Some of you may be familiar with the sleazy G.O.P. fundraising scheme in which physicians are told they have won a phony "Physician of the Year" award and are told to send either $500 to the National Republican Congressional Committee to receive the award in the mail or $1250 to attend a workshop in Washington D.C. to receive the award in person. The "award" is given to any medical physician who falls for the scam and sends in the money. While this scheme has been credited to Tom Delay, it is time to spread the "credit" around.
The original story reported by ABC news which can be found
here reported that a Jamestown NY physician was contacted by an unnamed U.S. Congressman. The failure to name the congressman involved lead the blogosphere to assume that Rep. Tom DeLay was involved, and I'm sure he was.
However, a column by Ron Watson appearing in yesterday's Buffalo News has revealed that the unnamed Congressman was Rep. Thomas Reynolds (R.N.Y.) This bozo, who is the current chairman of the NRCC
just eked out an unexpectedly close victory in the
last election.
An exchange between Ron Watson and NRCC aide Carl Forte provides a classic "Daily Show" moment:
You don't have to donate to win the award, said Forte. Oh? And what are some of the other ways you can become Physician of the Year? You can volunteer to help with a campaign, such as by staffing phone banks, he said.
The muck drips off DeLay and onto the rest of the GOP hierarchy.