“Dems blame vandalism on healthcare rhetoric,” reads the headline on yesterday’s blog entry from Denver Post reporter Jessica Fender, after a couple of people were spotted smashing 11 windows at Colorado Democratic Party headquarters early Tuesday. (A link including the original headline from the Post’s online news section, which has since been revised, is here.) Other nearby storefronts weren’t damaged. State party chairwoman Pat Waak accused opponents of ObamaCare for the vandalism:
“We ought to be having a serious, conscientious debate about what’s
best for the country,” Waak said. “Clearly there’s been an effort on
the other side to stir up hate. I think this is the consequence of it.”
Well, oops.
It turns out that the suspect in custody, 24-year-old Maurice Schwenkler, has been on the payroll of at least one Democrat-surrogate group. He was arrested for causing trouble during last year’s Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., and was paid $500 by a labor-backed 527 group last fall to canvass suburban Denver neighborhoods for the Democratic opponent of state Rep. David Balmer. Remember him?
Today, Waak selected the reverse spin cycle, sort of.
“What I’ve been saying is there is a lot of
rhetoric out there from both sides of the spectrum,” Waak said. “That’s
what’s been disturbing to me. People are saying a lot of things not
appropriate for civil discourse.”
You can’t make this stuff up.
