Main Smear Website Remains, But Blog Featuring Unsubstantiated Attacks, Lies --- Initially Posted Without 'Paid for by Feeney' Disclaimer --- Now Removed, Redirected!
Hapless, Corrupt Congressman's Sad Attempt at Discrediting Whistleblower Curtis Continues to Backfire...
By Brad Friedman on 10/13/2006, 6:35am PT  

Poor, poor, corrupt, ethically-challenged, morally bankrupt Tom Feeney (R-Abramoff). Can't even run a smear campaign without getting into trouble, screwing it up and seeing it backfire.

As we reported several weeks ago, the feckless Florida Republican launched a "Crazy Clint Curtis" smear website and blogsite, to attack his whistleblower-turned-congressional opponent with doctored photos and doctored facts.

The Tom Feeney for Congress Campaign's shameful tactics continue to fizzle, apparently, as they have been forced to remove their smear blogsite, which had been set up on blogger.com to attack Curtis. The removal of the site, and the link to it from the main smear-site, comes not a moment too soon: we had planned to run an item on Feeney's latest demonstrable lie, which we had noticed was recently posted on the smear blog. The blog, which had been at CrazyClintCurtisBlog.blogspot.com is now redirected to an innocuous search page, with no trace left behind.

In a blog item Feeney posted on the site --- before he "disappeared" it --- he charged that an article published in Hustler about the mysterious 2003 death of Raymond Lemme "was based on the delusions of Clint Curtis's murder conspiracy theory," or some such nonsense.

As it was "we," Brad Friedman, who actually wrote the article in question [PDF], we can tell you that it was based on nothing of the sort. It was based on the mysterious and still unexplained circumstances surrounding Lemme's death, which the Valdosta, GA police had initially ruled a suicide, but then later reopened the investigation after The BRAD BLOG reported on an affidavit filed by Curtis. Curtis alleged that his former employer YEI had harbored Chinese illegal aliens spying for China (later confirmed), overbilled on state contracts (later confirmed), and that Feeney, who also worked for the firm as lobbyist and attorney --- while simultaneously serving as Speaker of the Florida House --- had requested Curtis to create a software vote-rigging prototype (not yet confirmed, but similarly not disproven.)

Lemme was an investigator from the Florida Inspector General's office, looking into the charges Curtis originally filed with the state of Florida in early 2001. In his sworn affidavit, Curtis says that Lemme told him in June of 2003 that his final report was almost complete, and that he'd found the corruption "went all the way to the top." Two weeks later, Lemme was found dead in Valdosta, Georgia.

Our story on Lemme's death detailed the many contradictions between the official police report and the unearthed photographs of the death scene --- photographs which the police report originally stated were taken at the scene but unavailable, due to a "failure in the camera's flash memory cards."

And now, Feeney has scrubbed the smear blogsite altogether, in what appears to be the latest misstep in the Congressman's bizarre and shameful campaign.

Previous follies in Feeney's smear campaign include (but are not limited to):

  • Using hit song "Crazy", by Gnarls Barkley, without permission on the smear website. Feeney removed it after complaints from the record publisher.
  • Linking to a "How to Make a Tinfoil Hat" website. This prompted the owner to redirect his page --- when clicked from Feeney's smearsite --- to an ethics watchdog webpage detailing Feeney's lobbyist- and foreign agent-funded vacations in violation of Congressional ethics rules. (Feeney is the only, as-yet-unindicted Congressman remaining in the House to have traveled with disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff to a posh golf resort in Scotland.) Feeney removed the link a day or two later.
  • Failing to include "Paid for by Tom Feeney" on the smear blogsite. He recently added the disclaimer after a complaint was filed with authorities.
  • Creating a wacky 9/11 Conspiracy Theory concerning Curtis. Disproven by the very evidence Feeney used to make it.
  • A smear campaign mailing featuring doctored photos of Curtis and a Hustler magazine cover, sent by Feeney to more than 100,000 voters. A local mom was angered at having to explain the "smut" campaign literature to her 9 year old son, who picked up the mail. Local news stations covered the misstep.
  • All of this from a man who issued a news release in the early morning hours after Curtis's landslide victory in the Florida primary. Quoth Feeney: "Serious times demand serious leaders and Curtis is not even in the same solar system as the rest of us."

    Really? Which solar system are you in, Mr. Feeney? We're still waiting for your "serious" leadership, or at least a serious campaign on both the issues and allegations.

    For his part, Curtis recently issued a press release calling on Feeney to explain what he knew of Florida colleague Mark Foley's sexual predator issues and when he knew about them. As a GOP Deputy Whip in the U.S. House, Feeney is a part of the Leadership who had been reportedly made aware of Foley's predilections long before the information was publicly revealed.

    So far, Feeney has refused to comment on the record, to our knowledge, concerning the Foley matter.

    He has also refused to take a polygraph test concerning Curtis's allegations and has denied, but not answered to, them. Curtis, who gave an account of the remarkable story in video-taped sworn testimony to a Congressional panel in late 2004, successfully passed such a polygraph on his own in early 2005.

    For more info on The BRAD BLOG's continuing investigative series on
    The Clint Curtis/Tom Feeney/Yang Enterprises Vote-Rigging Scandal series, please see:
    - A Quick Summary of the story so far.
    - An Index of all the Key Articles & Evidence in the series so far.
    - Curtis is now running for U.S. Congress against Feeney.
    To support or for more info, see: www.ClintCurtis.com
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