Gomez, G Rep

http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/05/10/18171843-massachusetts-gomez-already-struggling-badly?lite

ust a week after winning his party's Senate special election primary

in Massachusetts, Republican Gabriel Gomez finds himself in the middle

of two fairly serious controversies. As of yesterday, the novice

candidate is handling both poorly.The first issue is Gomez's

involvement in a head-shaking tax scam -- he claimed a $281,500 tax

deduction by claiming not to change the facade of his house, despite the

fact that <a href="http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/05/08/gomez-claimed-controversial-tax-deduction-home/skZgaV3aBoGflKtR03ZEEJ/story.html?camp=newsletter">he was already forbidden</a>

under local bylaws from changing the facade of his house. The Senate

candidate, in other words, accepted a very generous reward for failing

to do something he couldn't do anyway.Asked for an explanation, Gomez <a href="http://boston.cbslocal.com/2013/05/09/gabriel-gomez-defends-280000-tax-break-on-cohasset-home/">said</a>

it's "disgraceful" and "dishonorable" for his opponent, Rep. Ed Markey

(D), to bring this up. Apropos of nothing, Gomez added that the veteran

congressman is a "hack."Of course, that didn't answer the question about his apparent tax scam. <a href="http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/05/09/gomezhouse/sMTxfyGqCM0STJBqfG6jPO/story.html">Neither did this</a>.

Republican US Senate nominee Gabriel E. Gomez, facing questions about

a $281,500 historic tax deduction on his Cohasset home, rejected calls

Thursday from the media and Democrats to release tax returns and other

details about the deal.

"I have nothing to hide,'' said Gomez on a campaign stop in Lawrence,

when asked by a Globe reporter why he would not make public the details

about how the federal tax deduction was calculated for the easement to

limit changes on the home that the candidate and his wife bought for

$2.1 million in November 2004.

</blockquote>Here's a tip for politicians everywhere: don't say you have nothing to hide while you're hiding things without explanation.Complicating matters, while this story was raising questions about Gomez's integrity, another story was putting the Republican's credibility in doubt.

Gomez is a rookie when it comes to seeking public office -- his only

previous experience was running for a local office in his small

hometown, and he came in third out of three candidates -- but he's not

entirely new to politics. In fact, just last year, he <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/05/07/1207436/-Reince-Priebus-demands-Ed-Markey-remove-video-of-Gabriel-Gomez-swiftboating-Obama-on-bin-Laden-raid">worked with</a>

a right-wing super PAC called the "Special Operations Opsec Education

Fund," which seemed to exist only to attack President Obama over the

mission that killed Osama bin Laden.This week, Gomez sought to <a href="http://www.boston.com/politicalintelligence/2013/05/08/national-democrats-hit-gomez-opsec/MCgkIxZHlhnRR9S331Ee3O/story.html">distance himself</a> from the smear operation, saying he didn't work for the group he used to work for.

At a campaign event in Boston on Tuesday, Gomez addressed his involvement with the group.

"As far as OPSEC, I did two interviews for OPSEC. I was never

associated with OPSEC. I never donated to OPSEC. I wasn't part of

OPSEC," he said. [...]

"I was never connected with them in the first place. I just went on

there because we overlapped on that issue about the president taking too

much credit and, more importantly, they leaked information that was bad

for the unit down there and it put their lives at risk," he said.

</blockquote>As Joan McCarter <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/05/09/1208015/-Gomez-furiously-tries-to-distance-himself-from-his-swift-boat-organization">joked</a>, "No, he was never associated with them. He was just the person they put on national TV as their spokesperson."Gomez

was "never connected" with the right-wing group? As a rule, political

operations do not send a spokesperson to speak on their behalf on

national television unless the spokesperson is, you know, connected to

the group.To answer your next question, I'm not familiar enough

with Massachusetts election law to know what would happen if Gomez exits

the race, but neither he nor the state Republican Party have much time

to deal with these problems -- the Senate special election is on June

25.---
Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus wants Massachusetts Democratic Senate nominee Ed Markey to take down <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/05/03/1206669/-Markey-calls-out-Gomez-for-trying-to-swiftboat-Obama-or-as-NRSC-spox-says-Markey-goes-ugly-early">a YouTube video criticizing GOP nominee</a> Gabriel Gomez for attempting to swiftboat President Obama during the 2012 election.

Priebus <a href="http://www.gop.com/news/press-releases/rnc-statement-on-rep-markeys-shameful-attack-ad/">is pretending</a>

that Markey's video smears Gomez by showing an image of him

side-by-side with Osama bin Laden, but the real story is that Markey's

video showed an image of Gomez appearing on MSNBC alongside a clip from

an anti-Obama swiftboating video that Gomez was defending. The video,

produced by a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/16/us/politics/ex-military-and-cia-officers-attack-obama-over-bin-laden-leaks.html?_r=0">right-wing Super PAC called OpSec</a>

in support of Mitt Romney during the 2012 president campaign, accused

President Obama of leaking classified information to take more credit

than he deserved for the killing of bin Laden.

As it turns out, the video Gomez was defending included images of

both bin Laden and President Obama. So it's true that there was a

fleeting split screen image of Gomez and bin Laden, but as you can see

above, there was also an image Gomez and President Obama. It makes as

much sense for Priebus to claim that Markey was trying to link Gomez

with bin Laden as it would for him to claim that Markey was trying to

suggest President Obama supports Gomez—or vice versa.

Despite all that, Priebus would have you believe that Markey's campaign <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKFYpd0q9nE">was doing</a>

what Saxby Chambliss did to Max Cleland or what the swiftboaters did to

John Kerry. But the truth is the exact opposite: Markey's video reveals

Gomez's past as a spokesman for swiftboaters. It's baffling that

Priebus would follow the <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/05/03/1206669/-Markey-calls-out-Gomez-for-trying-to-swiftboat-Obama-or-as-NRSC-spox-says-Markey-goes-ugly-early">National Republican Senatorial Committee's lead</a>

by calling attention to a video revealing Gomez to be a typical

Republican hack, but the fact that he would try to distort it is not

surprising at all.http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/05/07/1207436/-Reince-Priebus-demands-Ed-Markey-remove-video-of-Gabriel-Gomez-swiftboating-Obama-on-bin-Laden-raid
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