GOPAbraMafia

A batch of dated MOGOP press releases appeared in my RSS reader last night, so I'm a little slow on this -- but the headline in this press release from last week has me scratching my head: "On This Week, McCaskill promises unpopular public option."

What are they talking about?  While support for specific proposals in Congress is somewhat lower -- the idea of a public option to compete with private insurance companies is undeniably popular.  In fact, it's actually growing more popular with time. Here's a chart of data from Washington Post-ABC News polling over the last few months.

Politico reports that Dave Ayres, top aide to John Ashcroft in the Attorney General's office, is threatening to invoke his Fifth Amendment rights in the case against former Abramoff lobbyist Kevin Ring.

David Ayres, the top aide to former Attorney General John Ashcroft, is threatening to take the Fifth to avoid testifying in a case against a GOP lobbyist caught up in the Jack Abramoff scandal, according to lawyers for the lobbyist.

Ayres served as Ashcroft's chief of staff at the Justice Department and is currently the CEO of the Ashcroft Group, Ashcroft's consulting firm. The company has earned millions of dollars in fees from DOJ thanks to a controversial contract awarded the former attorney general to oversee a legal settlement with an Indiana medical devices company.

According to court documents filed by attorneys for Kevin Ring, a former Abramoff lobbyist, Ayres helped free up $16 million in DOJ grants that Abramoff sought for one of his oldest and most lucrative lobbying clients, the Mississippi Choctaw tribe...

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