Chlorophyll

One Democratic blog has launched an accusation against the Greens, in short that they accepted $55,000 from Republican donors to help get a Green candidate on the ballot in Pennsylvania. (Kos linked to the story too)

Republicans know Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Va./Pa. -- he and his family haven't lived in Pennsylvania in some time) faces a very stiff challenge against Democrat Bob Casey.

So, the theory goes, by getting a Green on the ballot it will take votes from Casey and maybe help Santorum close the gap.

Many progressives/liberals/people-who-don't-want-to-identify with-either-tag-because-of-25-years-of-GOP-name-bashing are not happy with Casey, who is very moderate and opposes abortion rights.

So, by helping the Greens get Carl Romanelli on the ballot, they think they're helping Santorum, one of the worst senators on Capitol Hill.

It's worse than we knew. Is the Green Party candidacy in the race for Rick Santorum's seat a wholly Republican sponsored affair?

As reported today by the AP and the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Green Party managed to get their candidate Carl Romanelli on the ballot with a costly petition drive, which was mostly funded by contributors who had also given to Rick Santorum's campaign. The party raised $66,000 for the effort, all of which they spent on a private company to collect signatures. TPMmuckraker was able to establish that at least $55,000 of that came from conservatives.

Virginia Davis, Santorum's spokeswoman, told the Inquirer that their office had encouraged the contributions. Why? Because a challenge from the left is seen as a liability for the Dem candidate, Bob Casey.

Quick reactions:

1. I don't care where the money came from, if it helps the Greens build, take it.

2. Santorum is awful. He wants to keep women at home raising children and shove gays so far back in the closet they may never come out again. But Casey has a long way to go to being acceptable to many Green-type voters. It's hard to see any Green voting for him for any reason other than he's not Santorum.

3. Do we really care where the money comes from? Absolutely. It's been a long-standing policy of most Greens that they don't take money from corporations. In fact, there's been a few fights over the issue when the Greens briefly considered seeking corporate sponsorship for conventions. If Wal-Mart backers were to offer a Green candidate significant funds, I doubt any Green would accept. There are loads of sources of potential funds that Greens would not touch. Are we hypocrites for taking GOP cash?

4. How the hell are you supposed to know it's GOP cash? AP and the Inquirer had reporters who compared donor list. Name me one Green campaign in the U.S. ever that has a spare volunteer sitting around with nothing to do that they can be spared to pursue that. Ain't gonna happen.

5. Long-term, these kind of stories damage the Greens. It continues to keep the myth that the Green Party is nothing more than a spoiler party, used by Republicans to keep Democrats down. Of course that's crap. The Democrats need no help staying down. They rolled over and played dead years ago. But stories like these will make it harder to grow the party.

I'm happy a Green is in the race, especially one as qualified as Romanelli. If I was in Pennsylvania, I'd vote for him. And I despise the idea of Santorum in the Senate for six more years more than anyone.

If the media thinks Romanelli's a spoiler, then he'll get coverage. There will be an opportunity to talk about Green issues and highlight the many, many differences between Greens and Casey.

And if Pennsylvanians vote to send Santorum back, well, what little faith I had in humanity may be loss.

But long term, the party and its candidates need to decide do they really want GOP cash funding their campaigns, and how can we combat the grand myth that kind of story perpetuates.

UPDATE: Just read through some of the hateful comments on Daily Kos on this story. It's the usual crap, still blaming Ralph Nader and not getting over the 2000 election. Democrats still don't have a clue. They keep looking outside for what's wrong with their party. The fault lies inside. Criticizing Greens for taking GOP money is amazing, considering how many major donors give to both parties for access and influence. Dems take GOP money all the time.

What little hope I had that the Dems had finally got their act together and maybe we could end this GOP nightmare ended today. The Dems are still clueless. Watching the Republicans go down in flames isn't a lot of good when you're own ship is sinking.