Conason: Gannon: The Early Years

[kskiska]

Before he was buttering up Bush at White House press conferences, "Jeff Gannon" was doing the GOP's dirty work in attacking Tom Daschle.

Long before "Jeff Gannon" became a household pseudonym in the nation's capital, he had earned considerable recognition among the political elites of South Dakota. During that state's closely contested Senate race last year, the Talon News writer -- whose real name is now known to be James Dale Guckert -- dug his claws deep into Tom Daschle, the former Senate minority leader narrowly defeated by Republican John Thune.

In 2004 Republican leaders placed no higher price on any head, besides John Kerry's, than on the Senate Democratic leader's. For years, conservative organizations had attacked Daschle with campaigns that included notorious ads that paired the Army veteran with Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. The smear efforts damaged Daschle's standing with the state's voters, and as the election grew nearer, Republican blogs and Web sites took up the dirty work. In what has now been exposed as a blatant Republican strategy, the seemingly independent bloggers had in fact been paid by the Thune campaign.

Gannon took up the Republicans' dirty work with great gusto, beginning more than a year before the election, in the summer of 2003. Working with two local South Dakota bloggers, both of whom later turned out to be secretly paid operatives of the Thune campaign, he targeted Daschle and discredited mainstream journalists. Among Gannon's direct hits was an embarrassing story that revealed that the three-term senator and his lobbyist wife, Linda, had applied for a "homestead exemption" on their costly Washington, D.C., residence, claiming it as their primary residence.

(snip)

Daschle's defeat is old news by now, of course. Yet to understand who "Gannon" really was -- and why he obtained such special treatment from Karl Rove's White House communications operation -- one useful exercise may be what intelligence analysts call "walking back the cat." In essence, this means running the movie in reverse slow-motion to see where the suspect came from and what he did along the way.

more…
http://salon.com/opinion/conason/2005/02/18/gannon/index.html

[wabeewoman]

1. A real scoop would be

where was 'Gannon' before this and how did he land this job. He is even referred to as a "Washington expert on South Dakota politics."

[HereSince1628]

2. Interesting, the predator has become the prey...

So Gannon toiled in the dirt-works of the republican machine.

Sounds like he worked his way up and into Karl Roverer's skunk works the old-fashioned way...

[The Backlash Cometh]

3. Daschle could have survived those attacks if he had managed to

keep the Dem party together. But, he was trying to serve too many masters. The right-leaning voters of South Dakota, the right-leaning leaders of the DLC and the Democratic masses. Maybe he would have been wise to refuse the position once he realized that he was going to get spread too thin.

[KoKo]

5. Agree...but think Conason is pointing "us" in a direction to "follow the

money" about Gannon. Track back where he's been and who he attacked in his articles and the money trail will start to follow a pattern. A DU'er posted this morning that a Repug House member asked for an article by Gannon to be entered into the Congressional Record. How many other Repugs got up on the Senate and House Floors and made Repug Talking Points by Gannon and asked them to put it in the "CR?" Tracing Gannon's influence with Repugs in Congress and the Media might start to expose more than we ever hoped for. The Vast RW Media Machine and who funds it. The Vast RW Moonie/Mellon Scaife/Falwell/Robertson Money Machine. Wayne Madsen was onto something....if only the pieces could be put together in a way ordinary folks could understand. :shrug:

I liked his expression: "Walking back the Cat..." :D

[The Backlash Cometh]

6. Thanks. Sounds like Gannon was a modern-day Drudge.

What Drudge was doing in the 90s, floating the Repub talking points, is what Gannon has been doing. Do you think the little patter of cat's feet will lead to Rove?

[diadem]

17. Interesting that both these guys are gay...

does somebody who is part of the inner circle have a secret? Were this administration not so aggressively hostile to gays and so wrapped in their "family values" mantle, the sexuality of these information conduits would not be of import. But damn, more hypocrisy!!

[crispini]

4. kick and RECOMMENDED.

This is important; it helps prove a pattern.

[suegeo]

7. Some people demand that Prof. Jon Lauck resign

One of the anti-Daschle bloggers that was publishing (PLAGIARIZING?) Gannon's work was a history professor name Jon Lauck.

For his services, the ethically challenged Lauck was secretly being paid (to the tune of $27,000) by the Thune campaign.

Damn those liberal college professors, oh err, never mind.

Don't history professors have a special obligation to be moral and accurate and esp. vigilant in getting the facts correct? God forbid if the professor plagiarized anything! The scandal!

Also, shouldn't those shaping young minds try to be fair and balanced?

Hypocrites.

Did John Thune attend any sporting events with Gannon after being interviewed on Gannons' lame ass talk show? Is John Thune gay? Wasn't he one of the sponsors of the same sex marriage bill presented at a federal level?

[suegeo]

8. Jason Van Beek? How'd he get his law degree?

Another person being paid secretly by Thune was a law student name Jason Van Beek. (he got $8K--where'd Thune get that kind of cash to pay for bloggers?)

Beek passed the bar recently, and currently works for Thune as a researcher.

Some people say that if Beek did something unethical he ought to be disbarred.

[seventythree]

9. at least reprimanded

do you suppose we can get "blockhead" or whatever that lawyer blogger's name was who brought up the stuff on memogate and did the legal petition to get Clinton's law license to go after this guy's? Nah, probably not -- don't we have any liberal lawyers who can put in a complaint to their attorney registration committee? In my state, a common citizen can make a complaint and open an investigation.

[notadmblnd]

12. Beek.. wasn't Beek the name of the crook in the movie Trading Places

with Eddie Murphy, Jamie Lee curtis and Dan Akroid? sorry it just popped in ym head

[sunnystarr]

10. These weren't Gannon's early years ....

Daschle just got defeated by Thune in November. Gannon was working under Talon. To me early years would mean pre-GOPUsa and Talon.

[verdalaven]

11. Yes, I was just wondering

I was just wondering what Gannon/Guckert was up to during Clinton's or Bush Sr's administrations. Maybe his "political career" doesn't go back that far, but wouldn't it be interesting if it did?

Was he in the military? Did he ever work in the Pentagon?

[Clark2008]

13. Someone on the Randi Rhodes blog said he went to school

at West Chester and was a member of TKE. He said Guckert was one of his fraternity advisors and that he knew, for a fact, that Guckert is a former marine and - get this - boasted that he was also working for the DOD as a negotiator.
Now, how much of what this blogger says is true, is speculative.
A.) The blogger could be making shit up and,
B.) The blogger could be telling the truth, but GuckGannon made the shit up he told the young fellow.

http://www.therandirhodesshow.com/randirhodes/messageboards/index.php?showtopic=38434

Check it out.

[grace0418]

14. Well, part of it is definitely true

Gannon had a link to the TKE website at his alma mater on his aol home page and referred to the link is "my boys" or something like that.

[T Bone]

15. If you can't go Greek, then go TKE

on the campus where I matriculated, TKE was the GAY HOUSE, no lie.
It was smirked about constantly.

things said were like my title, and also--

"If you want to go REALLY Greek, go TKE."

heheh

[sunnystarr]

18. He worked as a Court Reporter

in Wilmington Delaware until the town or county tightened up the requirements. From the post I retrieved this from this gave access to legal records that he could cull for some kind of business ventures.

http://www.infosourceusa.com/CAT/Secretarial-Court-Reporting/DE/Wilmington.htm

[Misunderestimator]

16. Gannon: A household pseudonym... love it.