matthews to the candidates. In truth, this is as best as I could glean from watching the debate. IMHO, I think Matthews relished clamming on the pols for their squishy answers, and in particular seemed to get Crist when he could.

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Wow. I spent last night and this morning watching and rewatching the Florida Governors debate between Attorney General Charlie Crist and Congressman Jim Davis. I was equally flummoxed and amused over the course of the debate. In some ways, it was almost a rerun of the Davis/Smith debate - just with a taller opponent against Davis and no Big Sugar references. From the debate - if you read the papers - you’ll hear:

Crist: Empty chair. People’s governor. You have the worst record. Rhetoric has to stand up to your record. You can see it on my website.
Davis: 40% reduction in insurance premium. Not just show up, you have to stand up. Stay the course or change course. $1B down payment. Special interests have to pay their fair share.

My favorite moment was Davis’ showing his insurance premium statement to Crist - totally surprising, but Davis looked kind of stiff, where Crist looked fluid. The laugh was well needed.

My biggest disappointment regarding this debate was that there was lots of political policy talk, and little in the way of explaining nuance or reasons. Both candidates could say whatever they wanted - and, for most viewers, looking into the details is almost impossible to do so. So, you are left with believing the messenger versus the content. Given the format of the debate - and the content - I am not surprised that anyone was able to “stay the course”.

As I did the last time with the Smith/Davis debate, I will try to summarize what each said with each question and give my opinion on success of the candidates. Understand, your mileage may vary since I am not a talking head for any major television network…

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Prior to the primary, the Florida Governor’s race was an exciting time on the Democratic side - two campaigns fighting it out - discussing issues and accusations of poor judgement and being in the pocket of some big industry PAC - and the television was filled with discourse on who would be the better candidate on the Democratic side. After the fighting was done and the votes were tallied, Rod went back to Alachua and Jim went back to determine who would be his running mate.

What’s happened since? Davis selected a terrific running mate for Lt. Governor, Daryl Jones and then went into fundraising mode. As reported in the St Pete Times, Davis has lagged in all of the metrics most political operatives discuss in terms of fundraising, field offices, television, and public appearances. I could have also given the same measure, simply by noting the Internet effort that occurred soon after the election. Much like the failed Betty Castor campaign in 2004, the Davis campaign has lost its online engagement strategy and the momentum is waning. Based on this measure, and previous experiences with other Florida campaigns - I worry that the Davis Campaign is in a hole - and, unless a heroic effort is undertaken, we will be discussing Governor Crist.

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Wow - after a hotly contested race, Davis wins. That is amazing. With the low turnout in Broward and Dade Counties, I guess the perceived advantage Smith had in the northern part of Florida did not offset the advantage Davis had in the I-4 Corridor. It is funny, we had a very similar situation happen to us (on the Deutsch Campaign) where we spent most of our time in the South Florida area and little up in Tampa or along the I-4. I understand that the Smith campaign did better, but my assumption is that Davis was more effective. And, in addition, the low turnout in Broward did not help Smith. I look forward to the breakdown of the votes in the major media markets and see how effective the campaign truly was.

Rod - a good fight was fought, and now we have a Governors mansion to win in Tallahassee. Go Davis!

Tags: Rod Smith, Jim Davis, Florida Governor

Only in Florida can a campaign be sidelined by Mother Nature - and campaigns are trains that, by themselves, are forces to be reckoned with. After Ernesto cancelled the debate for Tuesday, the Davis/Smith campaigns have had a field-day regarding whether or not to commit to another debate.

As reported in the Miami Herald, the Smith campaign decided not to commit to another debate because of the planned campaign stops in Northern Florida. The Davis campaign got a chance to give a shot about Smith’s connections with US Sugar. It was reported in the Palm Beach Post that Davis was ready as of 2pm Wednesday to be at the debate, but by 4pm, the Smith campaign decided that it would not work to be in West Palm Beach and still handle the campaign schedule they had already planned.

Is this horse-hockey?
Being on campaigns now for a bit of time, the time for prep and getting all of the practice in is extremely demanding on a campaign. I can speak to the stressors and efforts put into the Kerry and Deutsch campaigns to prepare for their debates - especially trying to get all of the advisors ready and to agree on what is the best spin on a topic. But, Rod is a natural orator. He was materful in the previous debate - and impromptu has never been his weak point.

Could it be that the efforts of ads, mailers and the previous debate (that is more than likely replying over and over again on PBS) was enough that Rod does not need any more visibility? With the Strategic Vision Poll out (reported by FLA Politics) yesterday, is it suprising the Rod is feeling the momentum that precludes a showing on local television? The amount of votes Rod is going to gain from this North Florida run that he has not already won is miniscule - compared to what exposure he might get given a focus on a West Palm debate. Think about the additional coverage he would get from WSVN and other local stations in a rich Democratic region like Broward County… Or could it be that Labor Day Weekend is not the best time to expect people to see candidates on television - especially since they would be heading out for a holiday with the family, and not sitting in front of the TV.

Truth be told, the race is almost over. After Labor Day, the decision will be made. The people coming out more than likely have already made their mind. The question is - who do you support?

Tags: Rod Smith, Jim Davis, Florida Governor