The Law Only Applies to Republicans

Well, let’s stop for a moment and take stock of the situation: John Kerry and his party engage in an orgy of incestuous Bushophobic political hatchetry with their army of hard-left 527s for the better part of two solid years, and the first scalp to be scored is…the Bush campaign’s legal counsel.

A lawyer for President Bush who also has advised Swift Boat Veterans for Truth resigned today from Bush's campaign. Meanwhile, a lawyer who works for Democratic National Committee and the Bush-hating group MoveOn.org refused to quit either organization.

I cannot begin to express my sadness that my legal representations have become a distraction from the critical issues at hand in this election,’ Benjamin Ginsberg wrote in a resignation letter, which Bush's campaign released. ‘I feel I cannot let that continue, so I have decided to resign as national counsel to your campaign to ensure that the giving of legal advice to decorated military veterans, which was entirely within the boundaries of the law, doesn't distract from the real issues upon which you and the country should be focusing.’

Why on Earth would Mr. Ginsberg quit while none of his Dem counterparts think anything about their blatant conflicts of interest to this day? The Kerry Spot provides a possible answer:

Ginsberg is not in the same position as the Democratic lawyers. Ben was one of the chief proponents behind the Republican strategy of shutting down 527s, both by seeking regulation from the FEC and making public statements designed to thwart 527 fundraising for both sides. It is true that attorneys make conflicting arguments on different clients' behalf from time to time, but it is very tricky to make those arguments in the same arena and at about the same time. Especially when you are touting yourself as an expert on the law, rather than as an advocate for a certain client.

My personal view was that his continued service was completely untenable, and that he brought this upon himself.

Thus, the remarkable irony of an anti-527 guy offering legal counsel to the very same 527 that just happens to be ripping out John Kerry’s entrails and jumping rope with them. Almost as ironic as Senator Kerry, the biggest beneficiary of 527 activity, filing the very same type of complaint with the FEC when a 527 popped up that actually had the temerity to oppose him. And still he won’t condemn all 527s, as the President invited him to jointly do on Monday.

One wonders what it would have really cost Lurch to do so. It’s not as if moveon.org and the Media Fund and Americans Coming Together would have stopped their hate-Bush agitating, after all – hell, they’ve vomited another rafter of hit ads just this week. They’d have recognized the non-nod/wink-wink of Kerry’s anti-527 plea. And it might have been a way out of this Swiftboat Vet business, which is slowly eating his campaign alive like a boa constrictor. I guess the answer is that Dems are so reflexively anti-W that if the President told them to not spay/neuter themselves, half the country would be sterile in a matter of days. Which is why. “Democrat lawyer Joe Sandler insists there is nothing wrong with working for DNC as well as for MoveOn.org, and Kerry continues to refuse to fire Zach Exley, a campaign staffer who was a director for MoveOn.org, just as Kerry's former campaign manager Jim Jordan refuses to quit the pro-Kerry Media Fund.“

Of course, the same dynamic is why a specific Bush denunciation of the Swifties would be as futile as it would be illegal. What else do both candidates expect? The whole point of 527 groups is that they’re independent of campaigns and parties. That’s why it’s illegal for candidates and party organizations to either coordinate or interfere with them.

One almost suspects that Kerry is trying to set Bush up for near-future impeachment proceedings. Except, of course, that Kerry himself would have to precede him in the docket.