Progressive Democrat Issue 33: TARGET THE CORRUPT REPUBLICAN CAMPAIGN:

This week's action is personal. I want to target a Corrupt Republican from California who not only is the epitome of what is wrong with greedy neo-Con politics, but who also is one of those disgusting bastards who have been exploiting 9/11 for their own personal gain. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham from San Diego County, used 9/11 to push the flag burning Amendment, claiming that those who died in 9/11 would want the amendment passed. When the New York Rep. Nadler (from Brooklyn) called Cunningham on this shameless exploitation of NYC’s, Nadler's mike was shut off as if Cunningham has the right to talk about 9/11 but a NYC Rep. doesn’t! This clearly shows what Republicans think of New Yorkers--we are silenced and shunned by the party that continuously uses our tragedy for their partisan politics. How could Rep. Cuunningham even DREAM of using my friend's death on 9/11 for his purposes? My friend who died on 9/11 was in favor of civil rights and freedom of expression, and he would NOT have wanted this amendment passed. How DARE Rep. Cunningham presume to speak for my friend. How DARE he presume to speak for New Yorkers. He does not know us. He does not represent us. He should stop exploiting New York's tragedy for his gain.

But let us also not forget that this is the same Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham who sits on the powerful Appropriations defense subcommittee and has taken bribes from a defense contractor around the same time that defense contractor began getting big government contracts. This is what we are going to target him for. Here is an article on FBI investigators actually raiding Cunningham’s home looking for evidence of his corruption.

And here is an article covering the scandal in more detail.

Here’s an excerpt:

WASHINGTON – Mitchell Wade, founder of the defense contracting firm MZM Inc., pressured employees to donate to a political fund that benefited Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham and other members of Congress, according to three former employees of the company.

Wade, who took a $700,000 loss on the purchase of Cunningham's Del Mar home and allows the congressman to stay on his yacht while in Washington, demanded employees make donations to the company's political action committee, MZM PAC, they said.
"By the spring of '02, Mitch was twisting employees' arms to donate to his MZM PAC," said one former employee. "We were called in and told basically either donate to the MZM PAC or we would be fired."

Many companies have PACs, but campaign finance laws prohibit employers from pressuring workers to contribute to the PAC. They may encourage contributions, but not compel them.

Here is the page on Cunningham from the Campaign for America’s Future.

Please write the media, including national, your local media and San Diego papers. Write them complaining of the corruption of the Republican Party. You can mention DeLay and the Ohio Republicans as well as Cunningham, showing how this is now typical of the criminal behavior of the Republican Party.

And let’s help out the San Diego Democratic clubs, if you can. Here is a list of the San Diego Dem groups.

Donating to them will help them defeat Cunningham in 2006. We need to make a big deal of this. This guy cynically broke the law and then he gets all self-righteous using 9/11 to try and push the flag-burning amendment. We need to nail him. So please write some letters to the editor and give to help the San Diego Dems.