The Other McCain

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PA12: Timing Is Everything; UPDATE: Video of Democrat’s ‘Apology’ Added

Posted on | April 29, 2010 | 10 Comments

With 19 days until the May 18 special election in Jack Murtha’s former district, the GOP’s Tim Burns gains momentum:

It’s been a very good week for Burns, who was featured Tuesday on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show and got a big push Wednesday from Newt Gingrich. Polls have shown the PA-12 contest “neck-and-neck,” as Burns campaign manager Tadd Rupp said, but Palin’s online endorsement Monday turned up the energy and focused national attention on the western Pennsylvania district. USA Today and the L.A. Times have both featured the race in the past 24 hours.
Burns’ staffers were in a celebratory mood after a candidate forum last night at Westmont Hilltop High School, where Democrat Mark Critz — a former Murtha staffer — apologized for a misleading TV ad run by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. FactCheck.org labeled that ad false last week, saying, “For Democrats, misrepresenting an opponent’s anti-tax position as an anti-jobs position is getting to be a bad habit.” . . .

You can read the whole thing. Unfortunately, local news reporters didn’t seem immediately to catch the significance of the Critz apology, but I just got off the phone with the Burns campaign, which expects to have video online this afternoon highlighting what one source called a “huge blunder” by Nancy Pelosi’s handpicked candidate.

Scott Ott at Scrappleface jokes that Critz believes PA12 has been “earmarked” for him. Meanwhile, a column today at the Daily Caller notes the result of a recent poll of 12th District voters:

When the question was put to them, would [you] like to vote for someone like John Murtha or would you like a fresh start, the fresh start won 63-34, not a good sign for the Democratic contender who used to work for Murtha.

But it’s still neck-and-neck going into the home stretch, and it will take an all-out-effort for Republicans to beat the Pelosi machine in this Democratic stronghold. Learn more at TimBurnsForCongress.com.

UPDATE: Pennsylvania blogger Chris Renner has a post with video of the debate.

UPDATE II: Here’s the clip of Mark Kritz apologizing:

Note the weasel-word method here:

So I want to take this opportunity, that if I’ve misstated Mr. Burns’s position on something, that I apologize. I didn’t mean to do that. It was my understanding that he did support the Fair Tax, and if that’s wrong, I apologize.

Beyond the two “ifs” which render the whole thing conditional, what Critz is apologizing for is not what he actually said previously during the debate, nor does it cover the distortions of his attack ads. It makes no difference whether or not Burns supports the Fair Tax. In his own ad, Critz portrays Burns’s signature on an Americans for Tax Reform no-tax-increase pledge as a job-killer (????), and the DCCC ad — called “quite misleading” by FactCheck.org — presents Burns as supporting a “23% national sales tax on just about everything” without mentioning that the proposed Fair Tax would eliminate all federal income taxes and abolish the IRS.

A cynic might suspect that Critz’s hypothetical “apology” is a clever attempt to prod Burns into denouncing the Fair Tax.

Category: Congress, Democrats, Election, Nancy Pelosi, Pennsylvania, Republicans

Comments

10 Responses to “PA12: Timing Is Everything; UPDATE: Video of Democrat’s ‘Apology’ Added”

  1. Obama as George III, a “clueless foreign ruler from central casting” | Liberty Pundits dot net
    April 29th, 2010 @ 9:20 pm

    […] 19 days until the May 18 special election in Jack Murtha’s former district, the GOP’s Tim Burns gains momentum,” notes Stacy McCain, who motored out from DC to Johnstown PA to get an exclusive interview […]

  2. Ruby Slippers
    April 30th, 2010 @ 1:39 am

    A Patriot for Pennsylvania\’s 12th Congressional District: Tim Burns…

    …

  3. Hank Van Gieson
    April 30th, 2010 @ 1:45 pm

    Actually, the DCCC ad understated the Fairtax rate in that it should have read the Fairtax would add 30% to the price of almost everything. (I would prefer it to say that the Fairtax would add 30% to the cost of everything which is really the case.)

    The DCCC ad is certainly guilty of ommission, and is not accurate as to the 30% rate that retail merchants have to add to their costs in order to arrive at a 23% tax inclusive price.

    The ad also said that we can’t afford the Fairtax, but that claim doesn’t apply to everyone. Certain retired and minimum wage earners would see their net taxes increase under the Fairtax, but many other workers would be better off.

    But, how much detail can one put in a 30 second ad?

  4. Hank Van Gieson
    April 30th, 2010 @ 8:45 am

    Actually, the DCCC ad understated the Fairtax rate in that it should have read the Fairtax would add 30% to the price of almost everything. (I would prefer it to say that the Fairtax would add 30% to the cost of everything which is really the case.)

    The DCCC ad is certainly guilty of ommission, and is not accurate as to the 30% rate that retail merchants have to add to their costs in order to arrive at a 23% tax inclusive price.

    The ad also said that we can’t afford the Fairtax, but that claim doesn’t apply to everyone. Certain retired and minimum wage earners would see their net taxes increase under the Fairtax, but many other workers would be better off.

    But, how much detail can one put in a 30 second ad?

  5. Candidate Of The Restoration: Tim Burns « The Camp Of The Saints
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  9. PA-12: Burns 48%, Critz 47% : The Other McCain
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  10. Good News From the Tim Burns Campaign in PA-12 « Red Dog Report
    June 10th, 2010 @ 7:04 am

    […] Burns’ positions. So much so that at one point in the campaign, Burns’ opponent, Mark Critz apologized for the DCCC’s misrepresentation of the Republican’s record. The DCCC commercials distorted the truth so bad that one local TV system pulled them from the […]