| The Republicans actually have a candidate in NJ6 to run against Frank Pallone, former Holmdel and Keyport Municipal Court Judge Robert McCleod. It doesn't seem like much of a challenge -- on his website the link to "What's Wrong With Frank Pallone" comes up 404 and all the information in on Word documents -- he has the great Republican ability to twist facts to the breaking point and use Chris Christie politically.
What? Use Chris Christie politically? How is that possible when Christie is such a non-partisan crusader against fraud and corruption?
Anyway. Back to McCleod. Apparently he has decided to pretend that Chris Christie impaneled a grand jury just for Frank Pallone to investigate his connections to the health care industry. Here's what he wrote in a "memo":
Attorney Chris Christie impaneled a federal grand jury to investigate whether Pallone had been the beneficiary of improper campaign finance actions by officials at UMDNJ.
The grand jury was impaneled to investigate problems at UMDNJ, not to investigate Pallone. In fact, according to the article McCleod points to as the source for his attack, it was not Pallone who was investigated but a lobbyist who raised money for Pallone. Pallone was not a target at all, much less the reason the grand jury was impaneled.
In a less cynical era we'd call it a lie, but today it is spin.
McCleod takes it a step further, stating as fact his own guesswork based on his own false interpretation of the facts:
To ward off any further action by this grand jury Pallone commenced his pattern of counterattacks on Christie and later John Ashcroft. "The Jersey Boys," The American Spectator, Washington Prowler, January 14, 2008.
There is no evidence, or even suggestion, in the article referenced, that Pallone went after the $50 million no-bid contract Christie gave Ashcroft as an effort to protect himself. It would have been stupid to draw attention to himself and piss off Christie, but he did it anyway. McCleod made up the accusation out of whole cloth, then attributed it to a third party to make it look real.
And to make it all perfect, McCleod decides to play the gay card. This one is really pretty funny:
Besides enriching himself with contributions Pallone is doing the bidding of Rep. John Conyers, Jr., Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, and another big recipient of Stryker family money. The Stryker family is also a big contributor to the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, a cause close to Pallone's heart, or another body part.
This is the level of discourse we get from the New Jersey Republicans? This is the kind of person who gets to be a municipal judge? Goodness gracious. |
