Wednesday, October 20, 2010

CD8: Pre-Debate Smack Talk

Posted By on Wed, Oct 20, 2010 at 3:06 PM

As a warm-up to tonight's Sierra Vista debate between Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and Republican Jesse Kelly, Giffords campaign manager Rodd McLeod and Kelly campaign manager Adam Kwasman exchange emails:

From: Rodd McLeod
Subject: Re: Jesse Kelly: "I would vote for the fair tax; I do support the fair tax."

Good afternoon, Adam.

I direct your attention to the link below, put up on youtube.com by Kelly4Congress. In it, Mr. Kelly describes the 23 percent consumption tax, and says, "I would vote for the fair tax; I do support the fair tax."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVeozni3klY

Mr. Kelly seemed unwilling to acknowledge his support for this policy in Monday's debate. We are committed to having a substantive discussion of the issues affecting Southern Arizona, and we hope Mr. Kelly will acknowledge his position, or explain that his position has changed. This video is posted online by your campaign on a page called Jesse Kelly for Congress, Kelly4Congress's Channel.

Tonight, unlike Monday, we hope that Mr. Kelly will not deny his stated position.

Safe travels and best of luck!

Sincerely,

Rodd McLeod


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On Wed, Oct 20, 2010 at 1:25 PM, @votejessekelly.com> wrote:
Dear Ron,

I cannot tell you how grateful I am to hear about the interest in honesty from your campaign.

I trust that this new interest in transparency will include an immediate release by the Giffords campaign admitting to purposefully lying to the constituents of District 8 about Jesse Kelly's positions on social security.

I can't tell you how inspiring it is to me

that one of the most dishonest campaigns in the history of southern Arizona is now interested in being truthful from this point forward.

Please forward your release to this email address for my personal records.

Yours, in liberty,

Adam Kwasman

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From: Rodd McLeod
Date: October 20, 2010 2:45:25 PM MST
Subject: Re: Jesse Kelly: "I would vote for the fair tax; I do support the fair tax."

Again, Mr. Kelly's own words on Social Security are the issue here. I took Mr. Kelly at his word when he was asked about Social Security, if he would "work toward eliminating it."

"If you have any ideas on that, I’m all ears. I would love to eliminate the program. I’d love to take steps to let people opt in and opt out of it. Privatize it." (Tucson Weekly, 12/2/09)

This came up again at the KUAT debate in July, and Mr. Kelly said:

"Right now, you have to take steps to reform it, to privatize it, to phase it out." (KUAT debate, 7/30/10)

In addition, Mr. Kelly has not explained how benefits for current Social Security retirees could be met if workers under the age of 55 simply opted out, as Mr. Kelly has proposed.

I guess we'll talk about it more tonight!

Safe travels,

Rodd McLeod

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