Santorum’s Amnesia On Abramoff And K Street
Santorum’s Amnesia On Abramoff And K Street
Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) has been a key player in the K Street Project. After the 2000 election, Santorum began closed-door meetings every Tuesday with “a handpicked group of two dozen or so Republican lobbyists“:
Every week, the lobbyists present pass around a list of the jobs available and discuss whom to support. Santorum’s responsibility is to make sure each one is filled by a loyal Republican–a senator’s chief of staff, for instance, or a top White House aide, or another lobbyist whose reliability has been demonstrated.
It appears Santorum has caught a sudden case of Abramoff amnesia:
The senator does not recall meeting Mr. Abramoff,†[spokeswoman Virginia Davis] said. “He has no recollection of being introduced to Mr. Abramoff, and he does not know him.â€
Maybe we can refresh his memory: When Santorum launched the K Street Project in 2001, the first meeting was held with an ultra-exclusive group of D.C.’s ten most influential lobbyists. Santorum can play forgetful now, but back then, he chose Abramoff as one of the ten.
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We really need to get the repukes and of government and start over. How about a new Declaration of Independence. Here’s a beginning:
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen (NOW NINETEEN) united (BLUE) States of America.
When in the Course of (IN)human events, it becomes necessary for one people ( - THE REALITY-BASED COMMUNITY - ) to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of (SCIENCE, DARWIN,) Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation BECAUSE THE REST OF THE WORLD THINKS WE’RE A JOKE.
The complete version here: http://circus-minimus.blogspot.com/
January 17th, 2006 at 4:25 pmAnd these Republicans know they can get away with these lies, because I can’t imagine a major broadcast newscast calling the statement on never knowing a meeting with Abramoff for what it is. When we finally see on regular news the neutral facts here on TP used to immediately debunk the most eggregious and plain falsehoods that come out of politician’s statements, it will be a major positive step.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:34 pmLet the hunt for photos begin!
January 17th, 2006 at 4:37 pmWag your finger… I did not have financial relations with that man… Mr Abramoff…
Or as Reagan said, I don’t recall what I did that day.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:39 pm#3 Forget the photos, let’s find the blue stained dress. That’s all Republicans care about.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:39 pm#2 Jonah,
I’m sure that if not tonight, then perhaps tomorrow night, Keith Olbermann will have something to say about it. And if he remains his usual tenacious self, eventually NBC will have to say something. Then, of course, CBS and ABC will feel they have to follow. Fox News will probably invite the Senator on tonight (or tomorrow) to give him a chance to promote his other lies on the subject.
I’ll say it out loud: Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) is a liar. Go ahead and sue me, Senator. The truth is a defense against libel. And you lied.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:40 pmBut he’s a CHRISTIAN. So he must be honorable and truthful. Being a christian in Washington means you can get away with murder.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:42 pmNice picture, Amanda!
What’s he doing in that picture? Being forced to watch “Brokeback Mountain” against his will? He looks pained.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:42 pmThe best thing about Sanitorum is the verb/noun that columnist Dan Savage of The Village Voice made out of his name that’s now stuck to him.
yuck, yuck, yuck.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:45 pmI’ll say it out loud: Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) is a liar. Go ahead and sue me, Senator. The truth is a defense against libel. And you lied.
Comment by Wayne A. Schneider
Your girl Hillary couldn’t recal this or that 250 times while under oath. I wonder how many times she really could remember but didn’t want to go to jail?
January 17th, 2006 at 4:46 pmBut he’s a CHRISTIAN. So he must be honorable and truthful. Being a christian in Washington means you can get away with murder.
Comment by ohdave
Maybe that’s why Bill felt he had to carry that suitcase size Bible easily photographed with the smallest lens every time he made an appearance at some church.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:48 pmCorrupt is as Corrupt does.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:53 pm#8 - THAT is smiling to a republican. Pained is the right word.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:57 pmCan’t let it go, can ya, IRI? So sad you can’t move forward. Sorry dude, you can’t go back.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:58 pmNo matter how many times I go through the topic, I still think it’s about Rick Santorum. I wonder how anyone could be imbecilic enough to think it has anything to do with the Clintons.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:01 pmHe doesn’t Jack-off him in the “biblical” sense. Although from that picture, it’s hard to tell.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:01 pmWayne:
I don’t follow Keith Olberman, does he usually latch his teeth onto one of these blatant falsehoods until someone on the networks calls it for what it is?? good for him then, I wish had a cable a little more.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:02 pm#8 - He looks pained because he enjoyed it.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:05 pmJonah:
On his MSNBC show “Countdown” he’s been following the Jack Abramoff and CIA leak scandals from the beginning. When he’s not doing segments his producers “forced him to do against (his) will” (like celebrity gossip), he talks about the serious ethical problems in Washington. My wife and I have been watching more and more of him lately. I’m not sure how much is on his website, but I’m sure you can find out some of the things he’s covered there. Good luck and enjoy.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:05 pmIt’s no wonder no repug can recall meeting Abramoff, he doesn’t exist! (That’s a talking point coming soon to a Fox channel near you.)
January 17th, 2006 at 5:06 pm#14 - “Right between the I’s” loves to bring up old news when there’s no real argument he can make against bad news for the Republicans. It’s like a mantra: “But Pres. Clinton !!!”
You can always count on Pres. Clinton being evoked when the going gets tough, or the stink of the Republican scandals reaches to high-heaven.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:07 pmJonah, Wayne and I like Keith Olbermann because he’s smart AND funny. If you can get MSNBC, or even go to their website, check him out.
We’re outta here, it’s sleeting. Have a good night, all!
January 17th, 2006 at 5:07 pmDemocrat Soldier:
I know, but I’m just sick of him and that “Clinton did it, too!” defense. It was wrong then, okay? Everybody happy now? I don’t care who is corrupt, I want then gone.
One more time: Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) is a liar. he’s a liar and he has no ethical base from which to claim any kind of superiority, no matter how pious he would have us believe him to be.
P.S. Thank you for your service to our country. It is very much appreciated by all of us, and I’m sure you aren’t told that enough.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:11 pmI am absolutely gleeful all that the neocons have to offer up is Santorum. Look, they stand my him too. Truly desperate, but truly a good day for freedom. He is clinically insane and everyone knows it. Yep, slim pickings.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:13 pm#20 Just like the mob.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:14 pmSen. Santorum should resign for being corrupt and a certified fool > lol.
January 17th, 2006 at 5:30 pmSantorum “forgets” ties to Abramoff, K Street lobbyists…
Amazing how those memory lapses pop up just when the midden hits the windmill, doesn’t it?…
January 17th, 2006 at 7:19 pmThe Republicans should bring in the experts to find out what is seeping through the air vents on their side of the Senate. So many of them, suffer from frequent memory lapses recently — that there must be a reason for it — it couldn’t all be convenient memories, could it?
January 17th, 2006 at 7:23 pmRicky can’t remember anything. This is what belief in intelligent design will do to a person. And yes, he did cheat the taxpayers of PA by falsifying his “residence”.
OUTSOURCE SANTORUM
January 17th, 2006 at 7:46 pmComment # 4 by cynial exhippie
January 17th, 2006 at 7:48 pmRick doens’t have an excuse. Reagen did - it’s called early dementia.
Comment 5 - cynical ex hippie
LOL - I’ll start looking in my closet for a blue dress. Will that help?
January 17th, 2006 at 7:49 pmRick would enjoy Brokeback Mountain.
January 17th, 2006 at 7:53 pmAbramoff got his start in politics while at Brandeis, chairing the Massachusetts Alliance of College Republicans from 1980-1981. Teaming with Harvard contemporary and lifelong fellow traveler Grover Norquist, Abramoff’s organizational acumen allegedly won Massachusetts for Reagan.
As head of the Massachusetts Federation of College Republican Clubs, Jack Abramoff (elected National Chairman in 1981) produced over 10,000 youth votes. Reagan won by only 3,000 votes. [College Republican History PDF]
From the Mass. Alliance, Abramoff jumped up to College Republican National Chairman (CRNC), a post he held from 1981-1985. Soon after Abramoff took the reigns as CRNC, Ralph Reed showed up at his door looking for a job:
sure he doesnt remember….sure rick sure…
January 17th, 2006 at 8:36 pmAnd the Neo-kook plan Backfires;
When Santorum became conference chairman, he reportedly took over operation of the senatorial side of the K Street Project, which was initiated by Abramoff associates DeLay and neo-conservative Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform.
Named after the street on which many of Washington’s most influential lobbying firms are located, the K Street Project was meant to extend the GOP’s political domination beyond the White House and Congress to include industry — and exclude Democrats.
As former Washington Monthly editor Nicholas Confessore reported in July 2003, Santorum met every Tuesday with a dozen or more prominent lobbyists. The goal was to find high-level, well-paying corporate and trade-association jobs for former Republican congressional staffers and other GOP allies.
“(T)he GOP has made a determined effort to undermine the bipartisan complexion of K Street,†wrote Confessore, now a reporter for The New York Times. “Every week, the lobbyists present pass around a list of the jobs available and discuss whom to support. Santorum’s responsibility is to make sure each one is filled by a loyal Republican — a senator’s chief of staff, for instance, or a top White House aide, or another lobbyist whose reliability has been demonstrated. After Santorum settles on a candidate, the lobbyists present make sure it is known whom the Republican leadership favors.â€
Reaching for power
DeLay and Norquist initiated K Street after the GOP gained control of Congress in 1994. Defenders of the strategy have likened it to the methods used by Democrats when they ruled in Washington.
But others, like Elizabeth Drew, an author and contributor to the New York Book Review who has investigated the K Street Project, see it as something fundamentally different: a grab for total control.
“The Republican purge of K Street is a more thorough, ruthless, vindictive, and effective attack on Democratic lobbyists and other Democrats who represent businesses and other organizations than anything Washington has seen before,†she wrote in the Review, shortly after the Abramoff investigation became public. “… The K Street Project has become critical to the Republicans’ efforts to control all the power centers in Washington: the White House, Congress, the court — and now, at least, an influential part of the corporate world, the one that raises most of the political money. … DeLay, Santorum, and their associates organized a systematic campaign, closely monitored by Republicans on Capitol Hill and by Grover Norquist and the Republican National Committee, to put pressure on firms not just to hire Republicans but also to fire Democrats.â€
January 17th, 2006 at 8:51 pmGrover Norquist: Conservative Exposed as Terrorist Sympathizer/Enabler
There’s an incredible story brewing in Washington that is too hot for the networks to touch.
Grover Norquist, whom most conservatives know as Executive Director of the College Republicans, boardmember of the NRA, and head of Americans for Tax Reform, has been exposed as helping Muslim groups and individuals who finance and support Islamic terrorism gain access to the Bush White House.
Norquist has also been exposed as the founder of the Islamic Insitute, a group believed to be funded by foreign governments, Wahhab Islam elements in Saudi Arabia, and U.S. Muslim groups recently raided by a special Treasury Department task force for funding Al Qaeda and Palestinian terrorists
January 17th, 2006 at 8:53 pmI emailed that story to the news editor at the philly inquirer. Never know, if it makes the philly news, it could help reduce santorums re-election chances even more. I should email to the pittsburgh paper. Of course, I haven’t the foggiest clue what the major paper in pitt is.
January 17th, 2006 at 10:53 pmJeremy - I’m sure Pittsburgh already has that story. Santorum is not well like in the Pittsburgh region of PA. This is the region where Santorum abused tax payers money. Everytime Ricky opens his mouth, his opponents win another vote.
January 18th, 2006 at 7:51 amYour girl Hillary couldn’t recal this or that 250 times while under oath. I wonder how many times she really could remember but didn’t want to go to jail?
Comment by I-RIGHT-I #10
IRI,
You won, remember?
Get over it!
January 18th, 2006 at 8:54 am#
Your girl Hillary couldn’t recal this or that 250 times while under oath. I wonder how many times she really could remember but didn’t want to go to jail?
Comment by I-RIGHT-I #10
IRI,
You won, remember?
Get over it!
Comment by big papa — January 18, 2006 @ 8:54 am
Naw he only thought he won because he paid off the kooks, yet the kooks were kookier than the kookiest
welcome to the ‘Herd’ IRI you winner you
January 18th, 2006 at 8:57 amMuuhahahahaaaaaaa
see IRI people like you whom think your money, or position make you, cough cough, somehow ‘CL-ASSIER’ actually make you more corrupt and tend to self bloviate. And of course those whom self
bloviate do so because bloviation is nothing but opinions.
Something you are quite full of. It wont be long until the stress reaches critical mass and you, well, you lose ‘it’.
Now, go back to your sandbox and think about it. Spoiled Child.
January 18th, 2006 at 9:02 amcome to the hood for a real education IRI, and bring those tuff talking Neo-kooks with you.
January 18th, 2006 at 9:04 amSay Rick has a Nice round mouth –Richard Simmons
January 18th, 2006 at 9:16 amSantorum’s Amnesia On Abramoff And K Street…
It’s amazing to me how the Republicans think they can just pretend the past didn’t happen and no one will notice. Santorum is the poster boy for this kind of revisionist history that has become the norm for the Radical……
January 18th, 2006 at 12:38 pmYu shur have a purdy mouth rick.
January 18th, 2006 at 12:47 pmHomophobes like Santorum usually are closet queens, like Rush Limbaugh > they hate themselves!
January 18th, 2006 at 12:56 pmBut people who spew hate and intolrance toward others are usually so insecure that deriding others builds their self esteme, of course building up outward appearances to impress people also helps, might be a reason so many of the right in washington are getting caught with their hand in the till, costs money to keep those apearances up.
January 18th, 2006 at 1:27 pm[…] Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) has been suffering from a debilitating case of amnesia about his leadership of the K Street Project and his close ties to Jack Abramoff. […]
January 27th, 2006 at 4:52 pmsuitcase girl
This enables authors to keep track of who is linking to, or referring
March 31st, 2008 at 8:20 pm