Stones in my pathway
I’ll admit it, I can’t get enough of the Roger Stone (pictured above with his wife) controversy, wherein longtime Republican operative Roger Stone left an obscene, threatening message on Eliot Spitzer’s father’s answering machine. Roger Stone’s bio has all the hallmarks of a typical modern Repbulican story: stealing elections, sleazy profiteering, sexual perversion. We’ll begin our story with a snippet of a New Republic profile from 1985 (via the NYT’s City Room blog):
As a 19-year-old student at George Washington University, Stone was the youngest Watergate dirty trickster. On orders from Creep boss Bart Porter, Stone hired Michael McMinoway — known as “Sedan Chair II†— to infiltrate the McGovern campaign and report back. Using the pseudonym “Jason Rainier,†Stone made contributions to the New Hampshire McCloskey campaign in the name of supposed left-wing groups like Young Socialist Alliance. He then sent the receipts along with an anonymous letter to The Manchester Union-Leader.
Flash forward 30 years from the biggest political scandal of 70s — Watergate — to what should have been one of the biggest scandal of our generation, the Brooks Brothers riot of 2000. And what does Stone get for organizing the melee? Gambling money of course:
Roger Stone, the dirty-tricks hobgoblin of Republican politics, has exploited his Bush connections to become an influence-peddling force in the $13 billion Indian gaming industry. Stone’s booming business in such a federally regulated enterprise makes his recent pro bono orchestration of Al Sharpton’s double-edged presidential campaign an even stranger covert caper.
The longtime GOP consultant’s reward for fomenting the “Brooks Brothers mob” that shut down the Miami-Dade recount in 2000 was an invitation within days of Bush’s election to serve on the Department of Interior transition working group—helping, in his own words, to staff its Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). Stone has since used this unannounced perch to market himself to tribes and developers from Louisiana to California, earning fat fees and contingent percentages of future casino revenue. Just two of the five deals examined by the Voice are projected to pay him at least $8 million, and perhaps as much as $13 million.
And now he’s working for the NYS Repbulican party. One note on the Brooks Brothers riot: Stone is generally credited with organizing it, while former Republican Congressman John Sweeney actually led the protest.
The pictures filed under sexual perversion tell the real story. Obviously went to Haggard’s church, and hung out with Foley during down time. Yup, the Republican Party. “The Family Values Party” my …
And just like Reynolds proclaiming to have “not known” about Foley (LIE) Bruno will probably proclaim his lack of knowledge on The Swinging Stone as well. Sure Joe, we’ll believe you. Stone may have been involved in Watergate, but he’ll soon become Bruno’s Waterloo.
Poetic justice indeed.
Of course a better headline for this one would have been:
“Let he who is without sin cast the first STONE”
Sorry, but I can’t pass up the opportunity to make a classic blues reference.
My questions are:
1) Why did Stone (who’s presumably a very slick operator) do something so blatant, controversial and stupid?
2) Why did he target Spitzer’s father? Of all the people, why threaten to kill somebody’s nice old ziedy (yiddish = grandfather). Why not threaten someone you can actually harm and who has actual power you can subvert - like a reporter or democratic lawmaker?
Another part of Stone’s past is that he was Golisano’s main guy during his gubernatorial bids. Evidently, the folks who thought that meant the NY GOP was done with Stone were wrong.
[...] — we’ve got details about his inolvement in Watergate and the Brooks Brothers Riot here. But, as usual, Jay Gallagher does a good job of putting this sordid episode into the proper [...]
[...] Right now, we can watch the sliming begin in real time. What’s remarkable is the complicity of the so-called respectable media in all of this. Today, Republican hacks at CNN, the AP, and the New York Times write articles and conducted push polls questioning Obama’s patriotism. The AP article was the most absurd: the only source the reporter — Nedra Pickler — used was disgraced Republican operative Roger Stone (yes, that Roger Stone). [...]
[...] the investigation may (and I stress may) have been triggered by a tip from Roger Stone. Yes, that Roger Stone, he of Watergate, the Brooks Brothers riot, Plato’s retreat, and obscene phone calls to Eliot [...]