Six Degrees

In a press release issued Tuesday, but just recently posted to his Web site, Kris Kobach lashed back at Congressman Dennis Moore on the issue of Kobach's donation from Gun Owners of America, whose leader Larry Pratt has a variety of opinions and ties to organizations that most Kansas-3 voters probably wouldn't care for.

Kobach stretches big time to connect Moore to Gun Owners of America, claiming Moore is a hypocrite on the issue.

Kobach's reasoning? That Moore accepted a contribution, not from Gun Owners of America, but rather from another Member of Congress who...more than four years earlier...had gotten a donation from Gun Owners of America.**

Kobach's manager, Todd Abrajano, claims Moore is telling "lies and distortions" yet never points out what part of Kobach accepting $3,000 from Gun Owners of America this election isn't true and/or what parts of Larry Pratt's views and connections aren't true.

We may have to fire up the ol' search engines if Kobach is wanting to get into a game of "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon*" when it comes to political donations. Given the various groups and individuals who have donated to Kobach for Congress, it could get interesting.


* Kevin Bacon did give $2,000 to the Democratic National Committee which gave money to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee which gave money to Dennis Moore. There, did it in three jumps.

** Update 3:10 p.m.: We went to the FEC site and checked the old reports, which the Kobach campaign apparently didn't do, since they could only say Rep. Baca received the donation in "his 2000 election campaign." (OpenSecrets is good, guys, but nothing beats looking at the real thing.)

Rep. Joe Baca received the $5,000 from GOA on September 17, 1999. He gave $1,000 to Moore on December 4, 2003. This is a gap of more than four years and it spans three election cycles (2000, 2002 and 2004) -- an even bigger leap than we originally thought, or that the Kobach campaign wants you to believe.

Kobach must have competed in the Olympics -- but in gymnastics, rather than rowing -- because his ability to stretch is stupendous.