Bob Schaffer's ties to Bill Orr, convicted yesterday in a multi-million dollar scheme to defraud the federal government, spent the night as the lead stories on Talking Points Memo and its sister site, TPM Muckraker. But at home in Colorado, news outlets paint a different picture, perhaps a result of what Colorado Pols reported last week:
... Dick Wadhams has gone even further than usual in trying to persuade news outlets to ignore the story, going over the heads of reporters directly to managing editors in a preemptive attempt to keep it from exploding into yet another damaging scandal.
Denver Post business columnist Al Lewis lumps Schaffer with Orr's other victims, in an attempt to wring sympathy for the former congressman, who trusted friends and political associates a little too much.
Any penny-ante huckster can con a few suckers with a fuel-additive scam.
William Orr conned Congress.
He also shafted Bob Schaffer, GOP candidate for Colorado's open U.S. Senate seat.
Lewis goes on to recount details from Orr's trial, including the defense theory that the Feds were out to get him because he dared sue the EPA over other, unrelated fuel testing requirements. Returning to Schaffer, Lewis lays blame squarely at the foot of Schaffer's trusting nature:
Schaffer, who served on the board of Orr's congressionally funded National Alternative Fuels Foundation, is not saying a peep.
His spokesman, Dick Wadhams, said Schaffer was not paid for his nearly six months of service beginning in October 1994.
"As soon as he was alerted to the problems, he resigned from the board," Wadhams said.
Schaffer joined the board at the behest of his longtime political associate Scott Shires, a notable GOP operative.
Shires pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor in the case. His sentencing is slated for June 23. He faces up to a year in prison and a $25,000 fine.
If Schaffer and the members of Congress who put up the $3.6 million earmark are indeed Orr's victims, it's hard to imagine how they could be such easy marks.
Lewis continues, other reporters weigh in (or not), and there's a poll after the jump.
Years before Orr set his sights on them, he was allegedly fleecing guys like Larry Potthoff, a Franktown general contractor, who told me he lost about $13,000 to Orr beginning in the mid-1990s.
"He kept sending letters, saying he's talking to Saudi Arabia . . . and on and on and on. But you could never get him on the phone. . . . He used Scott Shires as his go-between guy," Potthoff said. "I called several times and told him I wanted my money back. No response."
What are you gonna do when a flim-flam man with Orr's talents comes to town?
The Post's Karen Crummy writes a brief business story, reinforcing the point Schaffer wasn't paid for his work on NAFF's board. Crummy's story also includes this tidbit:
The money for the grant was provided in a congressional earmark. A then-House Appropriations Committee staffer slipped the earmark into a conference report after the bill passed, according to a federal official with knowledge of the government's case.
The two Post articles knock back questions raised yesterday by Colorado Pols, Talking Points and ProgressNow, whether Schaffer was paid for his work as a NAFF director and whether he had a hand in the initial $3.7 million Congressional earmark that funded Orr's scheme.
Only one Colorado reporter writes an article contrary to the story line advanced by Wadhams. The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel's Mike Saccone, who endured the wrath of Wadhams a month ago, writes a story headlined Schaffer-linked Pol Convicted of Fraud.
Yesterday's 9News story doesn't mention Schaffer's connection at all, and today's Rocky Mountain News skips the matter entirely.
Has Wadhams succeeded in persuading the local press to ignore the story, and scored a real coup casting Schaffer as Orr's victim, rather than a hapless accomplice who lacks judgment and the oversight skills necessary in a senator? Or is there more to the story?
