Getting the facts out on the Gregg "Pay for Play" Scheme.

Rob's Blog is at it again with what I will characterize as blogging that is either intentionally misleading, willfully ignorant, or lazy. Since Rob's a left-wing blogger, I expect Dan Rather is a hero and he's just imitating the modus operandi of the left wing (aka Mainstream) media.

In this post, Rob claims that Judd Gregg was involved in some kind of Blago-like pay-for-play scheme for his own Senate seat, would he have joined the Obama cabinet.

In his post, Rob fails to cite the article he sourced (it's here), and he decided to cherry pick this quote from the article, to back up his contention. I guess this is the blogosphere, and we all have our individual axes to grind, but, it is customary, if you're going to quote from an article, to link to it, so that your readers can see what you left out. I suppose if the whole thing is inconvenient, why bother, but, well, you know...

Anyway, the cherry-picked quote is:

"Besides its activities at Pease, Two International also develops properties elsewhere in Portsmouth, recently selling a $1 million-plus condominium at its One Harbor Place development to J. Bonnie Newman, Judd Gregg's former chief of staff. Gregg agreed to become commerce secretary if the Democratic New Hampshire governor named her to succeed him."

While I freely admit Gregg has probably been trying to increase the value of property he is invested in (with his brother), I can find nothing in the AP article to indicate he has a personal stake in Two International, which owned the building his former COS bought a condo in. His brother, yes. Judd Gregg, no.

Bonnie Newman is Gregg's former COS and her story on the condo purchase is:

"'We [her and Gregg's brother, Cyrus, who is also active in NH GOP politics] see one another on a pretty regular basis socially, so I think I may have said, `Let me know what you're doing with the apartments. I could be interested.' She used to have an office in the building, and it was well-known around Portsmouth that one floor was being converted to condos, she said. Newman negotiated the purchase through the fall and said she signed the purchase agreement in November, long before there was any indication Judd Gregg might be a Cabinet pick."

I don't know how there could have been a pay before there was anything in play.

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