In total, Focus on the Family spent $727,250 on the campaign, compared to the $189,000 donated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, according to records just released by the state of California.

A benefactor of Focus on the Family and an offshoot lobbying group also donated several hundred thousand dollars, bringing the total amount contributed by Focus on the Family and its associated organizations to $1.251 million — just shy of the leading donor, the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic organization based in New Haven, Conn.

Read the full story at The Colorado Independent.

Correction: This post initially misstated the amount contributed by Focus of the Family and its associated organizations. The total was $1.251 million, not $1.275 million, as originally stated. Apologies for the error.

Being a serial plagiarist may no longer be the professional equivalent of a hair shirt. Look at Vice President Joe Biden. Good thing for ex-Bush administration political operative Tim Goeglein too.

He’s been named the top Washington lobbyist for Focus on the Family, according to a little-noticed “comings and goings” political column in the Fort Wayne (Ind.) Journal Gazette.

Goeglein was personally recruited in 2001 by political mastermind Karl Rove to work in the Bush White House as chief liaison to conservative religious groups. There Goeglein rubbed elbows with some of the most powerful men in the evangelical movement — Focus on the Family’s James Dobson, Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition, convicted Watergate felon Chuck Colson who runs Prison Fellowships Ministries and then-president of the National Association of Evangelicals Ted Haggard.

“He is the key person that actually produced the evangelical vote in America,” Haggard told the Indianapolis Star. “It was Karl Rove’s initiative, but it was Tim that actually did it. When we call Tim, his office responds. He’s the one evangelical leaders across America have a relationship with.”

That was until Feb. 29, 2008, when ex-Fort Wayne News-Sentinel columnist-turned-blogger Nancy Nall stumbled across an odd reference in a Goeglein column written for her former paper. An ensuing investigation by the paper’s editors found he had plagiarized 20 of 38 columns and cited the works of such luminaries as the Dartmouth Review, Nixon speechwriter-cum-game show host Ben Stein and the Pope without credit.

Goeglein resigned his position with the White House by that afternoon and has apparently been kicking around the nation’s capital until his political rebirth as Focus’ primo lobbyist.

No word on just what he’ll be lobbying for as he prowls the halls of Congress on behalf of Focus’ many tax-exempt charitable subsidiaries; Focus spokesman Gary Schneeberger hasn’t yet returned an email inquiry. Though I am awfully curious if Goeglein’s pre-employment interview involved a good ol’ fashioned “spare the rod, spoil the child” whoopin’ by Dobson, who advocates corporal punishment for lying and misbehavior in his many parenting books.

Update: Spokesman Gary Schneeberger kindly forwarded a statement from Focus on the Family Action President and CEO Jim Daly announcing Goeglin’s appointment to the newly created position, vice president of external relations, and addressing head-on the matter of his plagiaristic ways:

Goeglein resigned from the Bush administration last February, after admitting to plagiarizing columns written for his hometown newspaper. He has accepted full responsibility for his actions, Daly said, and the matter is behind him.

“Tim has been forthright about his mistakes and humbly accepted the consequences of them – a pretty rare thing in Washington,” Daly said. “He is a Christian, and being a Christian doesn’t mean you’re perfect – only that there is grace and forgiveness when you confess your imperfections. Tim has done that, and we welcome him to our team enthusiastically.”

I guess that dispels the rumors of a “Dare to Discipline” lobbyist thumping. Oh well, let’s hope Goeglein will extend the same sense of charity on Capitol Hill to Focus’ political opponents since the recent track record isn’t so great.

Wendy Norris is a reporter for TWI’s sister site, The Colorado Independent. ]]> http://washingtonindependent.com/27345/disgraced-rove-aide-named-top-lobbyist-for-focus-on-the-family/feed 4 http://washingtonindependent.com/14268/did-mccain-flip-flop-on-gop-platform-or-is-palin-winging-it http://washingtonindependent.com/14268/did-mccain-flip-flop-on-gop-platform-or-is-palin-winging-it#comments Wed, 22 Oct 2008 19:55:02 +0000 Matthew DeLong http://washingtonindependent.com/?p=14268 Marc Ambinder speculates on why Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin would tell Focus on the Family Chairman James Dobson that Sen. John McCain now supports planks of the Republican Party platform that he previously opposed, including constitutional amendments banning gay marriage and all abortions, and opposition to embryonic stem cell research.

During an interview today on Dobson’s radio program, Palin said she believes, from the bottom of her heart, that McCain supports these elements of the platform. Here’s the transcript:

[DOBSON]: …But I am telling you the Republican platform is the strongest pro-life, pro-family document to come out of a political party. Even more so than the platforms during the campaigns of Ronald Reagan. There are principles there that just, I’ve been fighting for, for 30-40 years and you are trying to articulate those same principles, aren’t you?

[PALIN] Absolutely. And Dr. Dobson thank you so much for recognizing that. This is a strong platform. [inaudible] around the planks in this platform that respect life and respect the entrepreneurial spirit of this great country. And those things, back to the social issues that are what Republicans at least in the past had articulated and tried to stand on. Now finally we have very solid planks in the platform that will allow us to build an even stronger foundation for our country. It is all good and it is encouraging, you would maybe have assumed people would have, that we would have gotten further away from those strong planks. But no, they are there, they are solid, we stand on them and again I believe that it is the right agenda for the country at this time. Very, very clear and contrasted tickets in this election, November 4th. People are going to see the clear contrast, just go to the planks in our platform and that is where you see them.

[DOBSON] In your private conversations with Sen. McCain, is it your impression that he also strongly supports those views? I know that he did not oppose that platform when it was written. Do you think he will implement it?

[PALIN] I do, from the bottom of my heart. I am such a strong believer that McCain believes in those strong planks and we do have good conversations about some of the details too, about the different planks and what they represent. And I’m very heartened that John McCain, he doesn’t want a vice president who will check the opinions of me at the door and we talk about some of these. And they are very important. It’s most important though, as you are suggesting that Americans know that John McCain is solidly there on those solid planks in our platform that build the right agenda for America.

Ambinder suggests that one of three things are possible:

Either Palin is trying to mislead Dobson, equivocate or perhaps he doesn’t know what her running mate believes. McCain opposes a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage…. He supports embryonic stem cell research…he opposes a constitutional amendment banning all abortion. Read the platform for yourself:   On abortion… on gay marriage… on stem cells.. .

Maybe McCain changed his mind?

I would offer a fourth possibility: Palin hasn’t read the Republican Party platform and therefore is just winging it with Dobson.

Palin’s rambling, superlative-laden responses sound eerily similar to her rambling, superlative-laden responses to questions posed during her interviews with ABC’s Charlie Gibson and CBS’ Katie Couric, in which she clearly was winging it.

Here is an example, from Palin’s answer to a question from Gibson about whether she believes the Iraq war was part of “God’s plan.”

I believe that there is a plan for this world and that plan for this world is for good. I believe that there is great hope and great potential for every country to be able to live and be protected with inalienable rights that I believe are God-given, Charlie, and I believe that those are the rights to life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

That, in my world view, is a grand — the grand plan.

I’m not knocking her for not having read the Republican Party platform. I haven’t read it either. However, it’s probably a good idea to err on the side of caution, rather than to wholeheartedly affirm someone else’s position on something she is unfamiliar with.