Spoke to Eric Cantor of 7th Virginia tonight with
regard to the revolting facts about a 2000 anti-Semitic smear
campaign run against him during the Republican primary in his
district. The facts from the investigation by both the Washington Post and Hotline point to Jack Abramoff and
Ralph Reed and Grover Norquist as the major figures behind the
scenes manipulating a shadow 527 named the Faith and Family
Alliance of Virginia Beach, Virginia. Faith and Family Values used
up to $100,000 to distribute pamphlets and make robo-calls to
constituents to say that Eric Cantor did not represent "Virginia
values" and that his opponent was the "only Christian in the
contest."
Cantor won by a few hundred votes in June 2000.
Cantor knew nothing of the generation of Faith and
Family Values at the time. He especially did not know that Jack
Abramoff used Faith and Family Values to launder internet gambling
money (eLottery) to finance a cynical and successful lobbying
effort to defeat a Congressional ban on internet gambling, and that
the laundering process not only involved Reed and associates but
also another major Republican op, Grover Norquist. The Black
Hundreds character at Faith and Family Values who actually handled
the checks in and out of the shell, Robin Vanderwall, is now
serving a seven-year sentence for internet sex crime.
Cantor finally learned of the Abramoff-Reed-Norquist
connection to Faith and Family Alliance from the Susan Schmidt and
James V. Grimaldi reporting in late 2005 in the Washington Post. Cantor told me that back in 2000 there
was no requirement for transparency for a 527's donors.
The darkest turn in this tale is that in 2003 the
back-stabbing Abramoff sponsored a fund-raiser at Abramoff's deli
in Washington, praising Cantor to his face as a prominent liaison
between Congress and the Orthodox Jewish and Christian evangelical
communities.
Cantor also told me that he believes the DOJ is now
deeply involved in investigating Faith and Family Alliance for its
money manipulations. This means that the Abramoff scandal, with
Abramoff obliged to cooperate with DOJ in exchange for a ten-year
sentence, is looking not just at ten to twenty members of Congress,
but is also pointed at Ralph Reed and Grover Norquist. No mention
of Rove, not yet.
Cantor's unnecessarily humble response when prompted
how he felt about the smear at the time, how he feels now to learn
that Abramoff , Reed, Norquist were responsible in a labyrinthine
fashion for maintaining (and probably funding) the Faith and Family
Alliance, was to say, "Politics is a very interesting
business."
I also asked him if the former majority leader DeLay
spoke to him about the smear after the facts were published. No
comment from DeLay.
Cantor is now a potent candidate for the elected post
of Majority Whip. He is also a survivor of the grotesque Abramoff
and others now scurrying from the light.
topics:
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