Thursday, April 27, 2006

In Which the Ohio 13 Campaign Wears a Hole in My Soul


I got a break today from EMILY’s List-sponsored anti-Sawyer attack fliers courtesy of . . . an anti-Cafaro attack flier. This one was pretty well done as these things go and if it doesn’t prompt a lawsuit we will know that Betras’s threat was empty. What’s new in this is the reiteration of the charge leveled by AP last week that Cafaro's testimony that she donated money to candidates and was then reimbursed by her father may have violated campaign finance laws.

So yesterday was the City Club debate. Was she asked about it? If she was, the papers didn’t make note. Kucinich gets off his usual “if you did nothing wrong, why did you get immunity” jab, but evidently either doesn’t read the papers or didn’t bother to update his act.

And did anyone point out that Cafaro’s SAW plan would spend $55 billion before accomplishing anything? Well, that’s just a silly question. This is a political campaign; the last thing we want to do is talk about issues. How ‘bout more of Sutton and Sawyer bitching about when is a junket not a junket? Now that’s a campaign.

I like Betty Sutton but Lord am I hating on her campaign. She’s a good person with loads of potential. She deserved better than a beltway hackjob campaign that makes her look like a nippy, yappy toy poodle.

Meanwhile, the BJ’s Carl “Puffathon” Chancellor gets early consideration for this year’s Pot/Kettle award with this lede: “What the noontime faceoff of seven of the eight Democrats vying in the 13th Congressional District lacked in drama, it made up for in predictability.” Well Carl, back atcha. Maybe you want to ask just one difficult question next time you interview a candidate.

And the big news of the night is the new WKYC poll showing Sawyer, Sutton and Cafaro all tied. The only thing potentially more depressing than the possibility that Sutton’s remote-controlled campaign-by-numbers might lose her the primary is the possibility that it might win.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Talk about being influenced by "special interest" groups, Emily's List has run Betty's entire campaign. Makes one wonder, will they also run her congressional office should she be lucky enough to win??

k-pho said...

if it doesn’t prompt a lawsuit we will know that Betras’s threat was empty.

For the lawyers in the room: could she really sue Emily's list for quoting an AP story that says she probably did something wrong? (OK, by 'get sued' I mean 'have a chance of losing a lawsuit')

In short, can you actually lose a defamation suit when all you did was quote a news report?


I thought the flyer was ugly and kind of deceptive (such=politics), but she really made it easy for them with the lawsuit threat.

Frank said...

I hope Cafaro wins the primary. A pox on Sutton!

Anonymous said...

Betty should be ashamed of herself... and so should her mother for raising such a person.

Jeff said...

ends ... means ... ends ... means ... now, which one was it that never justifies the other? *head scratch*

I think she may win it, and I think it will take a long time for the stink to be cleared from the room, and for anyone to smile about her victory with any kind of conviction.

Great post, Pho!

BTW, anybody could file a defamation suit, but winning one is another matter, especially when you're a newsworthy public figure. My reaction is that there is no reasonable basis to sue here, and that she won't really try it.

Scott Piepho said...

You can be sued for reproducing something from a newspaper if it is untrue and if the defendant has the requisite level of culpability. Because Cafaro is a public figure, she has to show malice. This means she could only win if she proved that the person who reproduced the newspaper statement was reckless as to its truthfulness.

k-pho said...

Boy, I thought that the flyer you showed above was nasty, then I saw the follow-up that came today. More of the same, plus some newspaper quotes talking about people talking about the scandal, but used in a context to seem like they're about the scandal itself. Slimy.

Of course, Capri's faux newspaper thingy from today was annoying in its own way, but it didn't make you feel like you needed a shower afterwards.

Scott Piepho said...

And oh by the way, another lifted photo.