Posted on 02/05/2003 7:56:59 AM PST by cody32127
Several House lawmakers say they?ve been the victims of an Internet extortion that attempted to link their names to a racist organization. The scheme also involved House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) and at least two senators.
Sites named after Reps. John Mica (R-Fla.), Porter Goss (R-Fla.), Ric Keller (R-Fla.), Hastert and 18 other House members brought web-surfers to the National Association for the Advancement of White People and other unsavory home pages. Keller said he grew suspicious when he got an e-mail offering to sell him an Internet address bearing his name for $499. Rep. Adam Putnam (R-Fla) called the setup ?quite a little enterprise for extorting money.? But looking at the bright side, Putnam said, ?I ought to feel good. They wanted the same amount for the speaker?s name as they did for mine.?
For a time the congressional domain names were even for sale on the eBay auction site.
The House General Counsel quickly notified the Seattle entrepreneur causing the trouble that he had violated a provision of the U.S. code.
Registrant: Council on Political Accountability
(206)819-2503
Seattle, WA 98112 US
The administrative contact is as follows...
Domain Name: JOHNMICA.COM Administrative Contact:
Stamper, Jeremy montanarafting@hotmail.com
(206)819-2503
Seattle, WA 98112 US (206)819-2503
No idea who this is.
e-mail address: drichey@coxohio.com
Columbus Bureau
COLUMBUS | Typing www.jeffjacobson.com won't take an Internet browser to a slick home page for state Sen. Jeff Jacobson, the Butler Twp. Republican.
Instead, it links to the Web site of the National Association for the Advancement of White People, a "not for profit, nonviolent, civil rights educational organization, demanding equal rights for whites and special privileges for none."
The same thing happens when a browser types in the name of state Sen. Scott Nein, R-Middletown, and seven other Ohio senators — a development that has Ohio Attorney General Jim Petro threatening legal action.
"Obviously, I’m outraged," Jacobson said Tuesday. "It’s entirely repugnant." The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks such groups, lists the NAAWP as a white supremacist group started by former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke.
The NAAWP's site says, "The white majority must have a national organization that defends its rights, values, and heritage. . . . It’s not illegal to be white . . . YET! It only feels like it!"
The group sells sweat shirts, hats, Caucasian jeans and Confederate flag bumper stickers.
But Rich Faraone, a NAAWP vice president, said his group was not involved with the purchase of the politicians' Web domains, and that the NAAWP doesn't buy Web sites to link to its site.
A search through www.directnic.com, which sells and tracks Web domains, indicated Web sites named for the state senators were bought Jan. 9 with a year contract by the Council on Political Accountability of Seattle. The search listed Jeremy Stamper as a contact for the council. Stamper, did not return calls, and it's not clear exactly how the senators' named got linked to NAAWP's site.
Information on Directnic.com says the council is selling the addresses on eBay, with 25 percent of the proceeds to be donated to the American Cancer Society.
An eBay check found the council also selling Web sites named for 140 other state and national politicians from 19 other states. In a sampling of the names, each one linked to the NAAWP Web site.
The minimum bids for the addresses are between $99 and $499. Each Ohio senator’s Web site started at $149.
"I have no interest in paying anything," Jacobson said. "We’re just taking legal action."
Maggie Mitchell, spokeswoman for the Senate Republican caucus, said it's against federal statute to register a domain under another person’s name with the intent of selling the domain for profit without the person’s consent.
Petro wrote to Stamper giving his organization 24 hours to transfer the domains to each senator and stop selling the addresses.
Otherwise, the senators "have asked that we pursue all remedies available under the statute," Petro wrote.
"We’re taking it very seriously as a violation of our rights and a misuse of our names," said Sen. Randall Gardner, R-Bowling Green.
As of 5 p.m. Tuesday, only the name of Sen. Jay Hottinger, R-Newark, had been bid on.
"(The bidder) was not me or anybody connected to me," Hottinger said.
He said the attempt to sell the names is "pure extortion" and he will not attempt to purchase the site.
"It’s about $149 more than I’m willing to give them," Hottinger said.
At least one senator said he is letting time take its toll.
"I have quite a list of things to work on, and that’s not one of them," said Sen. Ron Amstutz, R-Wooster, adding that the NAAWP Web site makes no mention of his name besides the link itself.
Other Ohio senators with their names linked to the site include Louis Blessing, R-Cincinnati; Larry Mumper, R-Marion; Kirk Schuring, R-Canton; and Lynn Wachtmann, R-Napoleon.
I hope this guy gets a visit from the local authorities, not to mention cease and desist letters very soon.
Yet the Seattle-based group that orchestrated the Internet brouhaha said it was only trying to make a political point. "For 50 years, the Republican Party has had an exclusionary attitude toward people of color," said Jeremy Stamper, who identified himself in a statement as an African-American and president of the Council on Political Accountability. "My hope is that our act of protest in linking their names to the NAAWP will hold a mirror up to these people and their destructive policies."
And further down in that story (yikes!)...
In addition to the NAAWP site, their names were linked to the North American Man/Boy Love Association, Planned Parenthood, and sites claiming to sell cheese made of human breast milk and promoting the cloning of Jesus.
That sure doesn't seem to match the other targets of wrath. There are a lot of RINOs who would love to be linked to Planned Parenthood. So what does that tell us about this little miscreant?
Just because he's black, my opinion of Mr. Stamper hasn't changed. They need to throw the book at him. How's THAT for forcing someone to look in the mirror and face accountability?
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