JD Hayworth, Congressman, Hypocrite

Yesterday, JD posted a letter on his campaign website protesting a DCCC web ad that briefly showed some coffins of American servicemen and -women. He accused the Democratic Party in general and Harry Mitchell in particular, of hoping to profit from the exploitation of "our fallen heroes."

His righteous indignation over the "exploitation" of dead Americans would have more credibility if he returned the thousands of dollars in contributions he has received from defense industry donors. Donors that have profited directly from the deaths of thousands of American servicemen and -women.

...See: Tray.com or the FEC's website. Just for fun, go to the FEC's database and type in "Spectrum Astro" in the employer field on the donor lookup page.

He would have more credibility if he called for greater oversight of defense contractors.

...See: his No vote on an amendment to HR4939 (March 16th, 2006) to stop contracts to corporations that overcharge.

He would have more credibility if he honored the returning American servicemen by ensuring that they and their families receive adequate medical care.

...See: his No vote on an amendment to HR1815 (May 25th, 2005) that would have expanded access to TriCare ( the military health system) for members of the National Guard and Reserve.

He would have more credibility if he was equally critical when George Bush campaigned on the images of our fallen heroes of 9/11 in his 2004 ads.

...See: Actually, there's nothing to see there, and that's the point. He never criticized Bush's use of the 'firefighters on 9/11' imagery; in fact, in Congress, he has voted with Bush 87% of the time.

JD should ask himself...no, we should ALL ask ourselves...

Which is more disrespectful:

Showing images of our honored dead for political gain, or cravenly trying to hide those same images, also for political gain?

Note: many of the stats cited here, and the leads on the votes documented here, can be found at the DCCC's webpage covering JD.

Edit to add:

BOOOO! to the DCCC. Apparently, they have caved in and decided that offending Republican sensibilities was going too far. They have removed the ad from their own website.

No wonder we keep losing elections.