Roger Stone

From dKosopedia

Category: Republican operatives

Roger J. Stone, Jr. is a long-time Republican dirty-tricks operative who led the mob that shut down the Miami-Dade County recount and helped make George W. Bush president in 2000. He was also a campaign strategist during the presidential campaigns of Presidents Nixon, Reagan and George Herbert Walker Bush. He is the chairman of the Fort Hill Group, a Washington, D.C.-based public affairs firm.

Stone was also a strategist for the 1981 and 1985 campaigns for governor of New Jersey by Thomas H. Kean, who was later appointed by President Bush to chair the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (also known as the 9-11 Commission). [1]

During the 2004 presidential primary, Stone served as a behind-the-scenes consultant to black firebrand Al Sharpton's campaign to win the Democratic Party nomination, prompting speculation that Sharpton's campaign was actually a stealth operation to weaken the party's chances of winning in the general election. Writing in the Village Voice, Wayne Barrett noted that Stone was "financing, staffing, and orchestrating the presidential campaign of Reverend Al Sharpton. ... Sharpton has a little-noticed history of Republican machinations inconsistent with his fiery rhetoric. ... [A]ny Sharpton-connected outrage against the party could either lower black turnout in several key close states, or move votes to Bush." [2]

The New York Times has also reported on the strange-bedfellows relationship between Stone and Sharpton, noting that Stone was behind several of Sharpton's most visible campaign tactics, including scrutiny of primary candidate Howard Dean's record of minority appointees when he was governor of Vermont. [3]

In September 2004, rumors circulated that Stone was the original source of allegedly forged Killian documents seemed to provide proof that George W. Bush failed to fulfill his Air National Guard duties with TANG. Stone denied the charge. "I have nothing whatsoever to do with this," he said. "I'm a firm believer in political hardball, but I draw the line at forged documents." [4]

This has recently resurfaced as a result of the revelations that "Jeff Gannon" formerly of "Talon News" scooped the story about the Killian documents were funneled to CBS News via Mary Mapes. This has lead blog investigators to begin to look deeper into possible White House connections between "Gannon" and numerous dirty tricks he was in the margins of.

Affiliations

• Karl Rove
• James Baker

Related articles

• TANG
• Bill Burkett
• Killian documents
• Dan Bartlett
• Gannon scoop shows White House Forged TANG/CBS memos?!?! - dKos diary by RegenerationMan

External links

• Michael Slackman, "Sharpton's Bid Aided by an Unlikely Source," New York Times, January 25, 2004.
• Wayne Barrett, "Sleeping With the GOP," Village Voice, February 5, 2004.
• Glen Ford and Peter Gamble, "The Problem with Al Sharpton," The Black Commentator, February 5, 2004.
• Wayne Barrett, "A Dirty Trickster's Bush Bonanza," Village Voice, April 19, 2004.
• Roger J. Stone, Jr., "The Edge of Tom Kean," Philadelphia Inquirer, April 21, 2004.
• Martin Kasindorf and Richard Benedetto, "Parties Lob Accusations Over Suspect Papers," USA Today, September 21, 2004.