The GOP's 'FBI-Is-Investigating' Smear: A Special Report
by Robert Parry | October 20, 2008
Trailing in the polls with the election barely two weeks away, John McCain has dug deep into the Lee Atwater/Karl Rove playbook, now portraying Barack Obama as a combination of class-warfare socialist, terrorist fellow-traveler and crooked pol.
McCain also has sought to tie Obama to ACORN, a controversial grassroots organization that has been registering voters. At the third presidential debate, McCain alleged that ACORN “is now on the verge of maybe perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history in this country, maybe destroying the fabric of democracy."
That allegation got a big boost last week when the Associated Press reported that the FBI is investigating whether “ACORN helped foster voter registration fraud around the nation before the presidential election.”
The AP account – attributed to “a senior law enforcement official” speaking anonymously – raced across the right-wing news media and into the political world, giving fresh impetus to suspicions that ACORN was guilty of serious wrongdoing because some registration forms used fictitious names, like “Mickey Mouse.”
The FBI’s investigative interest also seemed to validate McCain’s allegations. After all, if there was nothing to this, why would the FBI be investigating?
However, the citation of an FBI investigation as a way of instilling doubt and spreading suspicions has been used before. Indeed, it’s becoming a well-worn page in the Republican playbook.
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http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/18068
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