Copper Kleptos

A recent AZ State Dems newletter suggests (carefully) that GOP vandals are behind a recent incident of vandalism at the Pima County Dems HQ:

Democrats Targeted for Vandalism

If all of this wasn’t enough, we learned Friday that the Democratic Party
Headquarters in Tucson was vandalized and the phone lines to the call
center were cut overnight.  This crippled our volunteer
call center and jeopardized our ability to talk to voters in Southern
Arizona at a critical time in the election.

Did radical GOP supporters cut critical phone lines to Democratic offices? You
decide.  But whether they did or not, I can assure you that Republicans
will stop at nothing to beat our Democratic candidates and push an
extreme agenda for Arizona.

We need your support today to stop them.

I can’t say I know enough meth heads to know if any significant number of them are "radical GOP supporters," but somehow I kinda doubt they’re all that interested in voting (except maybe to vote against Prop 301).

Workers at the Pima HQ indicate that there was indeed an incident of vandalism, but it wasn’t just the phone lines that were cut, it was the power. The reason it was done is that the copper wiring was stolen from the building’s power system: a common MO of meth addicts stealing copper to sell to recyclers and feed their habits.

It appears that either the person or persons in charge of the state newsletter didn’t bother to check the facts, or they deliberately mischaracterized the incident to throw some dirt on the GOP and whip up fundraising (though carefully covering their 180 by framing it as a question, and tacking on a weasely disclaimer, "But whether they did or not"). I tried to contact the state official in charge of internet campaigns, but have not received any response.

Now I detest the GOP as much as the next Democrat, but I see no profit in making shit up when there is more than enough real corruption, ineptitude, and degenerate behavior to write a thousand newsletters without stretching a single fact. All this does is give the GOP more ammo to claim that we are liars, and that nothing we can say (even those things backed by solid facts) can be believed by voters. And it makes our culture of political ethics more and more like theirs, and that I can’t abide.

Get your shit together Phoenix. And email a retraction.