Kudos And Reflections on the Gladney Case

Eric Boehlert had very kind words today in an excellent summary of the Gladney debacle:

An additional media note about the sad Gladney chapter: The two-year tale ended up pitting St. Louis blogger Loesch against an upstart local, a liberal blogger named Adam Shriver who runs a site called St. Louis Activist Hub. By the time the not guilty verdict was read yesterday it had become clear to everyone who followed the story that Shriver had absolutely demolished Loesch and her weak Gladney conspiracies.

Right from the outset, Shriver was among the very first bloggers to dissect the Gladney video and raise all kinds of factualdoubts about the tall tale the Tea Party was telling about the “union thugs.” And it was Shriver who stayed on the case since 2009 and who, I think, was largely responsible for helping to reveal, yet again, the kind of serial fabricator that Dana Loesch is. Andrew Breitbart, too.

So in that sense, the Gladney story helped highlight the stark, well-established contrast between the liberal and conservative blogospheres, and how Loesch and Breitbart effortlessly trafficked in lies, while Shriver stuck to the facts and undertook meticulous reporting.

And in the end, his story prevailed.

I'll add as well that while there was a lot of questioning of the Gladney story on the left, and especially mockery of the fact that Gladney appeared in a wheelchair, Boehlert by far provided the most responsible coverage among national bloggers, digging into the details of the case and asking the right questions, even from the very beginning. He's stayed on this case for two years, and took a lot of abuse for it, so it's definitely as much of a vindication of his careful approach to the story as it is of my local coverage.

The Riverfront Times should also be commended for, as far as I know, being the only established media outlet in St. Louis to investigate this story and ask serious questions about the validity of Gladney's story. It was the Riverfront Times, in fact, that revealed that David Brown, the man who was originally selling the offensive buttons, who just happened to immediately decide to be Gladney's lawyer and spokesperson that night, had allegedly told another employee that Gladney was his "gravy train.' There were some other media outlets that seemed to buy the tea party story so much that they actually contributed to the pressure campaign against St. Louis County to press charges when, in reality, there was no solid evidence. But the tea party was young then, and still had an ounce of credibility for people who didn't bother to dig in to their statements.

The Gladney story was actually my first real blogging. Activist Hub at that time was used primarily for posting weekly event listings, but when I saw the crazy narrative being pushed by the Right about this story I had to write a post questioning that narrative. I was immediately challanged by tea party blogger Jim Durbin, someone who admitted lying on this story but was nevertheless probably the only tea party person who was actually familier with the full body of evidence (Lord knows Dana Loesch didn't have a clue what she was talking about). I then proved, using Durbin's challange, that Gladney's attorney was lying, kicking off a new stream of right-wing vitriol against me. That probably is the real origin of my acrimonious relationship with the St. Louis Tea Party, though I can't imagine us liking each other even if this hadn't happened. Durbin was the source of all kinds of lies about me, including idiotic claims like "I attack people's children" that still continue on in the fantasyland of the right wing to this day. They continue on, I should say, without a shred of supporting evidence or even an explanation of what they're talking about. That's how sad and pathetic this group is: when they're desperate enough, they'll make accusations and personal attacks without even telling you what they're accusing you of.

And ultimately, that's why I agree with Boehlert that this incident was a great illustration of the, "stark, well-established contrast between the liberal and conservative blogospheres." Even to this day, I never once claimed that I knew that McCowan and Molens were innocent, or that Gladney was guilty of starting the fight. Rather, I dug into the evidence, asked questions about how conclusive it was, and challanged people who claimed that they were certain about what happened. In contrast, the tea party from the very beginning of this mess claimed that they knew beyond all shadow of a doubt that Gladney was "assaulted by union thugs," and they were immune to any facts that didn't fit their narrative and immediately personally attacked anyone who even questioned if there really was conclusive evidence. Though I'm happy to rub the right-wingers face in this one, I think the real lesson is that one should keep an open mind to the facts and analytically evaluate the available evidence. That's what jurors are asked to do, and twelve jurors, including two with tea party affiliations, came to the only rational conclusion: there was not any substantial evidence showing how the fight was initiated.

Update A couple other important kudos: Brian Matthews was someone originally accused of "resisting arrest" at this same incident, and has been repeatedly smeared by the tea party ever since. Ironically, a tea party video intended to attack Brian actually proved that the police account was innacurate, and the charges against him were dropped. Since that time (and probably even before), Brian has been tirelessly advocating on behalf of McCowan and Molens.

Furthermore, the defense attorney Paul D'Agrosa was really good. There were a lot of things I would have included in the defense (like video of one of the tea party witnesses having to be held back from an altercation earlier) but D'Agrosa apparently had a strategy of keeping it simple and focusing on the lack of evidence, and it worked.

NOT GUILTY!!!

Remember when I wrote all of the reasons why the tea party conspiracy theories about "two union thugs assaulting a black man in parking lot" at Carnahan's town hall were probably false? Well, after two years, a jury of twelve peers finally has reached a conclusion confirming what I've been saying. Elston McCowan and Perry Molens have been found NOT GUILTY of misdemeanor assault.

The conspiracy pushed relentlessly for the past two years by Dana Loesch, Jim Hoft, Andrew Breitbart, Fox News, and the tea party has been shown at long last to be a complete fraud. Two innocent men have been harassed and threatened for two years as a result of a tea party smear campaign with only one objective: to make unions look evil.

Of course, even though they didn't actually watch the trial, they're already declaring that there was some grand conspiracy involved:

What pathetic people.

Update: Thanks for the links from Eric Boehlert at Media Matters, TBogg at Fire Dog Lake, and David Neiwert from Crooks and Liars. By the way, TBogg's tweet:

Beat Me In St. Louis http://t.co/ntJtvLC from @firedoglake Slightly used wheelchair and neck brace for sale. #tcot #burnbabyburn

If I'm missing something, let me know. And don't worry local media (with the notable exception of the RFT), I won't be holding my breath for you to acknowledge that I've been covering this story responsibly and got pretty much everything right from the beginning, while you were busy covering tea party protests at the NAACP and SEIU offices. That would be waaay too much to ask.

Initial Thoughts On Gladney/McCowan/Molens Trial

The trial for Elston McCowan and Perry Molens, former SEIU members accused of attacking Kenneth Gladney in a parking lot, kicked off today. They are only charged with a misdemeanor, so the trial won't be a big to-do, and the prosecution has already rested their case after about four hours. I haven't seen anything that has changed my previous skepticism about the tea party story claiming that "union thugs" McCowan and Molens started mercilessly beating Gladney.

The entirety of the prosecutions case against Molens and McCowan is the testimony of Gladney, Sandra Himes, and John Mirelli (previously known as "towel man"). Apparently, the prosecution was not comfortable with having Harris Himes as a witness, which supports some of my previous speculation.

Gladney's testimony was the most damaging to the prosecution's case. For starters, Gladney appeared in a neck brace, which brought back memories of him showing up at a tea party rally in a wheel chair despite the fact that he was running around with no obvious discomfort immediately after the altercation took place. The defense lawyer said that Gladney's neck brace, which he was wearing because of surgery for a herniated disc, had nothing to do with the altercation, and Gladney did not challenge him on that point, so I assume it's true. But this opened up a criticism from the defense lawyer who asked Gladney why he showed up at the tea party rally in a wheelchair. Gladney said, basically, that it was hot and he was on medication and "they didn't have folding chairs or lawn chairs." Ouch.

The defense lawyer also pointed out that Gladney had repeatedly claimed in the past that he was "handing out flags for free." But this seemingly is in contradiction with his claim that he went to the rally to "make money" by selling buttons and flags. The defense lawyer suggested that Gladney said this because he thought it would make him appear more sympathetic, just as showing up in a wheelchair would make him appear more sympathetic.

A more important problem for Gladney was that his previous descriptions of what happened did not match his current testimony. He previously had claimed that Elston McCowan, a black minister, had called him the n-word. In today's testimony, he now claimed that Perry Molens, a white man, also called him the n-word, which would be a strange detail to leave out of all of his previous interviews. More importantly, he had previously claimed that 4 different people "attacked" him, yet now he clams only two. He also claimed that he "never said a word" to McCowan, which I'm pretty sure is at odds with his previous interviews. And finally, his story of the altercation provided no explanation of why Elston McCowan was seen lying on the ground at the beginning of the video And all of this was despite the fact that he told the defense attorney that his memory today was as good or better as immediately after the incident happened.

The second witness was Sandra Himes, wife of Harris Himes. Though the initial police report implied that she had seen Gladney attacked, she admitted (as I had noted previously) that she did not see how the fight started. She claimed that she saw all three of them "tussling," but of course the real question is who instigated the fight so it's strange that she's so confident that it was McCowan's fault. She, like Gladney, quite strangely could not account for why Elston McCowan was seen on the ground at the beginning of the video. She apparently seemed to suggest that she saw them tussling, then somehow did not see 30 seconds of the altercation including the moment when McCowan was on the ground, then returned immediately after the video started and tried to break them up. Finally, she claimed that she only heard one thing: Elston McCowan saying clearly "you son of an n-word" to Gladney. Neither of the other two witnesses for the prosecution heard this precise phrase, and McCowan and Gladney claim that McCowan did not use the n-word, though he did call Gladney an "Uncle Tom" because Gladney was selling buttons of Obama in white face.

Which reminds me of another point. Both Himes and Gladney claim that there were no buttons of Obama in white face, and the prosecution seems to be making a big deal about that point. All I can say at this point is good luck with that one.

Finally, the last witness, "towel man" John Mirelli, who was seen in the video screaming "you're going to jail!" at McCowan, Molens, and others in the initial video (while holding a white towel), claimed that he saw the beginning of the fight. He said that he wasn't at the event for political reasons, but "just wanted to know how health care reform would effect his company" which conflicts with a lot of video of him at the rally earlier arguing the tea party line. In fact, I'm pretty surprised that the defense attorney didn't bring up the fact that Mirelli can be seen in a previous video having to be held back from an altercation with another guy in an SEIU shirt (6:44 mark). Mirelli's story wasn't quite coherent, in my opinion. He claimed that Molens and McCowan were "standing over Gladney" punching and kicking him, and that Molens then "lost his blalance and fell backwards." However, the original video shows Molens losing his balance and falling backwards only after pulling Gladney backwards when Gladney was standing over McCowan. Is Mirelli saying that Molens lost his balance twice and fell over both times? Cause that would be pretty improbable.

Also not mentioned was David Brown, the employer of Gladney who tried for many months to serve as his spokesperson, who allegedly referred to Gladney as "his gravy train."

One last thing I just remembered. Gladney claimed that though the tea party paid for him to travel with them on speaking tours, he never "asked anyone for money or assistance." Actually, Gladney explicitly used Andrew Breitbart's websites to ask people to contribute to the "Kenneth Gladney Trust Fund" via Bank of America.

So. as is obvious, I have a lot of concerns about the case that the prosecution presented. I can't claim to know what the jury thought about what happened or what the defense will look like, but right now I don't see any conclusive evidence supporting the prosecution's case, and certainly not the Grand Tea Party Conspiracy that Obama ordered "union thugs" to beat up random people at town halls.

Why Won't Republicans Get Serious About Deficit Reduction?

We all know that deficits were not a big deal for most of our country's history, but as soon as George Bush left and Barack Obama became President, deficits all of a sudden became THE MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE EVER. Which is why I have to ask why Republicans are so Unserious about taking steps to reduce it? Republicans are holding their breath, stomping their feet, and threatening to destroy our economy unless we reduce the deficit by a paltry $2 trillion dollars. But Senate Democrats have proposed reducing the deficit by $4 trillion dollars which, as expert economists agree, is twice as much as $2 trillion:

Under the blueprint, the top income tax rate would rise to 39.6 percent for individuals earning more than $500,000 a year and families earning more than $1 million. That group, which constitutes the nation’s richest 1 percent of households, would also pay a 20 percent rate on capital gains and dividends, rather than the 15 percent rate now in effect.

In addition to raising rates for the very wealthiest families, the blueprint proposes to obtain fresh revenue by targeting offshore tax havens and corporate shelters. It would also scale back the array of tax breaks and deductions known as tax expenditures, perhaps by focusing on the wealthiest households, which claim an average of $205,000 in tax breaks each year on average income of $1.1 million.

The blueprint would take nearly $900 billion from the Pentagon over the next decade — the same amount recommended by Obama’s fiscal commission. It would slice more than $350 billion from domestic programs. And it would produce interest savings of nearly $600 billion attributable to reduced borrowing.

At this point, there is no other conclusion to reach but that Republicans are not really Serious about the Most Important Issue of All Time.

Akin and Martin Consultant: "Sleazy Is In The Eyes Of The Beholder"

As reported by several outlets, Todd Akin's campaign has recently hired the architect of the sleazy swift boat attacks on war hero John Kerry, Chris LaCivita. The Post-Dispatch reports the following comment from Civita:

Sleazy is in the eyes of the beholder.

Good rule of thumb: whenever someone tells you that "sleazy is in the eye of the beholder," there's probably a good chance that person is sleazy.

And, never one to settle for being out-sleazed, Ed Martin has apparently hired LaCivita as well.

h/t Fired Up Missouri

Rally At Roy Blunt's Office To Save Social Security and Medicare

Hundreds of activists gathered on Thursday outside of Roy Blunt's office to tell the Senator that Missourians don't want budget issues to be used as a cheap excuse to push through the Republicans' dream of cutting Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Polls have consistently shown that people overwhelmingly support keeping the social safety net in place and are in favor of allowing tax breaks for the uber-wealthy to expire. That is the responsible way to balance the budget.

Here are some photos from the rally taken by activist Brenda Ringo:


A press advisory for the event (I changed the tense):

ST. LOUIS – As Congress works to balance the budget and reduce the deficit, hundreds of Missourians rallied Thursday at 4:30 p.m. outside of Senator Roy Blunt’s (R-MO) Clayton office to tell him how his commitment to protect Corporate America and the wealthiest Americans will harm his constituents across the state of Missouri. Senator Blunt has publicly stated that he will not support measures to raise the revenue in order to confront budgetary issues; including closing corporate tax loopholes and increasing taxes on millionaires. Instead, he continues to support plans that will drastically cut funding to Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, and federal workers that provide critical services to Americans.

Senator Blunt stated that ending tax breaks and closing loopholes would not be fair to those who rely on them. Thursday, Missourians had a chance to reply to Senator Blunt with their message about what “fair” means to average Missouri citizens. Monica Williams, a Paraquad Community Advocate, spoke about how Medicaid is her lifeline to freedom and independence in the community since it provides her personal care attendant. “Medicaid enables me to go to work and be a productive citizen” she stated. “Taking away my opportunity to live independently and work in the community is not fair.”

Others spoke about how cutting critical programs will harm the seniors, people with disabilities, and working- and middle-class families that rely on them. Reverend Susan Sneed of Metropolitan Congregations United stated “balancing the federal budget on the backs of vulnerable Americans is never the answer. We promised our seniors that if they pay their taxes and paid into Social Security and Medicare, these programs would be there for them when they needed them. Rather than cutting critical programs, we must look for balanced budget solutions that uphold our American values, require all individuals and corporations to contribute their fair share, and ensure that all Americans have access to the basic services they need.”

Attendees signed a petition to Missouri’s Senators that states, "We urge you to stand strong and protect Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security and the federal workers who deliver our essential services. A cut to our federal budget and workforce is a cut to Missouri. We have sacrificed enough. Now, we urge you to raise revenues. It's time for the rich and big corporations to pay their fair share. We do not accept that there have to be spending caps, cuts to essential services or balanced budget amendments."

"It is absolutely critical that our efforts to reduce the deficit are balanced solutions that include new revenue,” said Kirsten Dunham of Paraquad. "We are very concerned that Congress will try to impose global spending caps or a balanced budget amendment that may sound good on the surface, but which over time would require drastically cutting Medicare, Social Security, Medicaid and other services that Americans value."

Organizers of the rally were the American Federation of Government Employees, Missouri Jobs with Justice, Metropolitan Congregations United, Missouri Health Care for All, Missouri Budget Project, GRO - Grass Roots Organizing, Missouri Pro-Vote, the Alliance of Retired Americans, Paraquad and the Disability Coalition on Health Care Reform. Representatives from each organization delivered the petition to Senator Blunt's staff during the rally.

Hotflash at Show Me Progress has more from the rally, including this great video of leaders sharing their concerns with with Blunt's staff:

Civil Rights Groups Sue Missouri Officials Over “Deceptive and Misleading” Voter ID Ballot Initiative

First-Ever Challenge to a Photo ID Constitutional Amendment Filed on Behalf of the Elderly, People with Disabilities, Racial Minorities, and Students Who Face Loss of Voting Rights

Press Release:

Thursday, July 7, 2011

ST. LOUIS, MO -- Advancement Project, the Fair Elections Legal Network (FELN), the American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri and the ACLU of Kansas and Western Missouri today announced a legal challenge to a ballot proposal to amend the state constitution’s voting requirements, saying that the ballots language misleads voters and if passed will restrict the voting rights of Missourians, including the elderly, people with disabilities, and students, among others.

The ballot initiative, SJR2, slated to be placed on the ballot for November 2012, was passed by the legislature in May in an attempt to circumvent the Missouri Supreme Court’s 2006 ruling that restrictive photo ID voting laws are unconstitutional.

“I cannot imagine anything more cynical and shameful than using the voting process itself to trick voters into giving up their rights,” said Denise Lieberman, senior attorney for Advancement Project, a civil rights organization that works to eliminate barriers to voting and has been fighting photo ID laws across the country. “Just as the Missouri Supreme Court rejected Missouri’s photo ID law as a ‘heavy and substantial burden’ on voting rights, the court should reject this deceptive initiative. It does not make clear to voters that they will be giving up a fundamental right.”

The lawsuit – the first-ever challenge to a constitutional amendment on photo ID laws and the first lawsuit in the nation filed challenging the rash of photo ID proposals introduced in states across the country this year– was filed on Wednesday and names eight Missouri voters as plaintiffs. Among them are:

* Two elderly women – 90 and 86 – who no longer drive and would have great physical and financial difficulty in obtaining the proper ID documents;

* A 43-year-old former musician who performed with Parliament Funkadelic, now stricken with multiple sclerosis and confined to a wheelchair, whose ID has expired and for whom obtaining new state identification would be both physically and financially difficult;

* A 43-year-old woman on disability due to a severe accident for whom obtaining new state identification would be a physical and financial hardship;

* A 35-year-old naturalized citizen who has had difficulty renewing her driver’s license after encountering problems when presenting her Russian birth certificate;

* A former school board member who won’t be able to renew her ID because the name on her birth certificate is not the name under which she is registered to vote and whose hand tremor could result in rejection at the polls if her signature does not match up; and

* A local college student and a recent graduate, whose out-of-state and student IDs, currently accepted for voting, could no longer be valid if the ballot initiative succeeds.

These individuals represent the many thousands of Missouri voters who could lose their right to vote under the restrictive photo ID proposal, according to Tony Rothert, Legal Director of the ACLU of Eastern Missouri. “We should ensure that every eligible voter is allowed to vote, not construct barriers that prevent registered voters from having their ballots counted,” he said.

Robert Brandon, president of the Fair Elections Legal Network, a non-partisan network of election attorneys, added: “The Missouri Legislature claims the proposed amendment would ‘protect’ voters, but in reality, it would weaken the constitutional protections of the right to vote. Missourians deserve a ballot title that fairly and honestly summarizes what they are being asked to vote on.”

Over 230,000 Missouri registered voters do not have a current Missouri driver’s license. African Americans, seniors, people with disabilities, the working poor, and students are twice as likely to lack such ID. Further, the cost of implementing the legislature’s photo ID proposal would run well over $20 million, according to recent estimates – a price tag the people of Missouri can ill afford in the midst of an ongoing economic crisis. The Missouri initiative was among stringent photo ID proposals introduced in legislatures in more than 30 states in 2011, according to a recent Advancement Project Report, “What’s Wrong With This Picture.” Companion legislation that would have implemented strict photo ID requirements in Missouri was vetoed by Gov. Jay Nixon on June 17.

The lawsuit asks the court to block the initiative from appearing on the November 2012 ballot because it “deceives and misleads voters about what the amendment would and would not do and thus is neither true nor impartial, but instead likely to create prejudice in favor of the proposed measure.”

The case is Aziz et al. v. Mayer et al., Case no. 11AC-CC00439, filed in Cole County Circuit Court and pending before Judge Patricia S. Joyce. The lawsuit names as defendants Senator Robert N. Mayer, Representative Steven Tilley, Senator Bill Stouffer, and Secretary of State Robin Carnahan.

The lawsuit is online at: http://www.advancementproject.org/sites/default/files/Petition%20-%20FINAL.pdf.

The attorneys in the case are Tony Rothert and Grant Doty of the ACLU of Eastern Missouri, Douglas Bonney of the ACLU of Kansas and Western Missouri, Denise Lieberman of Advancement Project, and Ben Hovland of the Fair Elections Legal Network.

For further information, please go to:

www.aclu-em.org

http://www.aclukswmo.org/

www.advancementproject.org

www.fairelectionsnetwork.com

h/t to Eileen Evans for the pointer.