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Corked Bats.
Unbelievable.
Political Vine goes to town on Ralph Reed today in a scathing article that finally blows open this whole Ralph Reed gambling scandal. For those of you unfamiliar, and I imagine most of you are, Reed is running for Lt. Governor in Georgia in 2006 for the spot being vacated by Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mark Taylor. But he's been embroiled in scandal since he announced, most recently in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Ralph Reed delivered what was expected as a consultant to two Alabama anti-gambling campaigns: victories over proposals for a state lottery and video poker, and donations totaling $1.15 million.
But Reed didn't tell the campaign organizations -- and, he insists, he didn't know -- that the money came from a Mississippi Indian tribe trying to protect its casinos from competition.
Reed is insisting that in the campaign he coordinated, he was unaware that $850,000 dollars came from Gaming interests that were looking to reduce competition.(The other $300,000 came from Grover Norquist's anti-tax ATF--more on this later) Rep. Randy Hinshaw, a Democrat from Georgia, put it best, I believe:
Republicans blocked last-minute efforts to revive a bill requiring nonprofit groups -- such as the Christian Coalition -- to disclose the sources of money they use to buy advertisements to influence referendums. The sponsor, Rep. Randy Hinshaw, a Democrat from Huntsville, said he was skeptical that such groups don't know where their money comes from.
"You give me $850,000," Hinshaw said Tuesday, "and I'm going to know who gave me that so I can give them a big ol' kiss."
Up to speed? Great, because now it gets juicy.
In 1999, during this whole anti-lottery operation, a rather interesting phone conversation occured between an employee of Ralph Reed's company, and a Gwinnett County-based sub-contractor of Ralph's. The sub-contracting mailhouse operator was hired to offload some of the direct-mail demand for the anti-lottery effort.
The sub-contractor observed that much of the mail that Ralph Reed wanted his company to process was sent out as "first-class, pre-sort," a rather expensive way to send direct mail, especially in the volumes it was being sent.
The mailhouse sub-contractor was curious about who was financing all of this mail expense. So, one day, back in 1999, he was in a phone conversation with a Century Strategies' employee, coordinating the production of a mail piece and the date it was to drop. The sub-contractor asked the Reed employee "Say, ___, you guys are sending all this mail as first-class, pre-sort...where is all this money coming from?"...and, the Reed employee paused, then said, with a quiet chuckle: "That's the big joke around here! Biloxi casinos!"
Now, if an employee of Century Strategies knew the source of money was casinos, then, it's for sure that people like Ralph Reed, Tim Phillips, and John Pudner knew damn well where the money was coming from.
So who is the source of all this information? Some disgruntled liberal? An opponent in the race for Lt. Governor? The Democratic Party of Georgia? Oh no.
Mark Davis of Data Productions, a well-respected businessman and Republican in Georgia and someone whose integrity is unquestionable. (Mr. Davis initially told us this story about 4 months ago...long before either the Globe story or the AJC story.)
He is also someone who won't be working for either candidate in this Lt. Governor primary, so, we know he has no monetary interest in the outcome. Why did Davis come forward with this information? Davis told the Political Vine that he is very concerned that Ralph Reed would "weigh down the entire ticket with his political and professional baggage" if he wins the primary.
As a result of this experience with Reed in 1999, and observations of Reed's other campaign dealings, Davis long ago quit doing business with Reed. Davis told us point-blank the reason why: "I stopped doing business with Ralph Reed or any of his companies because I don't like the cavalier manner in which he manipulates the faith of Christian voters for personal gain. If he doesn't answer for that on Election Day, one day he will answer to his Maker, and I don't think he'll be happy. The Lord hates a hypocrite."
So what is Grover Norquist's role in all this? Americans for Tax Reform wouldn't seem to play any role in all of this anti-gambling nonsense. Unless it were to do something like, oh, launder money...
Grover Norquist dreamed-up this new "anti-lottery" statement to avoid an investigation into the use of Americans for Tax Reform as a money washing machine to hide the source of contributions from Indian casinos in Mississippi to the anti-lottery forces in Alabama.
In the AJC article, it was revealed that one of ATR's Federal Tax supplemental filings was accidently given to a writer for The Nation magazine in 1999. The filing revealed that $360,000 was given to ATR by the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians.
Priceless. Please recommend this--people need to know that the theocons are going to become all the more dangerous if Reed sets a precedent by getting elected to office in Georgia.