Two weeks ago, we had just completed one of the first major accomplishments since taking over leadership of the Kennebec County Democratic Committee in 2005. Between the combination of hard work by our candidate, Deane Jones, and his team, and the efforts of our County Committee and its volunteers, we won a special election for a State House seat.

Very soon after, the Christian Civic League was irate, attacking Planned Parenthood of Northern New England for paying for a "push poll" condemning Penny Morrell's abortion stance:

Over $918 has been spent within the last week by Planned Parenthood of Northern New England's Action Fund -- MEPAC on the campaign of Maine Democrat State Representative Candidate Deane Jones of Mount Vernon.  Jones is running for the Legislature's vacant House District 83 seat against Republican Penelope "Penny" Morrell. Morrell is employed by Maine Right to Life.  Jones was endorsed by EqualityMaine in his failed bid for the same office last year. (source)

And, in another article, they state "Pro-Sodomy, Pro-Abortion Forces Pick Up Legislative Seat" in the headline. They also state that Morrell "handily won" her hometown of Belgrade- but when you only win your Republican-leaning hometown by 80 votes, that's telling a different tale. One that involved someone calling to congratulate us on that achievement at the victory party, actually.

So, so far, so good. Nothing out of the ordinary. Right-wing crazies are pissed off that we beat them, and handily at that- by about 60%-40%. But this is where it gets weird.

On Monday, our county chair received an e-mail from the state party chair, Ben Dudley. He was forwarding a letter from Mike Hein of the Christian Civic League. I won't post the content of the e-mail here, but the gist was it was demanding her resignation because she was Pagan. The Pagan listservs are lighting up, talking about the action being taken by the CCL, and referring to this article:

Democrat County Chair Worships Witchcraft Goddess; Promotes Paganism

Rita Moran is well-known in Central Maine as the longstanding Kennebec County Democrat Chair and the the owner of Apple Valley Books at 121 Main Street in Winthrop. Less well-known is Moran's involvement in one of Maine's thriving underground pagan worship circles.

And it goes on from there. You can imagine that by now, people are a little nervous- they are posting the location of her store, her home, and multiple methods of contact. Anyone who visits Daily Kos regularly knows that they are inviting hatemongers to attack her. And it gets even more interesting in the comments section of the website.

Right in the comment submission form, it states that an e-mail is required, but will not be published. If you read the comments, you will see that there are e-mails in the comments supporting Rita, that have been posted there by the CCL. There is also personal information, as much as they could find on Google- including addresses, phone numbers, and even dates of birth. The comments themselves have been heavily edited, as stated by some commenters on some of the Pagan blogs (I won't source this, to respect their privacy- but Googling "rita moran pagan" should cover it if you're curious).

At first, we were hoping that this attack would be a simple deal. Crazy wingers attack, we ignore, they remain in obscurity. Rita wanted her privacy, as we keep our politics and our religion separate around here. But the actions of this organization are dangerous, to say the least. Contact with the hate crimes division is being considered.

Also, as Paganism is poorly understood, we stand to lose donors to the County Committee. Her small local bookstore also stands to suffer. So I will do what I'm supposed to do when we're attacked, and that is ask the progressive blogosphere to jump in and get our backs.

If you support our work in electing good Democrats to office, and fighting back against the Taxpayer Bill of Rights, and the referendum to repeal the gay civil rights, then get our backs. Join the Pagan community which has already been so generous, and help both the Kennebec County Democrats and Rita herself.

We have no overhead costs, and no paid staff. Every dime you give us goes directly to work, and we work for every Democrat in the county. Our State Senate is only held by a one-seat margin, and we plan to take back one of those seats in the heart of Kennebec in 2008. As many of you know, Maine is the testing ground for many types of legislation- Clean Elections included. "As Maine goes, so goes the nation." We intend to stay blue.

The Kennebec County Democrats ActBlue page is here.

And, the next time you want to buy a book, please consider buying it from Rita's bookstore, by clicking here.

I thank you for all that you do. Let's kick some winger ass!

(Crossposted at Turn Maine Blue)

UPDATE: I received from Rita a couple of notes she sent to the Pagan community and felt she should have posted here to break her silence. Some of the information is also included in the diary I wrote up, but better to post what she said than try to edit it like crazy. Also, some of the info is now a tad old, since we have received some donations from some folks in the Pagan community since this broke.

Sadly, as of now, none from DKos.

I've been a bit shaken up by all this. While I've never denied being Pagan, I considered it a private matter. Lots of folks figured it out; lots of folks enjoyed the plausible deniability my privacy offered. Perhaps even more disturbing is how Michael Hein and Company have both edited the comments supporting me, and investigated folks posting those comments, posting additional information about them which they did not want posted.

I have the full support of the Maine Democratic Party, and the Executive Committee of my own county Dems, and resignation is not in the picture.

My primary concerns are financial. When this happened, I "zeroed out" the donation total on our county Dems website ( http://www.kennebecdems.org). There has not been a single donation since I've been "outed". I'm even more concerned about the loss of business here at our bookshop as Michael Hein's attack turns to even more vicious rumors.

I guess what I'd ask from the community is whatever support they can offer. Tranquil energy, book orders, donations to our county committee if you wish to recognize that aspect of my community service.

and

Thanks to all for your words of support. Some of you have contacted me off-list to ask if I knew why I became a target, and why at this particular time. It wasn't until I had a great discussion with one of our local legislators that I was able to understand this.

Here goes: I've worked hard to become an effective county chair, leading a county which has many, many swing voters. If I were forced to resign, there is nobody with the time and experience to take over and do the job as it needs to be done in this critical cycle (a targeted US Senate race, plus a presidential election coming up next year). That's the "why".

The "why now" seems even clearer. On June 12th a special election was held to elect a representative to the Maine House. The principal difference between the two candidates was the issue of choice, with the Republican candidate actually being on staff at Maine Right to Life. We won, they lost and, two weeks later, the smear campaign began. Coincidence? You tell me.

UPDATE 2: The Christian Civic League has purged their website of comments. Anyone know how to find 'em in a Google cache?

UPDATE 3: We are up to over $600 in donations (and don't even know who raised us 3 of them!) Multiple people have given me information on how to score a Google cache of the comments, and they are saved on my hard drive.

The backlash on the CCL has been amazing. I'm sure that Michael Hein is just waiting for a group of mean old nasty Pagans to turn him into a newt. (He'll get better.) It doesn't look likely that we can prosecute for hate crimes, but we are eyeing what we can do in regard to their tax-exempt status. The hunt continues. Thank you all.