House colleague calls Weldon "slightly unhinged" - Time
In a compelling piece in Time, Sept 17, 2006, Joe Klein tracks the PA-7 race and talks about the characteristics of Joe Sestak and Curt Weldon. Pretty good article
This part jumps out:
"Unhinged"? That's putting it mildly!
"questionable lobbying schemes"? The only question is why the Republican controlled House failed to investigate these incidents. But I guess that question answers itself.
This part jumps out:
"Curt can be absolutely brilliant," says a House colleague. "But there's also a slightly unhinged quality to him." Weldon recently insisted, along with Pennsylvania's U.S. Senator Rick Santorum, that there were still weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. He also claimed that a secret Pentagon unit called Able Danger had identified Mohamed Atta at the center of the 9/11 terrorist conspiracy a year before the attacks, a claim that has been dismissed by both the White House and the 9/11 commission. Weldon has been associated with some questionable lobbying schemes: both his daughter Karen and his real estate agent, a longtime friend named Cecelia Grimes, have set up lobbying firms representing defense contractors and East European companies that have received Weldon's support for their products.
"Unhinged"? That's putting it mildly!
"questionable lobbying schemes"? The only question is why the Republican controlled House failed to investigate these incidents. But I guess that question answers itself.
posted by Seventh Watch at 6:25 PM
16 Comments:
"slightly unhinged"--that's being charitable.
"slightly unhinged"-that's just a cheapshot.
It would be a cheap shot if we said it...but it was one of Weldon's colleagues in the House. I'd say that speaks volumes.
Hi, anon-
Are the comments about Curt's multiple 'questionable' family dealings (more than listed here) also cheap shots.....or are they just business as usual for the Republicans?
Is Sestak bullying and berating those under him in the Navy also cheap shots...or are they business as usual for the Democrats?
What also speaks volumes is that same colleague also said Weldon "can be absolutely brilliant".
Anonymous Weldon Campaign Staffer-
"Is Sestak bullying and berating those under him in the Navy also cheap shots...or are they business as usual for the Democrats?"
No, if true, it just makes him a piss-poor boss or a boss that sets the bar a bit higher. Is forcing the county employees to work on campaigns at risk of their jobs "business as usual" for the Delco GOP?
Setak's going to have one vote out of 435. Doesn't sound like he's going to be boss of anything besides some staffers.
A congressman is not a boss, but rather an employee/representative of the people that can hire/fire him.
The voters of the 7th have the opportunity to fire Weldon (a terrible employee) and hire a better one (Sestak).
Nothing scares the GOP more than a Congress that actually represents the interests of the voters.
slightly unhinged? How about slightly leading Sestak by 19 points?
I was a "colleage" in the House, probably Nancy Pelosi or some other left-wing Dem who seems to think anyone who doesn't agree with their extremist views must be unhinged.
I can guess that Pelosi didn't say: "Curt can be absolutely brilliant," says a House colleague. "But there's also a slightly unhinged quality to him." She would have never started a comment about Weldon that way.
And hey, nobody is calling Weldon a dummy. After 20 years in Congress, the dinosaur has been able to avoid ethics inquiries into all his shady dealings. So there certainly some savvy there.
It's the unhinged part along with smarts that makes him dangerous.
And if you Weldon supporters think Weldon is going to win by 19 percentage points, would you like to make a wager on that? Or doesn't your confidence go that far?
Can we see the poll data instead of just hearing the numbers? what questions were asked? how was the samling done? Doesn't this show he's losing ground from the prior poll?
Look, let's be real, Curt knows its not a 19 point race, we all do. is Joe winnig in the polls today? probably not. Is Curt ahead in the polls by more than 5 pts, probably. The only poll that counts is in November, and you only need to win by 1. Let's stop fixating on polls, and get ready to work the polls. Curt must go, everyone vote for joe.
September 21, 2006
The War on Weldon
World Net Daily - Jack Cashill
The Clinton shadow government (CSG) is picking battles where it can as long as they are not on a real battlefield. This November it has set its figurative sights on Curt Weldon, a veteran Republican congressman from Pennsylvania’s Democrat-leaning 7th District.
Weldon is paying the price for exposing a project known as Able Danger. In June 2005 he revealed that Clinton administration attorneys had intervened to stop the “Able Danger” group in the Defense Intelligence Agency from initiating preventive actions against two of the 9-11 terrorists. He has also written the book “Countdown to Terror,” an expos of the CIA’s performance prior to September 11 that won him few friends in that overly politicized agency or in the bowels of either the previous or the current administration.
To oppose him, the CSG has put up a retired admiral who grew up in Weldon’s district, but has not been seen there since, by the name of Joe Sestak. I say “put up” with some precision. The Weldon camp fully believes that the CSG handpicked the admiral to prevent Weldon from digging any deeper into the Clinton track record. This unseen record includes, as Weldon himself told me, clues to former NSA Director Sandy Berger’s motive for stealing and destroying documents from the National Archives.
Now principal of the lobbying and consulting firm Stonebridge International, the dubious Berger has been leading the charge for Sestak. To that end, he hosted a serious fund-raiser for the admiral in Washington, which raised tens of thousands of dollars for the Sestak campaign. Berger has also lent the Sestak campaign Stonebridge’s director of communications, Allison Price, to serve as its official campaign spokesman.
The Sestak donor list reads likes a who’s who of international mismanagement. There is, of course, the disgraced Berger. Then there is the disgraced former CIA director, John Deutch, who had signed a criminal plea agreement in connection with his mishandling of national secrets a day before being pardoned by the outgoing President Clinton. One interesting contribution came in from the disgraced Mary O. McCarthy, recently fired from the CIA after failing a polygraph on leaked classified information in regards to CIA prisons overseas.
In addition to the disgraced there are the merely disreputable. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, still fuming over her churlish portrayal on ABC’s “The Path to 9-11,” gave her fair share, as has Hillary Clinton, Richard “Against All Enemies” Clarke, former NSA Director Anthony Lake and former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta.
Sestak’s own employment record is a little troubled as well. Gil Spencer, a columnist with the Delaware County Times, talked with many of the military people who knew him best. Although very bright by all accounts, Sestak was “reassigned” by the U.S. Navy for what was called “poor command climate.”
According to Navy people, “reassigned” is a nice way to say “fired.” One colleague called him “narcissistic” and “Machiavellian.” Said another, “He has a dark side to his personality.” Even his supporters acknowledge that he could be extremely difficult. Sestak’s “reassignment” has not, however, kept him from wearing a full dress uniform in campaign appearances, a Navy no-no.
He may not have known. Until this past year, he had no known political aspirations or interests.
In an ongoing pattern - Kerry, Murtha, Wesley Clark - the Democrats use military veterans as props in their ongoing campaign to weaken America’s defenses and then attack the military record of anyone who dares challenge their Potemkin veterans.
As part of the pattern, the left in general and the Sestak campaign in particular has come to use “swiftboat” as a verb meaning “to slander.” They have convinced themselves that Senator Kerry’s fellow swiftboat officers all lied. What this suggests, of course, is that no Democrat has actually read “Unfit for Command,” a painfully true account of John Kerry’s sham heroics in Vietnam, affirmed by essentially every officer who knew him and co-authored by a Democrat veteran, John O’Neill. The ability of the left to screen out all information that does not serve their worldview drives the rest of us nuts. It also has serious negative implications both for the culture and for national security.
Weldon has been victimized by this myopia. One Democrat blogger casually refers to the congressman as “unhinged Republican incumbent Curt Weldon.”
Another refers to him as “Crazy Curt ‘Able Danger’ Weldon” as though Able Danger was some sort of right-wing fantasy.
When Weldon’s campaign manager, Michael Puppio Jr., questioned the propriety of Mary McCarthy’s donation to the Sestak campaign, another blogger ridiculed his comments as conspiratorial. The possibility that a book like Weldon’s, which details the CIA mismanagement of the war on terror, just might raise the ire of the political types within the Agency strikes this blogger as “vintage conspiracist nuttery.” The same blogger goes on to comment that “no conspiracy is too attenuated, too poorly supported by the evidence and too downright stupid for a bona fide conspiracy theorist.”
Weldon knows a good deal more about Washington’s secrets than he has already revealed, including at least one close to my own heart. But living in a media world that turns a blind eye to the obvious and accepts the fantastic as true, he has to be careful with what he says, certainly before an election. If the Democrats regain the House in November, his seat in particular, the possibility for exposing the truth on several key issues will effectively end.
That is not to say that the climate right now is terribly encouraging for truth telling. But on the other hand, it is not terribly scary either. That could change.
the previous comment is a laundry list of bs. how about take a long time and talk about karen weldon, celia grimes, charlie sexton and the other weldon kids who are feeding at our tax dollar trough!
"Slightly unhinged" is not a cheap shot when referring to Weldon. Anything less than "Completely Unhinged" is an equivocation that shows some regard for Curt.
I am a realtor in Delaware County and I know CeCe Grimes, I have always known her to be very ethical and very straight forward.I also live in Curts district and I am voting for Curt. Experience is more valuable then anything. Its easy for people not living here to judge, but ask the people of Boeing if Curt is the way to go. Boeing is a major employer in this area and if it were not for Curt Weldon I am sure Boeing would have left. I do not have the time to mention all the other work Curt has accomplished for our area.I respect Joe Sestak and feel he is an honorable man, having served in the military myself I am torn at times when it comes to voting for a military man. I just do not feel Joe Sestak is the man for the job and I am a democrat. Curt Weldon cares about Delaware County I care about Delaware County.
The above poster can state their opinions about CeCe Grimes and Curt Weldon, but the facts are that Grimes profited greatly from her relationship with Weldon and her new business as a lobbyist. Curt Weldon's campaign fund was helped too. Corruption is a good reason to find a new Congressman.
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