Posted on 07/19/2007 7:33:24 AM PDT by pissant
This may be the political version of Evolution. The New York Times is out this morning with a story about billing records that show Fred Thompson did indeed charge for his time while helping a pro-choice group. Details from the article below:
Billing records show that former Senator Fred Thompson spent nearly 20 hours working as a lobbyist on behalf of a group seeking to ease restrictive federal rules on abortion counseling in the 1990s, even though he recently said he did not recall doing any work for the organization.
According to records from Arent Fox, the law firm based in Washington where Mr. Thompson worked part-time from 1991 to 1994, he charged the organization, the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association, about $5,000 for work he did in 1991 and 1992. The records show that Mr. Thompson, a probable Republican candidate for president in 2008, spent much of that time in telephone conferences with the president of the group, and on three occasions he reported lobbying administration officials on its behalf.
Mr. Thompson's work for the family planning agency has become an issue because he is positioning himself as a faithful conservative who is opposed to abortion.
Read the whole article here. The Brody File has a call in to Thompson's people. Check back later for an update. Already, email is coming into The Brody File about the story. Here's one:
"The significance of this is not what Fred did 16 years ago. Had he been candid and honest, and explained himself, all would be well. The issue is that Fred lied for political expediency, and allowed others on his staff to do so on his behalf."
Lied may too strong a word. It seems like Thompson did what most politicians do. They beat around the bush and try to avoid an outright apology. Let's review shall we?
When this story first broke, Thompson's spokesman Mark Corallo said the following:
"Fred Thompson did not lobby for this group, period."
Then it became Thompson had "no recollection of doing any work on behalf of this group. He may have been consulted by one of the firm's partners who represented this group in 1991".
Days after the story broke, Thompson told radio talk show Sean Hannity:
"You need to separate a lawyer advocating a position from the position itself. They will probably come at me, in 35 years of law practice, with some people, I represented criminal defendants. I was a prosecutor. I had a general law practice. So that in and of itself doesn't mean anything anyway. … I'm not going to get down in the weeds with everything they dredge up over the next six months."
Thompson also sent in a column to the Powerline blog where he seemed to suggest he did some work:
"A lawyer who is a candidate or a prospective candidate for office finds himself in an interesting position because of the nature of the legal profession and the practice of law. … I've experienced another gambit of those schooled in the creative uses of law and politics: dredging up clients - or another lawyer's clients -that I may have represented or consulted with and then using the media to get me into a public debate as to what I may have done for them or said to them 15 or 20 years ago. Even if my memory serves me correctly, Even it would not be appropriate for a lawyer to make such comments."
Any way you slice it, what we have here is an "evolving story". This isn't really about the abortion issue. Because of Thompson's consistent pro-life record in the Senate, pro-family groups will probably give him a pass on that aspect. But Thompson needs to be careful. He wants people to see him as a plain spoken, tell it like it is southerner. But evolving stories like this are normally left to "inside the beltway" Washington insiders. For his campaign to be successful, he needs to be seen as a Washington outsider not just another politician who is spinning his way out of a mess.
Don’t you have anything better to do?
Funny how Lindsey Graham scored to the RIGHT of Fred in every one of those "true conservative" ratings, but he's still referred to as a "RINO traitor" on FR.
Would you prefer he list "Fred's own words" about those those three issues? Here you go:
ON McCAIN-FEINGOLD
"We are making headway to do something that will reduce the cynicism in this country and that will help this body, that will help us individually. [McCain-Feingold will] help challengers reach a threshold of credibility when they want to challenge us in these races."
-- Fred Thompson, March 27, 2002
http://www.nysunpolitics.com/article/20
ON AMNESTY
"I think that you have to realize that you're either going to drive 12 million people underground permanently, which is not a good solution. You're going to get them all together and get them out of the country, which is not going to happen. Or you're going to have to, in some way, work out a deal where they can have some aspirations of citizenship"
http://www.latestpolitics.com/blog/2007/05/fred-thompson-no-restrictionist.html
--Fred Thompson, Fox News' "Hannity & Colmes," 4/3/06
ON ABORTION
"Should the government come in and criminalize, let’s say, a young girl and her parents and her doctor? I think not...I do not believe abortion should be criminalized."
-- Fred Thompson, Oct. 1994
http://shotpolitics.com/hollywood-fred-said-we-shouldnt-criminalize-abortion.htm
There you have Fred's own words. If you disagree with those statements, take it up with him, not freepers who "question" Fred's position on those issues.
Either Fred himself was "lying" when he made those statements, or Fred has changed his position on those issues. If Fred would like to admit a mistake and say he ABSOLUTELY no longer supporters those things (and what caused him to have a change of heart), he's free to do so. We'd welcome hearing "his own words" admitting that, rather than his spinmeisters here on FR.
Tommy Thompson is NEVER going to be the President of the United States.
Nothing in your post is “pro-amnesty.” It is not that specific.
The 1994 “pro-abortion” thing (so-called) is vitiated by his voting record and endorsements/damnations ever since. He has also expressed his regrets about McCain-Feingold.
In other words, beebee: go pound sand.
1. I honestly know nothing about Graham.
2. How can you score to the right of right-wing-groups’ 100’s and left-group zeroes?
I thought it was stating he was pro-choice (pro-death)
That would be a bummer!
It sure would.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.