[UPDATE: This story broke at the lunch hour, plenty of time for a wire report or evening news piece, and still we’ve seen no coverage whatsoever. Nothing. Nada. Zip. The incumbent Lt. Governor can be caught in a documented lie – and one that involved him lounging in Hawaii while he claims to have been be doing the people’s business – all only days before the election, with the general issue already very much in the headlines – and that apparently is not worthy of attention from a single news source if you’re a Republican incumbent chummy with the press corps. Un-freaking-believable.]

Matt Dunne’s campaign, recently nitro-boosted with the addition of campaign veteran Adam Quinn, wasted little time perusing the official schedule which purports to chronicle Lt Governor Brian Dubie’s time spent in serving the duties of the office. Despite a (presumably intentionally) significant delay in releasing the information, and the vetting of it prior to release before multiple sources (including GOP beltway insider Brady Toensing), Team Dubie screwed up – big time.

According to the Dunne campaign press release, Dubie’s schedule shows the following for the week of February 21st, during the time Dubie was actually in Hawaii (independently confirmed by a Feb. 24 Rutland Herald piece, currently behind their pay wall):

Tuesday Feb 21st

Private Appointment, 1000am 1030am Senate Convenes, 345pm 400pm Testify
FYo6 Budget house approps room 42, 400pm 430pm Committee on Committees
with Peter & Dick (here),

Wednesday

Private Appointment, Private Appointment, 1:30pm 200pm Senate Convenes,
500pm 800pm Julius Canns calling Hours (Union Baptist Church) (route 5
south)

Thursday

Private Appointment, Private Appointment, 1100am 1200pm Julius Canns
Memorial Service (Union Baptist Church (Route 5 south), 400pm 430pm
Senate Convenes, 500pm 700pm ??? – Blue Cross/Blue Shield Reception
(Cap Plaza), 700pm 800pm Private Appointment

Friday

Private Appointment, Private Appointment, Private Appointment, 800 am
830am Meeting with the Gov (Ceremonial Office), 1130am 1200pm Senate
Convenes, 1200pm 100p ???? Larry Dupont — ??? Lake Cham Cit Advis Comm
annual leg day – GOV CAN”T –???

[Click here to see a pdf of the actual document] Looks an awful lot like Dubie just made things up, and didn’t even put enough thought into it to make sure the story itself added up. In addition, his lawyers, such as national-GOP hack Toensing, would seem to be complicit in essentially perpetrating a fraud on Vermont voters.

By all rights, this should be a VERY big deal, folks. Let’s see if our Traditional Media — particularly WCAX — pick it up.

In the same press release, the Dunne campaign releases an exchange of letters between Dunne and Dubie directly, wherein Dubie demands Dunne pull his TV ads and apologize for the supposedly “misleading” content. That dog’s not gonna hunt after this latest bombshell, which calls not only Dubie’s credibility into question, but his honesty and integrity as well.

Click on “theres more” to view the text of the correspondence (bloggers just love non-copyrighted material!).

The three letters exchanged between Lt. Governor Dubie and Sen. Dunne
are attached.

##

Dear Lt Governor,

Below, find two letters we exchanged. In the first, you requested I
take
down my ad because you believed it was untrue. This was a poor attempt
to defend the negative ad you were about to release. It turns out your
ad is the one which is factually incorrect.  And ironically, your own
schedule only proves that you show up to the office less than a third
of the time.

Assembling your schedule required multiple lawyers (one of them a
high-priced DC lawyer) and three weeks. It should not have taken either
since you schedule should have been transparent from the beginning like
Gov. Douglas’

In addition, your own schedule only proves that you show up to the
office less than a third of the time. In point of fact, the entire
schedule’s credibility should be called into question.

It lists you attending 12 meetings, including testifying before a
senate
committee, during the week you were in Hawaii while the legislature was
in session. This fact alone impugns the credibility of the entire
schedule and therefore your own credibility.

Vermonters deserve a government of transparency that includes your
activities while Lt Governor. 

My ad lets Vermonters know they had a choice. They have a choice
between
someone who, for $61,000 per year of taxpayer money, showed up to the
office less than one third of the time and someone who would work
full-time, and make the office an office of action. It is factually
correct.

Your negative current ad is yet another example of why your credibility
should be questioned. By airing a factually incorrect and distorting ad
you continue to show that you, your schedule and your campaign should
not be trusted

As you know very well, I have worked very hard on healthcare, safe
neighborhoods, and protecting our environment. Vermonters should know
that while you were on vacation in Hawaii you missed important debates
on voyeurism, renewable energy, and cancer trials.

I request you remove your current negative ad, as it is factually
incorrect and distorts my record. Among other things it ends on a
picture of an empty Senate Seat- #14. I am #13. 

Sincerely,

Matt Dunne

Date: Wed, 1 Nov
Dear Lt. Governor Dubie, 

  Thank you for your letter.

In this election, I have emphasized that Vermonters have a choice. You
have chosen to work as a part-time Lieutenant Governor. You have stated
that you will continue to work as a part-time Lieutenant Governor. My
vision is to be a full-time Lieutenant Governor. I will use the office
in and out of session to bring Vermonters together and continue my
vision of Service Politics. 

You do not come to the statehouse with any regularity when the Senate
is
not in session. Your own staff left me a voicemail August 22nd of 2005,
saying that you “were not in the office regularly until January.” This
recording is available on my website. I even received an email from a
tour guide who has worked in the statehouse for 17 years and says she
never sees you when the legislature is out of session. People who are
regularly in the statehouse know that for much of the time, your office
is empty and closed off with a red velvet rope.

I stand by my ad, which highlights that for most of the year you do not
show up to work at the statehouse.

The focus of my campaign has been that Vermonters have a choice between
a full-time and a part-time Lieutenant Governor. I believe that for
$61,000 per year Vermonter deserve someone full-time who will make Lt
Governors office an office of action. There may be days when I travel
around the state, but I will be based out of the Capitol Building,
where Vermonters can reach me in person and where I can be an active
participant in state government in our state’s capital.

Sincerely,

Senator Matt Dunne

October 31, 2006

Senator Matt Dunne

P.O. Box 1135

White River Jct., VT 05001

Dear Senator Dunne,

I respectfully ask you to please pull your attack television ads off
the
air.  You have made slanderous attacks against my service as Vermont’s
Lieutenant Governor. 

You have made these erroneous attacks with nothing to back them up.

Furthermore, in yesterday’s AP Article by Lisa Rathke, you were quoted
as saying,  “I don’t believe you should be in the office everyday but
you should be sharing your calendar and be transparent about it.”  If
this is the case then why are you misleading the public about my
service as Lieutenant Governor?

In this same article, former Lt. Governor Doug Racine states that the
demands of the office frequently required him to be out of the office
when the legislature was not in session.

Senators from both parties have supported my record. “Brian did not
abuse the office of lieutenant governor. If anything, he worked as hard
as any Lieutenant Governor I’ve worked with. I want to get the record
straight,” said Sen. Dick Mazza, D-Grand Isle.

I call on you to set the record straight with Vermonters and pull the
ad.  I also ask you to apologize for misleading Vermonters about my
service as their Lieutenant Governor.

Sincerely,

Lt. Governor Brian Dubie

I’m sure GMD readers have all been doing their duty, either by waving signs, getting signed up for get-out-the-vote phonebanks, knocking on doors, etc. If not – get yer ass out there. Here’s a link. And if you’re one o’ them readers who just hates all things Dem, call 862-1505 for Bernie’s office to get plugged in. Not sure where to vote? Here’s a link to a helpful VDP site (which should be linked from the VDP front page, folks… c’mon, now…)

If you absolutely cant do any GOTV shifts but you want to help the greater effort, MoveOn.org could use your help with GOTV calls from your home into targeted districts across the country. Click here to find out more.

From Martha Rainville: “I don’t think any candidate should just be jumping on a political bandwagon… That’s finger-pointing and grandstanding and I don’t think it’s helpful.” Nope, that’s not about the Republicans falling all over themselves to try and make John Kerry’s bungled attack on Bush a campaign issue, that’s about calling for Donald Rumsfeld’s dismissal ([Burlington Free Press, May 5, 2006). As far as Kerry goes, General Integrity is singing quite a different tune:

Rainville said late Wednesday afternoon that Kerry had not gone far enough in apologizing and asked all Vermont candidates to ask him to go further. [Times Argus, November 2, 2006]

Real class act, that Martha…

If you haven’t heard it yet, the Dunne campaign has a recording of an August 2005 voicemail message saying Dubie won’t be back in the Lt. Governor’s office “regularly” until the following January, and clearly indicating that an attempt to reach him during that period is problematic. If Dubie wants to argue that it’s not a full-time job and needn’t be, that’s one thing – but given that he’s decided to take the opposite track and argue that he does put in year-round hours, this recording is pretty damning. Bad call, Dubester (no pun intended)

Speaking of Dunne, Usual suspect political “expert” predicts Dunne victory. Middlebury PoliSci Prof Eric Davis, the go-to guy for political analysis from the Vermont media said the following on VPR’s midday report today:

Steve Delaney: Alright, lets look at the top of the state races

Eric Davis: I would say if there’s going to be an upset next Tuesday night it would be in the race for Lt. Governor. This is a race that really has just taken shape in the last couple of weeks. Matt Dunne has been coming on very strong. He’s gotten some high profile endorsements in the last week or ten days from former Governor Howard Dean, and from the Burlington Free Press editorial page. There’s momentum behind the Dunne campaign.

Hmmm… I’ve always thought this could be the race with an upset, but I’m not prepared to make an affirmative prediction. This bodes very, very well, though…

I’d decided not to do any more diaries on the US Senate race, but then I read this in the Freeps endorsement of Tarrant:

His “rural technification” plan is a common sense proposal that includes expanding broadband Internet access to every corner of the state; and locating a branch of Vermont Technical College within commuting distance of every Vermonter to expand the state’s pool of trade and technology workers.

Regular visitors will recall the gleeful fun I made of this “technification” business – on the one hand because, as near as I can tell, there’s no “plan” beyond what you just read (sort of like calling my opinion that everyone should have health care my “universal health care plan.”) – but on the other hand, because he was talking about an education oriented plan using a made-up word. I checked the dictionary and could find no word from which “technification” could have been derived – no verb to tecnhify or technificate.

But I’ve seen the light! I found it! The definition of “technification!” It IS a real word, and I am here to offer my mea culpa. Here, dear readers, is the verb behind Tarrant’s eloquent plan, so endorsed by our state’s largest daily::

The word “technification” is a back-formation from the Spanish tecnificación. The practice of technification was spurred by the spread of coffee leaf rust to the New World in the 1970’s. (The coffee leaf rust, Hemileia vastatrix, is a fungal disease of coffee, known in Spanish as la roya.) Technification projects were assisted by the United States Agency for International Development (U.S.-AID). Technification goes beyond the intensive management of shade and shrubs to the application of agrochemical inputs and the introduction of higher-yielding, disease-resistant varieties of coffee that respond well to those inputs.

Well I’m sold. With the help of the US Senate and the leadership of Rich Tarrant, we can move beyond the intense management of the internet and Vermont Technical College to the application of agrochemical inputs and the introduction of higher-yielding, disease-resistant varieties of students and computers that will respond well to those inputs.

Sounds like a serious boon to the biotech industry to me!

In the meantime, The Times Argus has endorsed Bernie in the race, and while most of the piece reads as a positive argument as to why Sanders is the clear choice, a couple paragraphs read unintentionally (I assume) like a direct refutation of the Freeps editorial:

Tarrant attacked the campaign like a salesman, not a politician. An effective politician speaks and listens. Tarrant had a product to sell — himself — and he thought the wizardry of television would allow him to do it.

But the self he was selling appeared to be an off-the-shelf Republican, eager to parrot the talking points of the national party. He adopted the party’s electoral strategy, pretending he was an independent rather than a Republican and adopting an attack-ad strategy of innuendo and distortion. He tried to peddle the shopworn ideas of supply-side economics — the theory that when the rich get richer, their riches trickle down to the rest of us. This theory has created deficits of historic proportions and crippled the federal government.

Tarrant, too, has cut the Bush administration slack on the abuse of civil liberties, with bizarre fear-mongering statements about terrorists entering Vermont by night on Lake Champlain. And he does not believe in a woman’s right to choose an abortion.

‘Nuff said.

Rosemary “Rozo” McLaughlin, Democratic Representative from the Windsor-Orange-1 district (Tunbridge, Royalton) has passed away from cancer. From the press release sent out of the Speaker’s office: Until running for the House, Rozo’s life’s work had been running her family’s Hitching Post Farm in Royalton, where she was born and raised. Rozo stepped bit by bit into public service. When her daughter entered public school, she realized that a community thrives when its members are active and engaged, and it wasn’t long before she had a seat on first the school board and then the selectboard.

Rozo considered running for office a duty. “I feel that if there comes a time in your life when you have the ability, and you can possibly share a bit of yourself with the world around you, you should take your turn. It may be just volunteering as a mentor or a chaperone with a school group, or serving on a town board. We all receive the benefits of living in a community, so if we are able, we should give something to it as well.”
Rozo’s most recent work in the Vermont House focused on legislation to connect farms and schools, providing important outlets for farmer’s products and access to nutritious local food for students. She worked across party lines, with legislators and the Douglas administration, with the goal of engaging Vermont youth in becoming lifelong consumers of fresh, nutritious foods.
Representative Ann Seibert of Norwich, said of Rozo, “Who could not like Rozo? She was so open to everyone and everything, honest and truly genuine. Thinking of her reminds me of one of my mother’s old sayings, ‘She was all wool and a yard wide.’”

My own in-person contact with Rozo was limited to an extended walk through part of Randolph with her during the last election season after a campaign event (although we did speak on the phone from time to time). Rozo was wise, quick-witted, and had a real no-nonsense honesty to her. She was also very personable, easy to talk to and immediately likable. While she instantly inspired respect, she did so without seeming intimidating or superior in any way.

Rozo was a very good person who made a real impression on me, and the world truly feels diminished by her passing. I hope her example will inspire others like her to step up and take control of their communities’ destinies by running for public office. This world could use more Rozo McLaughlins.

The Herald endorsement is not exactly a surprise (unlike the Freeps endorsement of Dunne… although in light of the Freeps’ endorsement of Rich Tarrant this morning, I suppose it was all part of the horse trading going on between the reality based members of the editorial board, and the usual, knee-jerk, live-Republican-or-die editorial suspects over there…).

I’ll admit, part of me was concerned for the RH endorsement, given the high-profile presence of former reporter Brendan McKenna on the Rainville team, along with the Herald’s tolerance for his thinly veiled electioneering on her behalf in the months prior to his leaving the paper. Still, they did the right thing in the end:

Peter Welch, the Democratic candidate for the U.S. House, is knowledgeable, experienced and committed to working for change in Washington, D.C. His Republican opponent, Martha Rainville, has shown herself to be a personable candidate, but she has been unable to show that she fully grasps the scope of the disasters authored by Republicans in Congress and the White House in the last four years.

Welch deserves the support of Vermont voters.

Click here for the whole thing.

[UPDATE 10/31: I have just been politely corrected by Mr. Drysdale as to the relative conservative-ness (uh…conservativity? conservitude?) of the Herald’s editorial page. It seems I may have unfairly tagged them as right wing, despite a history of Democratic endorsements and policy statements consistent with this editorial. Fair enough! Hey, it aint my hometown paper, so I just go by reputations and heresay that reaches my ears (and we all know how accurate that can be). If any Orange County-ers wanna weight in, by all means feel free…)]

The following editorial was brought to my attention by a GMD reader. It’s an affirming read and spot on endorsements of Sanders and Welch – but what’s of particular note is that it comes from the editorial page of the Herald of Randolph, a conservative paper. Editor and Publisher Dick Drysdale (who was kind enough to send the complete text for reproduction here, as it’s currently behind the web site’s subscription wall) is about as far from a wild-eyed left winger as you can get:

Drive Them Out
Editorial: Randolph Herald

What is a free and democratic people to do when their leaders prod them into an unprovoked and unnecessary war, spilling the blood of their sons and daughters in a desolate land in pursuit of vain and foolish ends?

What is such a people to do when they hear their treasured democratic heritage mocked throughout the world and savaged at home by a government that knows neither truth nor honor?

There remains but one recourse for a people burdened with such leaders, and that is to rise in wrath and drive them out.

Drive them out of their marbled offices. Drive them from the reins of power. Drive them out.

Exactly that is the task before the American people in the election of 2006-to exact retribution, simply by casting their ballots to replace Republicans with Democrats in the halls and councils of Washington. Have no doubt about it: This is an historic choice, a choice whether an all-Republican government-House, Senate and Presidency–will be permitted to continue to run roughshod over the nation’s well-being and good name, or whether it will be called to account.

At this writing, replacing the Republican majority in the House of Representatives appears likely; a change in the Senate leadership appears possible. Changing both must be the goal.

That’s why, here in Vermont, the two national races-one for Senate and one for the House-must be decided, this time, on the matter of party affiliation. It hardly matters, this year, that Martha Rainville is a likeable, intelligent, strong-minded, competent new alternative-which she is. Or that Rich Tarrant is a man of proven ability who has doggedly overcome his own inexperience and some bad advice to evolve into an independent-minded candidate with many of the most interesting ideas in the campaign.

What matters, unfortunately for Rainville and Tarrant, is that if elected to Congress, both will vote for Republican speakers and majority leaders and party whips and in so doing they will vote to keep the leadership of the national government in Republican hands. In 2006, this is an unacceptable alternative.

We need not ask candidates Peter Welch and Bernie Sanders precisely what plans they have to end the carnage that President Bush, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld and the rest have wrought. We need only ask that when in Congress the battle lines are drawn, Rep. Welch and Sen. Sanders will be on our side, on America’s side, and not on the side of those whose reckless policies have placed our youths in mortal peril, ransacked our treasury, defamed our precious reputation, and eroded our security.

Vermont will do the right thing when it elects Bernie Sanders and Peter Welch to Congress on Tuesday, Nov. 7.

This mini-mockumentary of another Vermont candidate for the US Senate was up this weekend (and I posted a link), then it was down (and I removed it), now it’s back up again – hopefully to stay. Very entertaining (but long – 10 minutes with both parts combined) from the ladies at the House of Lemay (and I write that like I know who they are, but I really have no idea… if anyone does, please share). Lots of fun (the “circumcision highway” line made me crack up), but please don’t…you know… actually write in her name, please…

Part two can be found here.

This is from a letter to the Rutland Herald:

Martha Rainville will bring integrity back to the office for the people of Vermont.

Integrity is the standard line from Rainville supporters. What makes Rainville a paragon of integrity? The fact that her supporters say so, apparently. We’ve chronicled her flip-flopping on dirty campaign contributions, plagiarism issues (that continued well after the web site had supposedly been scrubbed), her brazen, pandering flip flop on global warming, among other things. If those don’t convince you, here’s a veritable smorgasboard of phoniness as compiled by the VDP communications operation.  While reading, remember that Dictionary.com defines integrity as:

adherence to moral and ethical principles; soundness of moral character; honesty.

On with the show…

Again, I almost never reprint press releases in toto without making fun of them, but Andy Bouska at the VDP has done such a good job compiling this stuff (and few people go to the VDP website as it isn’t a very helpful site at all), folks should get to see some of what the press has been seeing from him.

From a VDP email on the 26th:

SAYS: She is opposed to privatization of Social Security. [“The Greatest Generation” web ad]

DOES: Signs a pledge with the organization, For Our Grandchildren, which is committed to privatizing Social Security. [Caledonian-Record, October 21, 2006]

---

In Tuesday night’s WPTZ debate, Martha Rainville claimed that she:

DOES: Signed a pledge not to raise taxes.

SAYS: Martha Rainville has already proposed a windfall profits tax on oil and gas companies. [Martha Rainville Press Release, July 27, 2006]

From the VDP on the 24th:

14 days before the election, Martha Rainville has decided that the war in Iraq is, as she told WDEV’s Mark Johnson this morning, a “debacle.”

---

Martha Rainville in February:

“Rainville said she believed it was a matter of months before the U.S. military could begin reducing troop strengths in Iraq, though a long-term military presence of some kind was probably inevitable.” [Rutland Herald, February 14, 2006]

“Rainville said Iraqis are relying on American troops but are making progress.  ‘We’re headed in the right direction… They’re almost there.’” [Eagle Times, February 14, 2006]

Rainville: “I think that we are well on track to continue the withdrawal of U.S. Forces because they have been successful in training the Iraqi security forces… As time goes by, each month I think it will require less and less Americans on the ground there.” [VT Guardian, February 17, 2006]

---

Martha Rainville in March:

Rainville: “I can clearly see that we’ll be able to bring more and more of our troops home, not because we want to pull ‘em out of a bad situation, but because they’ve succeeded.” [You Can Quote Me, March 12, 2006]

---

Martha Rainville in August:

Rainville: “We, I believe, are closer than we’ve ever been.” [Bennington Banner, August 23, 2006]

“It’s very difficult for citizens to have an accurate perspective of the war, of our successes, or our weaknesses, how we are actually prosecuting the war and are we meeting our objectives,” Rainville said. “We don’t get well rounded information through the media. What’s reported happens, but so much more is going on, on the ground in Iraq than we are aware of.” [Bennington Banner, August 23, 2006]

---

Martha Rainville in October:

Rainville: Iraq is a “debacle.” [WDEV, Mark Johnson Show, October 24, 2006]

And in a blast from the past, here’s a reminder of Rainville’s “clean campaign” gimmick. From September 12th:

From the start, Martha Rainville has run a campaign with a wink and a nod to the National Republicans – trying to present herself as independent from the national GOP and pledging a “clean campaign,” while relying on the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) to do her campaign dirty work.

There is no such thing as a coincidence when you look at the pattern that continues to emerge:

---

Example 1: 

Immediately following Martha Rainville’s “clean campaign pledge” proposal, a source close to the NRCC stated it would not abide by it, stating, “The NRCC is always going to do what the NRCC needs to do.” [The Hill, June 21, 2006]

---

Example 2:

Martha Rainville proposed the “second component of her plan to restore honesty, integrity and accountability to Washington” on the very same day that her partners at the NRCC reported an expenditure of $21,000 on a poll designed to test negative attacks on Peter Welch. [Martha Rainville Release, July 11, 2006; FEC, July 11, 2006]

---

Example 3:

Once again, on the very same day, Martha Rainville submitted yet another letter with a pitch for her campaign pledge to Peter Welch claiming, “I again urge you to reconsider my Clean Campaign Pledge and join me in setting a positive example for Vermont and for the nation,” the NRCC reserved $240,000 in advertising for Martha Rainville. [Martha Rainville Letter, August 7, 2006; WCAX, August 7, 2006]

---

Example 4:

And yet again, the day after Martha Rainville unveiled the third plank of her “clean campaign,” calling for a website to track the explosion of Republican-led Washington earmarks, the NRCC officially purchased $60,000 in advertising for Martha Rainville’s campaign. [AP, September 9, 2006]

And that’s just a few of my favorites. The VDP Communications operation has been very good this time around, laying out the case for why her integrity is very much in question this election season.

( – promoted by odum)

In response to Matt Dunne’s attempt to make an issue of Lt. Governor Brian Dubie’s schedule in the waning days of the election, Team Dubie attempted a classic Rovian turn-the-issue-on-its-head maneuver by demanding Dunne release his schedule in an attempt to make an issue of Dunne’s absences.

Dunne has responded with the information, and in doing so quickly, has taken the wind out of Dubie’s counter-attack (I’m glad somebody in Vermont besides Bernie appreciates the value of rapid response!).

Still, like any political issue, there’s always a trail of breadcrumbs to the next issue if you know where to look – and thankfully, an astute GMD reader knew exactly where to look and sent me an email. From the AP (emphasis mine):

“My schedule as a part-time legislator is an open book as all of the records are public, including when I paid back the state for any day that I missed,” Dunne said in a written statement. “However, in the interest of transparency, we are compiling those public records for anyone who wants to see them.”

The request for Dunne’s schedule came from Brady Toensing, a Washington, D.C.-based lawyer who is handling Dubie’s schedule request issues.

The part of this report to keep an eye on is that name: Brady Toensing. Toensing isn’t just some local attorney with a shingle on his door – he is a Washington GOP insider.

So the question is, if Dubie is so confident about his re-election (and is such an upstanding guy), why is he turning to a high powered member of the GOP beltway sleaze machine to go after Dunne?

Background: Digenova & Toensing, Mr. Toensing’s Washington firm is a big-name Republican lobbying outfit. And by “Republican,” I don’t simply mean that they favor Republican clients, I mean these are people on a mission that goes back many years… sordid details on the flip…

From the WaPo in ’98:

[Victoria] Toensing, a former federal prosecutor, and [Joe] diGenova, a former U.S. attorney here, wear a number of hats. The law partners are the outside counsel for a House committee’s investigation of the Teamsters union and its ties to the Democrats. The couple also represent the committee’s Republican chairman, Dan Burton of Indiana, in a probe of whether he improperly demanded campaign donations from a lobbyist for Pakistan. Toensing represents Gingrich’s wife, Marianne, on ethics matters.

More recently, Media Matters fleshes out the family firm’s history in the context of their unchallenged “analysis” on CNN and ABC of the Valerie Plame Scandal, and Karl Rove’s unindicted role in the affair:

Toensing was President Reagan’s deputy assistant attorney general and chief counsel to former Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-AZ). DiGenova has been described as a “confidant” of independent counsel Kenneth Starr during the Monica Lewinsky investigation [The Baltimore Sun, 9/21/00] and as “a former federal prosecutor now working for House Republicans” [The Washington Post, 2/23/98]. In 1998, Toensing and DiGenova angered House Democrats by repeatedly discussing the Lewinsky investigation in the media while under contract with the House Committee on Education and the Workforce to investigate the Teamsters union [The Washington Post, 2/13/98].

That’s right. Ken Starr. Monica Lewinsky. The Clinton impeachment. Dubie is running with that crowd. It doesn’t get much ickier, folks.

Now lest you think that the apple may have fallen across the park from the tree (although since he is, in fact, working for his parents’ business, I don’t know why one would assume he isn’t part and parcel to the sleaze), here’s Brady himself on CNN in 2002 discussing the rights of Bush-labeled “enemy combatants” who may happen to be US Citizens:

BRADY TOENSING, ATTORNEY: Well, if the judge follows Supreme Court precedent, I think that they’ll have to find that a United States citizen, once they’re designated as an enemy combatant, can be held.

NEVILLE: And that’s OK by you — his rights are not being violated?

TOENSING: Well, I don’t know if they’re being violated. The judge is going to look at that under a habeas corpus motion.

But the Supreme Court has said that United States citizens can be held by military tribunal if they are designated as enemy combatants. And, in fact, they can be executed.

Why the interest in Vermont? Well, Brady lives here and is been involved in Charlotte’s Zoning Board of Adjustment. He’s also friendly with Kevin Blier’s local religious right/anti-gay organization, the Center for American Cultural Renewal/Vermont Renewal.

In fact, rumor is that he was involved in the ethics attacks on Elizabeth Ready that caused her to lose her post as State Auditor to Randy Brock.

If so, that’s two high-profile races over two cycles – which would leave little doubt that Toensing is a living, breathing straight line of connection between the Vermont GOP and the Washington GOP slime machine.

But the question remains unanswered; why is Dubie getting his hands dirty with this guy?

Maybe he’s scared. Dunne is looking dangerous in the waning days. Perhaps his internal polling has him looking for options.

Or maybe Dubie’s just not the boy scout he presents himself as.

[Originally published in the Vermont Journal… nobody gets that the title is a riff on Conason’s “The Hunting of the President,” so it was changed in print, but I’m hoping all the good ol’ blog readers will get it. It did occur to me that this piece could be read to be encouraging complacence, which is NOT my intent. You’ll note Bartlett is on my local target list in the diary below…]

The Vermont GOP is AWOL on state legislative elections this year, leaving many of their candidates to fend for themselves. Why is hard to say. With county committees forced to put want ads for candidates on neighborhood bulletin boards and an astonishing number of state Senate and House seats simply going uncontested, Republican Chair Jim Barnett and company seem exclusively focused on the statewide elections.

Almost.

It’s not quite accurate to say the state GOP has no state Senate operation. It’s just that the state Senate operation seems for all the world to have only one target they really care about – their favorite Senator, Susan Bartlett of Lamoille County.

Nobody drives the Republicans crazy like Bartlett. She’s the sole Senator from a County they think should be theirs. And it’s always a battleground. Election after election, the Lamoille Senate contest is always the Thunderdome of Vermont politics, and time after time, when two candidates enter, it is always Bartlett who leaves, and her opponent who is carted off on a political stretcher.

This alone would be enough to make her a perennial target of GOP ire, but somehow she always finds a way to rub it in by finding a way to tie one hand behind her back as she goes into every fight, yet still come out on top in November.

She survived her Act 60 vote in the last county where that should have been possible. When then Senate President Pro-Tem Peter Shumlin decided to run for Lieutenant Governor, it was Bartlett who was left with the task of leading the Senate Democrats’ election operation, taking on responsibility for every other Democratic Senate candidacy in the state in addition to her own. Such divided attention and energy again smelled like blood in the water to circling Republican sharks, but Bartlett wasn’t merely victorious, she expanded the Democratic Senate caucus into an impenetrable supermajority.

However, that’s not the worst of it. Bartlett isn’t just any thorn in their side; she is also among the most powerful and effective senators in Vermont.

As Chair of Appropriations, Bartlett brings a level of influence to benefit her Lamoille constituents that is the envy of the state. While the last two President Pro Tems have had their eyes on higher office, Bartlett has held a steady and forceful hand on budgets and policy, and all the while having little tolerance for partisan posturing. Bartlett is often the first to call nonsense like it is, and the Republicans just hate that.

It’s likely that in a year the GOP doesn’t seem to care about the state Senate, that the Governor himself pulled rank to have the machine turned on her – and that includes him personally campaigning against her, as well as the appearance of some nasty campaign attacks. Bartlett has enraged the Governor by, among other things, casually and definitively showing his prized “promise scholarship” program to be an unfunded gimmick designed for headlines and utterly meaningless as policy. When Douglas petulantly dubbed Bartlett’s counterproposal “mouse meat,” he only made himself look worse in comparison.

So this time around, it’s the same old story. The mortal injury du jour was supposed to be Bartlett’s departure to a conference while final negotiations for closing the legislative session were underway. What an opportunity. The GOP finally has something they can spin into an early political retirement for their favorite nemesis.

Gimme a break.

Another nail biter, another razor thin margin, another long Election Night, and another term for one of the most effective senators in the state.

See you in Montpelier in January, Susan…