Political Cortex: Brain Food for the Body Politic

Reed first entered politics in 1981, when he interned for none other than Casino Jack himself. In 1983, he was promoted to Executive Director of the College Republican National Committee. That same year, he had his first brush with trouble when he was caught plagiarizing an article for the college paper. (Plagiarism - the starting point of any good movement conservative's career!) Incidentally, the article he plagiarized was an attack on Mohandas Gandhi, and was apparently written under the title "Gandhi: Ninny of the 20th Century." Very classy. Following his expulsion, he began the fine conservative tradition of attacking people who call you on your lies, referring to the grad student who caught him of "the most shocking, profane form of personal attack I can imagine." (As opposed to calling Gandhi a ninny, I guess)

That same year, he was caught in another deception. While campaigning on behalf of an ally for the University of Georgia College Republican's presidential race, Reed was caught rigging the election. The process was so ugly that some of the College Republicans splintered off, forming the Clarke County Republicans.

At this point, you have to realize that Ralph Reed is special. Most conservative strategists take years to rack up such an impressive record of dishonesty and trickery. Plus, Reed gets extra points for managing to alienate members of his own party. This is Karl Rove level manipulation.

Later that same year, Reed suddenly found Jesus, becoming a born-again Christian. Cynicism aside, I believe that Reed's conversion is just as legitimate as the President's. And in the same vein, I believe that Bill O'Reilly really did single-handedly lower the price of oil.

In 1985, Reed exploded back onto the political scene when he organized protests of the Fleming Center, a Raleigh area women's clinic. There'd always been protests, but after Reed showed up, they turned ugly. Head nurse Denise Moore, spoke of the situation: "I don't remember it getting bad until he [Reed] showed up. It was scary -- every single day." Former clinic bookkeeper Denise Lowery added, "When Reed was there, people were ... threatening us, threatening our children, screaming obscenities at patients. They really carried it to an extreme." (Aren't you just loving him more and more by the minute?) He was arrested after he refused to leave the premises. He was released on bail and the charges were ultimately dropped.

In 1989, Ralph Reed was appointed executive director of the Christian Coalition. For those of you not familiar with his time with the CC, here's a synopsis of what he did for them: Reed took the completely insane things that Pat Robertson said on a regular basis, and reworded them to be palatable to mainstream America. Since Reed left in 1997, Pat's had to watch his language, and as a result he doesn't sound quite as crazy anymore. (If, for some reason you want to know what Pat sounded like when he was really crazy, track down a book called "The New World Order." Fun fact from the book: Pat believes that Catholics and members of most Protestant denominations are devil-worshippers. Needless to say, Reed earned his paycheck)

Did I mention that there were some financial indiscretions at the CC when Reed was here? It seems that the CC's chief financial officer, Judy Liebert, found evidence of overbilling by a direct main vendor with (surprise!) close personal ties to Ralph Reed. Attempting to keep the issue under wraps, the CC offered Liebert a severance package including a letter of recommendation and over $100,000 in return for not saying anything negative about the CC in public. Now, where I come from (Kansas), we call that a bribe, but I understand the vernacular is different everywhere.

After that, Reed wisely kept his head down. Unfortunately, he got greedy, and once again he ended up working with Jack Abramoff. And why not? After all, if he was willing to rip off his own allies during his tenure with the CC, what exactly would stop him from doing the same to some Indian tribes he'd never met? It's just logical, really.

In conclusion: I'm sorry, Canada.