Glad to See More Media Picking Up on This Story

I'm glad to see that more media outlets, old and new are picking up on this story from the Daily Progress. As this morning's PilotOnline headline explains, for instance, "[Bob] McDonnell aide's past links with group raise questions." Here's more on those "questions":

An episode from the political history of the man running Bob McDonnell's campaign for governor is raising concerns among some Republicans that he may hurt the GOP's chances of ending an eight-year Democratic hold on the governor's mansion.

McDonnell's campaign manager, Philip Cox, had a key role in a political advocacy group that put out a last-minute mailing during a 2000 congressional campaign attacking a candidate [Eric Cantor] for not paying taxes.

The same group, known as the Faith and Family Alliance, also served as a funding conduit between evangelical leader Ralph Reed and Jack Abramoff, the Washington lobbyist later sent to prison on multiple fraud charges.

In that 2000 race against Eric Cantor, according to the Daily Progress, "The anti-Cantor mailing was apparently sent out by the Faith and Family Alliance’s president, Robin Vanderwall...who is [now] serving a seven-year prison sentence for soliciting sex from a minor on the Internet." Yes, this is the same Robin Vanderwall who ran Bob McDonnell’s 1999 campaign for the House of Delegates. Lovely, huh?

But wait, there's even MORE.

In June 2000, a series of four mailers began appearing in at least 40,000 voters' mailboxes attacking Cantor in his race against Martin. Phone calls also were made describing Martin as "the only Christian" in the race and mentioning that Cantor goes to a synagogue, but Cantor's campaign never determined who ran those attacks, an aide said.

So...what do we have so far here? Well, let's see: we've to ties between Bob McDonnell and a convicted sex offender, ties between Jack Abramoff and Bob McDonnell, and even anti-Semitism (in fairness, the calls were anonymous and never proven to have come from Faith and Family, but it was strongly suspected). Ah, Virginia Republicans...the gift that keeps on giving.

P.S. Republican blog Tertium Quids has been doing excellent work on "the old Faith and Family alliance web," including the "anti-Semitic smear campaign against Eric Cantor" "the closeness of other members [aside from RPV chief Pat Mullins] to the McDonnell campaign."

UPDATE: The DPVA is saying that "ethical questions swirl" around Bob McDonnell, specifically "his top campaign staff's involvement in a shell group that funneled money for an indicted lobbyist." The DPVA press release continues:

Today's Virginian Pilot reveals new information on Faith and Family Alliance, a front group that whitewashed gambling money for indicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff and ran anonymous attacks on Rep. Eric Cantor. Bob McDonnell, his campaign manager Phil Cox, his former campaign manager Robin Vanderwall, and new RPV Chairman Pat Mullins were all involved in the group.