Mystery of Christine O’Donnell’s Rent

The mystery of Christine O’Donnell’s rent and campaign expenses has now been solved.

One of the scams run by the liberal news media and the Left was the claim that Christine O’Donnell was using campaign money to pay her rent. (Never mind that FEC laws and regulations allow a campaign to pay the candidate a salary. Otherwise only rich people could afford to run for office.)

All true conservatives know that the news media lies. A person who reads or listen to the mainstream media and believes what they say about a conservative leader or candidate does not have any genuine experience in conservative politics.

How many times have I attended a rally or press conference in person, then returned home to flip on the news — and what is reported bears no resemblance to what I personally witnessed a few hours before?

So the news media attacked Christine O’Donnell. When experienced conservatives heard those stories, they immediately understood the hogwash. Conservatives know that this is the same old song the Left and their fellow travelers in the media have been singing for decades, since portraying Barry Goldwater was a war-mongering lunatic.

Christine O’Donnell’s campaign reported that her U.S. Senate campaign paid “half the rent” on the condominium townhouse that Christine lived in in Wilmington, Delaware.

So imagine my surprise, when I visited my friend Christine after the election at the famous townhouse condo. Er, condos — there are two of them!

We should have expected the Delaware news media and national news media to be completely incompetent in mis-reporting this information.

The reason the O’Donnell campaign paid “half” the rent is because 1 of 2 townhouses is 100% dedicated to office space and the other townhouse is living space. There were and are TWO (2) completely different townhouses.

But both condos were contracted through the same realtor in one single contract. So “half” the rent means ONE (1) of the TWO (2) completely different townhouses.

Christine O’Donnell’s campaign paid for the townhouse used 100% completely and separately for NOTHING but office space. For convenience, the two townhouses are next door to each other. But they do not connect.

The townhouse (condo) used for living space was the half NOT paid for by the campaign.

The liberal news media, Left-wing activists, and “sore loser” moderate Republicans tried to suggest that Christine O’Donnell was living in one part of a single apartment and the other part of the same apartment was used for office space.

So I was surprised to visit the office-use townhouse as completely separate from the other townhouse used for living space. Why was I surprised?

Of course, what is different about these lies is that the Delaware Republican Party helped spread these lies. Kristin Murray worked for the Delaware Republican Party under Tom Ross, then spent 1 1/2 weeks as Christine O’Donnell’s campaign manager in 2008. Christine fired Kristin Murray for not showing up to do any work. (Apparently Kristin Murray had some personal relationship crises that seemed more important at the time and distracted her from being consistent about work.)

Christine then talked to Tom Ross about the problem. So Tom Ross actually knew that Kristin Murray was not actually Christine O’Donnell’s campaign manager for more than 1 1/2 weeks. Tom Ross actually knew that Kristin Murray was not a reliable source of any information about Christine O”Donnell or O’Donnell’s 2008 campaign.

Yet in March 2010, Tom Ross and Kristin Murray knowingly lied to the Delaware News Journal, to national Republicans, and to Delaware and national media. Knowing it to be a lie, Delaware Republican Chair Tom Ross actively spread the slanderous lie that Christine O’Donnell was paying her personal (living space) rent with campaign funds. Tom Ross knew that to be false at the time, and knows now that he lied about Christine O’Donnell.

How about the “Reimbursements” to Brent Vasher that are suspiciously like rent payments at 518 N Lincoln St?

Brent Vasher paid for a great many expenses out of his own pocket for the 2008 campaign. Brent Vasher put all of the hotel expenses for the May 2008 convention on his credit card. So, Brent Vasher was legitimately owed reimbursement of actual 2008 campaign expenses from the 2008 campaign.

It appears that under pressure to pay back those expenses, the amounts and timing were what was necessary to cover Brent's obligations on the mortgage.

However, the payments were for legitimate 2008 campaign expense reimbursements.

There is insufficient evidence to make a judgement here.

But if you want to bring an accusation against someone, you need to have the proof. You cannot bring an accusation without any proof. If critics cannot prove what they are claiming, then don't they need to admit that they are just spreading hogwash and horse feathers?

It also seems that if this explanation was available, the campaign would have used it, rather than all the explanations they did use.

No, that is false. If you grow up politically, and learn how the media works, you will discover that you can have a 45 minute interview with the news media and only have 5 words actually printed in the newspaper or used on TV.

I was interviewed for about 45 minutes by Gannett. They used about 5 words out of that interview, and indirectly referred to one other point I made.

The fact that you don't read something in the newspaper does not mean the point was not made to them repeatedly.

You can never be a grown-up in politics until you realize that what you read in the newspaper ain't necessarily so.

I would like CharlesWayneCT to prove that Charles did not personally create the AIDS virus as a military experiment.

Or would it be *MY* burden of proof to prove that he DID?

Can I just make a wild accusation, and then demand that Charles prove it false?

The campaign put out it’s own press releases. This is the internet age, you know. It is absurd to argue that we, in the conservative movement, at Free Republic, didn’t have access to every argument the O’Donnell campaign chose to make.

If they had an argument and we didn’t know it, that’s there fault — all they needed was a logon, and they could post whatever they wanted.

Which goes back to our previous argument — who is to blame?

Which I should say I don’t entirely disagree with you — I certainly wish I lived in a world where it was different, and certainly all the roadblocks against conservatism hurt. But they are what they are — we change what we can, we overcome what we need to. In the end, that is what we can do.

Technically, you can accuse people with no evidence at all. The question is whether the accusation should be taken seriously.

I find “evidence” to be a better word than “proof” here, because there is so rarely “proof” of anything. There is conflicting evidence, and we decide how to weight the evidence.

For example, we wanted proof that Obama was born in the USA. His campaign put out a “birth certificate” which it claimed was proof. But people analysed the paperwork, and many think it was bogus, or that it didn’t show he was actually born here — it was evidence, but not “proof”.

Anyway, there was evidence that the campaign was paying rent on the townhome. They didn’t make up the accusation our of whole cloth — they had the FEC filings. I don’t know when the burden should shift from the accuser to the accused — but I know that when it’s a conservative, they better well jump to it, because the media isn’t fair.

Being involved in politics as you seem to be, you should know as much as anybody that politics isn’t about proof, or evidence, or facts. It is about perception — the perception of the voters. If you can’t convince 50%+1 voters to pick you, it makes no difference WHY. It makes no difference if you can prove charges against you were false. You need to win over the voters. Nobody is going to win the voters over for you.

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