Ehrlich: Democrats plotting to make him look bad (NCPAC-MD4Bush)

The Ehrlich administration released e-mails and a photograph yesterday that Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. and his aides said support the notion that there was an orchestrated campaign to make the governor look bad by leaking information about Joseph Steffen, a former gubernatorial aide.

"We really want to know about any political orchestration" by the Democratic Party or Democratic officials, Mr. Ehrlich said.

But Democrats said the documents support the allegations, denied by Mr. Ehrlich, that Mr. Steffen was a close aide of the governor who was sent into state agencies to fire workers not considered loyal to the administration.

"We want to publicly thank Governor Ehrlich for further exposing the misdeeds in his administration," Josh White, executive director of the state Democratic Party, said.

Items released in response to federal Public Information Act requests by news organizations included a photograph of Mr. Ehrlich and Mr. Steffen with Michelle Lane, who was fired from her state job last summer, e-mails exchanged by Ms. Lane and Mr. Steffen and an e-mail from Ms. Lane to the governor and his top aides in February.

In the e-mail to the governor, Ms. Lane said the administration had begun a "whisper campaign about me" which she described as "assassination politics." She said every time she heard "about Ehrlich people engaging in this whisper campaign about me," she would release more documents relating to Mr. Steffen and his activities in the administration.

Mr. Steffen, a longtime aide to Ehrlich in Congress and at the state level, was fired by the governor last month after acknowledging he had used a conservative Web site to spread rumors about Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley, a potential opponent to Mr. Ehrlich in next year's gubernatorial race.

The photograph showing Mr. Ehrlich standing between Mr. Steffen and Ms. Lane is similar to one sent anonymously to some news media outlets, when the Steffen story broke, that showed just the governor and Mr. Steffen, with the person on Mr. Ehrlich's right side cropped out of the picture.

"It supports the notion that has been around for quite some time that the Steffen matter has been orchestrated," Paul Schurick, Ehrlich's communications director, said of the photograph and the e-mails.

Asked if there was any Democratic involvement in the Steffen story, Terry Lierman, chairman of the state Democratic Party, said, "No. 1, I never heard of the woman. No. 2, her allegations don't surprise me because Steffen, who has been a close confident of the governor for 14 years, has an increasingly public record of living up to his job description, which he said is, quote unquote, to hurt people."

"I would suggest that what they (the administration) are doing is a lame attempt to try to divert attention from their bad deeds," Mr. Lierman said.

In documents released previously by the administration, Mr. Steffen exchanged e-mails with aides at the highest levels of the administration about getting rid of employees in state agencies and replacing them with Ehrlich loyalists. But Mr. Ehrlich and his aides say Mr. Steffen was a low-level employee who did not play any role in deciding who would be hired and fired.

In the documents released yesterday, Mr. Steffen wrote in an e-mail to Ms. Lane that when Kenneth Schisler was confirmed as director of the Public Service Commission, "they can start cleaning house." Several high-level employees were fired by Mr. Schisler over the objections of other members of the Public Service Commission.

Asked by reporters about his reaction to the e-mail from Ms. Lane threatening to release documents relating to Mr. Steffen, Mr. Ehrlich said, "Getting a blackmail e-mail from a woman I don't know was interesting."

Daniel Clements, Ms. Lane's lawyer, said her e-mail to Mr. Ehrlich was prompted by "what she believed to be the administration's attempts to have her fired from her present job" teaching nursing at Towson State University.

"She was not blackmailing him. It is in fact outrageous in light of how they treated her as a state employee ...," he said. "All she did was bring the failings of the state's actions toward the children in their control to the administration, and she was throughout ignored and then fired for her whistleblowing."

Mr. Ehrlich said he did not know Ms. Lane even though she worked on his congressional staff and was an employee after he became governor in the Department of Human Resources and the Governor's Office of Children, Families and Youth.

Democratic leaders in the Senate and House of Delegates are considering holding hearings about the administration's hiring and firing practices. Mr. Ehrlich said again yesterday he not only would welcome such an inquiry but would like to co-host the hearings.

The photograph of Governor Ehrlich and Joseph Steffen (NCPAC) sent anonymously to media outlets had Ms. Lee cut out from it. Now, why would someone do that unless there was something to hide?

The plot thickens...

Well, DOH!!! Of course the sewer dwelling dems are trying to make Ehrlic look bad!! That's the only tactic they have that works! Willie proved the value of diversion; to avoid discussion of your own dem filth and corruption, point at a Republican and scream "bad guy!" The media will fall over themselves avoiding the dem filth and corruption and endlessly question the Repblican about the accusations that he is a bad guy. Any Republican who doesn't understand how the dems and their running dogs in the media play this game, time after time, doesn't know what he is doing!

Asked if Ms. Lane had anything to do with the reports of Mr. Steffen's role in spreading rumors about Mr. O'Malley or his role in the administration, Mr. Clements said, "It doesn't matter how the public came to learn of this administration's unconscionable actions toward state employees."

In other words, busted! Lane's lawyer denied she's MD4Bush in the other article by BalmoSun, though. I don't think she is MD4Bush but I suspect she was working with WaPo reporters. Were the WaPo reporters MD4Bush, which would be highly unethical journalism? We should also note that the Capital Gazette, unlike WaPo and BalmoSun, never mentions Gilbert Genn who is a DUmbocRAT friend of Lane and a former Delegate from Montgomery County, home of County Executive Doug Duncan (likely challenger for O'Malley in the 2006 primary).

What do we know about this plaintiff's lawyer Clements? Perhaps the MSM should ask him if he is or knows MD4Bush. I wouldn't put it past someone who's trying to push wrongful termination actions to try to entrap government employees in conversations to poison the jury pool.

Fascinating. Ms. Lee, it would appear, was in the loop, for a while. I wonder if she looked over Steffen's shoulder and saw him on FR? And the Dims claim they don't know who she is? Get real!

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