No really. It's not.
The press officer for Republican congressional candidate Bill Greene may face criminal charges after allegedly punching a pickup driven by the supporter of another candidate outside a Greene fundraiser Tuesday night, police said.
That's right. He punched a truck. I fear Georgia blogging may just dry up once the 10th district election passes.
9 comments:
So much speculation, so little knowledge of the facts. So here are the facts.
On the evening of May 22nd, the Greene for Congress campaign was holding a private fundraiser at the Community Center in Watkinsville, Georgia. A Whitehead campaign staffer, Brandon Phillips, arrived as it began and placed Whitehead campaign signs all around the building (NOT just in a private yard, we have the pictures) where the Greene fundraiser was being held. I approached the Whitehead staffer, who was standing by his truck in a private driveway getting more signs out, and asked him to take down the signs around our building, which he refused to do. Then the owner of that property asked me to step off of his property, which I did. As I left, I mentioned to him that (A) I'm sure Jim Whitehead would never approve of placing his signs all around the building where his opponent's private function was being held, and (B) I'd hate to see them lose all that money, since the people inside the building would be coming out shortly to pull up the signs there were not on private property. (And yes, there were Minutemen inside as well, which Phillips knew in advance.)
I went inside to greet all of our supporters, and our campaign manager, Eric Spohn, went out to take pictures of the signs and the truck's license plate (to show Jim Whitehead what his people were doing), at which time the Whitehead staffer jumped into his truck, threw it into reverse, and attempted to run down Eric. Eric jumped out of the way at the last second, pushing off of the truck as it sped by, putting a small dent in the side.
All of this happened right in front of the police station (which is attached to the Watkinsville Community Center, where our event was being held), the two of them were questioned, and they were asked if they were pressing charges against each other (against Phillips for assault with a deadly weapon and/or attempted vehicular manslaughter, against Eric for property damage). Eric said he didn't want to have to do so if it could be solved between the two of them, as he didn't want to have to bring all of his witnesses (some of whom were minors, there with their families as volunteers at the event) into court. Phillips, it turns out, couldn't file charges, because it wasn't his truck.
So no one got into a fight. No one was arrested. No one filed charges. The signs were all removed (both the dozens surrounding our building, and from the yard of the private home -- apparently, someone was simply paid off to put a sign up for the evening). Our event went great. We all went home.
Unfortunately, this is just another example of politics as usual. What we had was a foolish young man, making several foolish mistakes. He was foolish to put dozens of signs around his boss's opponent's private event. He was foolish to try to stop the Greene for Congress campaign manager from taking pictures of his truck & license, by attempting to run him down. And he was foolish to think that this is how politics is done -- which is what the voters of Georgia are sick and tired of. Jim Whitehead should do the right thing: this staffer should be fired (or if he was a volunteer, banned from the campaign), and I hope he learns his lesson and avoids foolishness in the future.
That's what happened. I was there. You weren't. End of story.
Except for one more thing: I called Jim Whitehead's campaign several times, and left messages asking him to return my call, so we could discuss this incident. He hasn't done so.
Bill Greene
Thanks for stopping by Mr. Greene. And for clarifying your view of what happened. Feel free to drop by any time and let me have it when you think I'm wrong. But just for the record, I never claimed to be there. Selah.
The in-fighting and imploding Republicans in Georgia must surely be at some level aproaching lunacy. And they're just getting started! Don't throw those typewriters out the window anytime soon.
Honk if you love you some Republicans! Just don't honk AT them or they'll try to whip your truck's ass.
Don't call him "Mister," Griftdrift, he'll take on airs. He's one of us. Wildlife.
I'm working on a theory that since we purged all the crazy from the 4th it somehow seeped over to the 10th.
The 4th? My God, Hank Johnson looks more presidential than any of the current presidential candidates!
Grift,
Old Greenie has been spreadin' this around at all the blogs. He even gave me some!
Just think, in the time it took him to find all this on blogsearch, he couldve been skeerin' up some Mexican schoolchildren and anchor babies named Jesus....
Whats a minuteman to do???
Grift,
It only dawned on me a little later that he went around posting this on several blogs...note he says "I was there, you were not." Looks like he was pretty confident the odds were against lots of people having attended his fundraiser...
Hehe.
Steve, I'm betting we've got an unpaid staffer here with a canned response. Poor kid had to surf the internets all day yesterday.
Hey unpaid staffer! Contact me and let's do a deep background interview!
Post a Comment