Some Republicans still think their Schmidt don't stink. Indeed, Mean Jean ranks as one of the deep thinkers of the GOP, the creme de la creeps, one of the illiterati who couch their opposition to health care reform in philosophical terms.
Schmidt and Limbaugh decry the "Culture of Victimhood" that they see infecting liberal America, the unreal America where freeloaders trump up stories of how they have been victimized in order to claim rights and privileges unbefitting their station or race.
In a frenzy over HCR passage, Ms. Deep Schmidt, facing a severe reelection challenge, decided that she can't cut and run. Rather, she must get in on the act.
On March 24, Schmidt's Chief of Staff told media that the congressentity from Ohio had received a voicemail message threatening her life. The incident played off another during the runup to the 2008 election, when Schmidt outright claimed that a man tried to kill her by running her down (in a car).
Schmidt is bucking for a two-fer: two sympathy-vote election victories on the basis of one concocted "victimhood" allegation. Neither incident involved any real "threat" on her life.
Before getting to the sordid but less-than-gory details, let's realize that Schmidt's new allegation is one of two in which anti-HCR Republicans have claimed that they have been targeted with violence. On the very same day, as if timed to coincide (perish the thought), Eric Cantor, with a Schmidt-eating grin, said
"a bullet was shot through the window"
of his Richmond, VA, campaign office.
That sounded scary! Until, that is, Richmond police determined that the bullet's trajectory was almost straight downward, the bullet only grazed the window but did not penetrate the office, and the office wasn't Cantor's but another office in a building that ALSO houses a Cantor campaign office.
Perhaps God has it in for Eric Cantor. But assuming God would have better aim, Richmond police concluded that some numb-nuts (probably an NRA Cantor supporter) had fired a gun into the air (trying to hit God?), in lack of consideration for the laws of physics.
Sorry, Eric, you don't qualify for Victimhood Obamacare this go around.
The Schmidt assassination hoax is a bit more complicated, and right off we ought to question: Why does it make sense that anyone would target the LOSERS of the health care reform battle AFTER the vote? Schmidt and Cantor both released statements accusing dark angry forces (racial implications intended) of wanting to "punish" them for their "no" votes.
This makes no sense at all, even in that bizarro-planet wingnuttery sort of way. The stance of Schmidt and Cantor had been well known. If anyone cared enough to seriously threaten or off the two, why not make that move before the vote? And why "punish" politicians who have already lost their battle?
I point this out only to lay an important foundation for understanding what actually happened: Schmidt thinks that her home audience, consisting largely of Appalachians and evangelicals, is so stupid that these folks don't even understand the logic of punishing a bad-ass politician. Oh, but we do!
Schmidt and her operatives also hope that people won't remember the details of the hoax assassination attempt of 2008. But some of us do! In fact, I published a DailyKOS diary on the incident at the time, subtitled "The Politics of Victimhood," which you can read here: http://www.dailykos.com/...
To summarize that diary: Only four weeks before the 2008 election pitted Schmidt in a rematch against Victoria Wulsin, Schmidt, a marathon runner, claimed to be the victim of a deliberate hit-and-run outside her Miami Township home, while jogging at 5:45 am.
According to Schmidt's story, which was reported without challenge by virtually all Ohio media outlets, Schmidt saw an approaching car that headed straight for her. Before the car hit, Schmidt turned her back to avoid a frontal impact, and then jumped into a ditch alongside the road. Schmidt said she saw the color of the car and the face of the male driver, her alleged assassin.
As a result, Schmidt broke some ribs and fractured some vertebrae, but she allegedly felt well enough to board a plane headed to Afghanistan, on a mission supposedly requested by the Department of Defense.
In great pain (which was no doubt real), Schmidt left the US Air Force base in Germany, where her flight first landed, to seek off-base medical care at a private German hospital. (That socialist German health care is so superior, don'tcha know.) Upon return to the U.S., Schmidt suspended her campaign for a crucial week of recovery, and Wulsin, who is an M.D., did likewise to avoid any criticism. Wulsin never challenged Schmidt's version of events, and Schmidt went on to widen her margin of victory over Wulsin from 1.5 to 4.5 points.
But there were enormous problems with Schmidt's story, and I wasn't the only one to realize it. Virtually all thinking people in the district smelled a rat, and not one behind the wheel of a car. Because many voters blamed Wulsin for letting Schmidt lie with impunity, the anti-Schmidt vote split, and Independent David Krikorian (now running as a Democrat), garnered 18% of the total vote, the highest of any Independent in a congressional race that year.
Here are the problems with Schmidt's 2008 story:
- At 5:45 am in October, it is pitch black in Miami Township. That means the car allegedly came at Schmidt head-on in the dark with its headlights on. If so, how could Schmidt possibly see the driver's face or the color of the car?
- If the car came at Schmidt head-on, aiming to kill her, how could Schmidt possibly have time to turn around and then jump out of the way? (Note: It was crucial to the story that Schmidt had time to turn around, in order to explain the pattern of injuries to her backside. Schmidt claimed the car struck her back.)
- Long after the story broke, it was revealed that Schmidt did report to a Cincinnati hospital, where X-rays did reveal the broken ribs and fractured vertebrae. That being the case, why did Schmidt then board a plane for Afghanistan, before getting her injuries treated?
- Assuming she did realize the extent of injuries on the plane, why didn't Schmidt seek care at the U.S. AFB hospital? Why did she insist on going off-base?
These inconsistencies are definitive: While Jean Schmidt's injuries were no doubt real, she did not receive those injuries in the way that she reported. The police investigation went no place, and there are indications that the police shared my skepticism. Something else happened. What was that something else?
There are various possibilities, but here is my best guess, an opinion I have not altered: Schmidt was running on the wrong side of the quiet road, with traffic instead of against traffic, probably distracted. When a car came up behind her, it surprised her, and not being able to see where the car was, she reflexively jumped off the road into a ditch, causing her injuries (landing on her back). Her injuries were self-inflicted.
Realizing that an admission of the true circumstances might jinx her reelection, I think that Schmidt and staff concocted the assassination story as a way to salvage the sorry affair and win the election. To accomplish the hoax, it was necessary for Schmidt to refuse local care, or care at the base hospital, and get treatment on foreign soil, from practitioners who would be less likely to spill the beans.
So Jean Schmidt suffered an excruciating plane trip in order to keep her congressional seat. And it worked. MANY citizens in OH-02 familiar with Jean Schmidt's pattern of lying reached the same conclusion as I did, independently.
Now Jean's pulling the same rigamarole to keep her gubmint health care for two more years, by which time she can rely on the Obamacare provided for all.
According to the 2010 assassination conspiracy theory, a caller readily identified as African American (speech pattern and content), and so identified in numerous right-wing blog comments, threatened Representative Schmidt's life on March 24. Barry Bennett, Schmidt's Chief of Staff, reported the call immediately to The Hill, aka DC Gossip Monger Magazine (fast thinking, Barry!), portraying the caller with these words:
"who talks of wishing the congresswoman had broken her back [in 2008]."
Oh really, Barry? (Barry and I are on a first-name basis, usually shouting at each other at public events). At this point it might help to point out that Barry Bennett served as both Chief of Staff and Campaign Manager to Schmidt during the 2006 campaign, until it was pointed out that this arrangement is illegal. Since then, Barry serves the campaign role only unofficially.
Parliamentary inquiry: Would advising a congresswoman to lie about a criminal complaint count as a campaign function or a legislative function under federal statutes? I'm genuinely unclear about this.
In any case, Barry lied. He knew that the caller did not "wish" that Schmidt had broken her back. (How do you wish something past tense, and is that a threat?) What the caller actually said was:
"Jean Schmidt, when you got hit by that car or fell down, whatever, you shoulda broken your back."
Meaning, given the known hoax that Schmidt had pulled in 2008: IF you had really been hit by a car head-on as you claimed, THEN by the laws of physics, you should have broken your back, but you DID NOT.
In other words, the caller was calling out Schmidt's 2008 lie, a lie that sticks in the craw of many an OH-02 voter, since we now rely on the liar for representation.
Now the caller, obviously inebriated or just very angry, also said some other things, but none of them constitutes a threat on Schmidt's life. He repeatedly calls Schmidt and neighboring congressman John Boehner "racists." (Anyone want to argue with that?)
The caller also refers to Tea Party violence that had already made the news, and he says:
"If teabaggers woulda spit on me, I woulda shot them in the f**king face with my f**king 9 millimeter."
In other words, a black man is saying that if they come at him with violence, he's going to defend himself. That may be scary to the likes of Jean Schmidt, but that's the way things work in real America in 2010.
We can be quite certain of what was said, because Barry Bennett, in his "legislative" function, made the voicemail available to YouTube, fanning the flames of violent discourse, and enabling scads and scads of racist hatemongering on the wingnut blogs.
Here's the link, but realize how much difference it makes if you know the actual facts of what transpired (or didn't) in 2008: http://www.youtube.com/...
Now I don't condone the language used, nor any implication of violence. This is not what we now need, and it was not a smart phone call.
What Schmidt and Cantor have tried to do, however, is just plain abhorrent. Schmidt is insulting the Appalachians and evangelicals of her district, right along with the African Americans, and everybody else. Our only solace is in knowing that Jean Schmidt isn't a local disgrace. She's a national disgrace.
And we're going to cause her pain, a worse kind of pain than what she felt on that airplane to "Afghanistan." I mean we are going to unelect her this year. Democrats, Independents, and even some Republicans, united.
NOTE: This diary reflects my personal views only and is not connected to any campaign. I do not work on the staff of any campaign.
UPDATE: To clarify the "severe reelection challenge" that Schmidt faces this year, David Krikorian, who garnered 18% as an Independent in 2008, is now running strong as a Democrat with no strong primary opposition. Meanwhile three establishment Republicans are challenging Schmidt in the GOP primary, smelling blood.
UPDATE: I've been reminded that I neglected another major inconsistency in Schmidt's 2008 story. After an alleged assassination attempt, it took hours for Schmidt to report to the hospital, and more hours for Schmidt to report the incident to the police. What did the congresswoman do during those hours? Apparently it took some time to figure out an angle and a course of action with her campaign staff.
There are also unconfirmed reports that Schmidt's injuries were inconsistent with a hit-and-run collision.
UPDATE: Reliable sources have filled in some details of the 2008 incident that I had missed:
- Schmidt claimed that she crawled out of the ditch and hitched a ride home with a passing motorist, but no such motorist has come forward.
- The incident happened at 5:45 am, however, Schmidt did not report to the hospital until 4 pm that day. The police report was filed in mid-afternoon. It took at least eight hours for the congresswoman to decide to report an alleged hit-and-run assassination attempt to police and medical authorities.
- Correction to the details as given in the body of my diary: Schmidt was seen at two Ohio hospitals -- one on the afternoon of the incident, at which time no broken bones were discovered, and another after her return flight from Germany. It was the latter examination that confirmed the German diagnosis of broken ribs and cracked vertebrae.
- The incident occured only a few days after Schmidt announced a change of position to support the financial bailout bill, a switch that brought severe criticism from conservative supporters, casting doubt on her reelection chances.