Update: Local blogger Tony Wilkins has Hagan on WPTF yesterday. Host Bill LuMaye presses the issue, but Hagan basically repeats that she knows nothing about nothing.
The Winston-Salem Journal weighs in on the Kay Hagan/Godless PAC controversy with a solid piece and a lead editorial.
The Journal’s Wesley Long —-amazing —-actually got Godless Americans PAC board member Woody Kaplan on the phone:
Kaplan said last night that he is “flabbergasted” that Dole is making a connection between the fundraiser and Godless Americans “when they were clearly not connected.” He said that the people at the fundraiser were supporters of a broad group of Democrats running for the Senate.
“It is simply a group of donors that probably have no idea that either of us are involved in any of those groups,” Kaplan said. He said he did not know if the people attending were religious or not because “it is not something we kick around.”
Kaplan said he personally did not know if Godless Americans, the only group mentioned in the Dole ad, is still active. The group did file a pre-election statement with the Federal Election Commission on Oct. 20.
Meanwhile, the Journal’s editorial calls Hagan’s connection to the Godless Americans PAC “threadbare” and “tenuous at best,” accept for the fact that she was at a fundraiser in Kaplan’s home. It defies credibility to think that issues weren’t discussed and assurances weren’t made while mixing and mingling.
It’s just hard to muster sympathy for Hagan because she’s being so defensive and secretive about this whole deal. She’s had the right and the responsibility from the very start to explain her relationship with Kaplan and Wendy Kaminer. Instead we get a lawsuit and a nine-minute press conference where she cuts reporters short and her handlers are constantly interjecting themselves.
This is a North Carolina Senate race, for heaven’s sake. It’s hard to believe Hagan didn’t know what she was getting into, because it’s clear she sure knows how to play the game. Yet Hagan didn’t manage her associations carefully, a mistake many a politician has made. That’s politics, man.
