It's election season, so Doug Guetzloe is making up stories again

It's election season, and a perfect time for a reality check: just because someone posts something on the internet does not mean it is true. 

Exhibit A: Doug Guetzloe's repeated claims about supporters of Lawson Lamar being charged with ethical violations. He, both individually and through his "Ax the Tax" group, has been sending out mailers, making robocalls, and writing too many Facebook posts to count, with a wild assortment of false accusations.

Facts are pesky things to people like Guetzloe, so I thought I'd just share some information as a reminder to question what you read and demand evidence of his claims.

Mystery mailers sent out supporting Peg Dunmire

Last week, I received two mailers at my house, attacking Republican District 8 Congressional candidate Daniel Webster and supporting Peg Dunmire.  Neither of them had a return address or any political advertising disclaimer.

Here is one of the mailers (the other is substantially similar, slightly different text and graphics, but same message and again no return address or disclaimer):

(click to enlarge image)

(click to enlarge image)

Federal law requires disclaimers for political advertisement mailers, regardless of whether they are sent by a candidate, a political party, or a independent PAC or "527" organization.  These mailers have no disclaimer whatsoever, no return addresses, no way to identify who sent them.

The only identification is the mail house's bulk mail ID and the print shop's union label, the logo on the bottom left of the first page of the mailer above that says "16 Typographical Union Label Casselberry, FL."

This union label can be traced to Lawton Printers in Casselberry.  Here is a screenshot of their website page that shows the same union label:

 

Interestingly, last week the Florida Democratic Party sent out a similar mailer in Congressional District 2, with similar fonts and message, and again attacking the Republican candidate and promoting the third party candidate:

See Practical State's great discussion of this mailer here:

Practical State | Florida #2: Allen Boyd's Last Dirty Trick

So who paid for the Dunmire mailers?  Was it the Florida Democratic Party?  The voters of District 8 have the right to know who is trying to influence this very important election.

UPDATE: Here is Local 6 WKMG's story on this mailer:

Local 6 Click Orlando | Lawyer: Pro-Grayson Mailer Breaks Law

...and yes, the "Lawyer" is yours truly :)

World Net Daily dumps Florida Tea Party as a sponsor

Love this...

WND's Miami conference dumps Florida Tea Party

World Net Daily is sponsoring a "Taking America Back National Conference" in Miami next month, and the Florida Tea Party Fake Tea Party had originally been listed as a sponsor of the event.  However, after WND's investigation led them to conclude that the group "was misrepresenting itself" FTP's sponsorship was rejected:

"We are returning the money this group paid for sponsoring the conference and rejecting its participation," said Joseph Farah, editor and chief executive officer of WND. "This event and the tea-party movement are not about making money. They are about changing the direction of our country. It's clear to me that the Florida Tea Party...has an agenda all its own."

Two thumbs up to World Net Daily for seeing the light about the Florida Tea Party. 

As expected, Doug Guetzloe and Peg Dunmire are screaming bloody murder about this, but too darn bad.  WND is a private organization and it has the right to refuse FTP's money and reject their sponsorship for any reason they chose.  It does not matter that the many lawsuits facing Guetzloe and FTP are not yet concluded; WND has the right to reject what their leadership views as a controversial group in order to avoid distractions from the purposes and goals of the event.  

I find it highly entertaining when Guetzloe & Gang cry that their First Amendment rights are being trampled when someone doesn't want to hear from them or doesn't want to invite them to something.  News flash: the First Amendment means you have a right to speak, it doesn't mean we have to listen...and it definitely doesn't mean we have to use our speech (or our time, energy, money, or resources) to promote your speech.