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NOT making this up. The investigative journalism was done by Carl 
Kozlowski of the Pasadena Weekly and published Thursday the 25th, noted and passed on by the Godlike Moxley, and then I still probably wouldn’t have noticed for a few days if it weren’t for Ill-Tempered Dan of the LOC (who NEVER links to or credits this blog, but I’m better than that.) And Dana’s folks happily confirmed the story to Mr. Koslowski. Meanwhile, as I attempt to lift my lower jaw off the floor, I ponder how I can best get this story across to the voters of the 46th District, especially all the old Republicans who will be filling in and mailing in their absentee ballots this week, the complacent ones who will just check off R, R, R as they do every two years. They NEED to know what an UNHINGED BUFFOON they keep sending off to Washington to represent them, and how regularly and bizarrely he pops up with “R-Huntington Beach” appended to his name.
Background: Dana’s head is always filled with conspiracy theories. (Just try googling Rohrabacher Oklahoma City bombing.) One theory that’s been haunting him for forty years now is the vast Arab plot to kill RFK, using Sirhan as a patsy. That’s been in his mind since the day of the 1968 assassination, when he claims to have been at the same hotel at a different party (?) and to have been run into by a fleeing Arab being chased by cops, BEFORE the assassination. (This would have been when Dana was a little under 21, s
till a stoned, surfing, college kid, singer-songwriter and anti-war protester.)
So, who knows what wild hair got into Dana in Jan. 2007 (right around the time, as Moxley notes, that he was famously attributing global warming to dinosaur farts.) Sirhan Sirhan, poor pathetic bastard, has been in solitary confinement since 9/11 because his stupid fellow prisoners think he’s part of Al Qaeda. And Dana can’t go question him without his permission, so he hatches a plan…
So he gets to Sirhan by impersonating a female human rights worker, “Diana,” who is concerned about the “atrocious conditions of his confinement.” Sirhan jumps at that chance, not even contacting his lawyers, and is utterly shocked and confused to be suddenly confronted by the red-faced, bellowing, male Congressman, accompanied by two tape-recorder-toting aides, demanding to know all about the conspiracy. Knowing what we know of the amusement and glee Dana expresses over the abuse of Arab p
risoners at Gitmo and elsewhere, we can only imagine the belly laughs Dana and his aides shared before and after the visit. A “human rights worker” – HA, that’s rich!
The image of a female-impersonating Rohrabacher spewing spittle at a half-mad Arab assassin with two aides dutifully taking notes is on a level of surreal absurdity that beggars Photoshop; it really needs to be filmed, along with the rest of Dana’s life story, by a David Lynch. And it’s of a piece with the rest of Dana’s career: no successful legislation, but twenty years of often disastrous “rogue diplomacy” – Taliban, Laos, Angola – dating back to when the slogan above his desk read “Fighting For Freedom While Having Fun!”
Setting aside the more disturbing aspects of his character – particularly his sadism and his unabashed love of pollution – Dana is basically a political prankster. He would make a very entertaining and successful talk show jockey on, 
say, KFI. But he does not belong in the Congress of the United States, representing and humiliating the people of California’s 46th District, who are growing in political maturity and now have a viable alternative.
One remarkable thing about working in Debbie Cook’s campaign office is the frequency with which some new development will send in a wave of “lifelong Republicans” who have just had enough with Dana and want Debbie yard signs and to know what they can to help. A few months ago there was his madcap performance at the Orange County Business Council’s Water Summit (something commenter “just … asking” tipped me off about and I still have to find the video.) His recent sleazy, dishonest (and amateurish) attack mailers against Debbie seem to have turned more recipients toward her than the reverse – even if they don’t know the precise facts of the solar plant environmental reviews and her record on taxes, it just sets off their BS detectors. And we’ve gotten a lot of new Republicans on account of that. This new story should be GOLD – how do we get it out?
Finally inquiring minds NEED to know: How often does Dana morph into “Diana?” And also: How long until it happens on the floor of Congress?
My “body of work” on Dana (so far)
Portrait of the Torture Apologist in the Twilight of his Career (panties on head)
Mirror Mirror on the Wall, Who’s the Biggest… (a McCain/Dana whore-off)
Dana, Terrified of Debating Debbie, Muddies the Waters
(note: since that post, Dana has agreed to three debates, but not until late October, when many ballots will already have been mailed in)
Surfers Turn Against Dana Rohrabacher
Gay Dana Tales
Irrelevance: Dana’s Lovin’ It!
Did I Ever Tell You About The Time…
and my UR-post: Mayor Cook Vs. Dana, volley 1: IRAQ
MORE COMING UP SOON TOO! (before election day)
Dana Rohrabacher and Jack Abramoff: An American Romance
Dana Rohrabacher: In the Beginning (the Oliver North / Iran-Contra connection)
Mariana Island Fetuses Weigh In On HR 3079
and The Notorious OCBC Video!
So Vern, any hit piece on Dana is fair?
Even when your headline is wrong and your inquiry to the author, you linked, about it, has gone unanswered, you will repeat it anyway.
Don’t tell me you think Scott Moxley is really godlike either, well you might, but he isn’t remotely devine.
This is exactly what I was referring to in my post yesterday. This builds disrespect and isn’t raising anyone level of trust in what you say.
So then, this is all for your friend Debbie Cook, the “green queen“?
Now we know how she got that title, wasting so much water in the process.
Her averages are nearly twice the norm for monthly usage. Last month was triple!
I guess it’s not easy being green 😉
Well, Carl, every sentence of my post is true. If you noticed, I have a question mark in my title after “in drag.” Lots of people, including Moxley and Dave Dayen of Calitics (and Dan from Liberal OC if he actually read the original story) came away with the impression that Dana was dressed in drag. But it’s true that if you read the story it doesn’t necessarily say that, which is why I have an inquiry in to the author. [Oh yeah, thanks to Laura “asslicker”Longboobs who works partly as a detective, for pointing out the ambiguity to me.]
We know he got in to see Sirhan by pretending to be “Diana.” So either he dressed as a woman and showed the guards a fake ID (which is the most fun to think) or else the Corcoran guards were in on the subterfuge, and following the illegal wishes of a Congressman, which is also disturbing (but less fun)
But either way it’s a bizarre story. This is how our Congressman spends his time? And we constituents would never have known if it weren’t for the work of Koslowski.
Hm… “all for Debbie Cook, the green queen?” (also known recently as the Anti-Palin) Not really. I’ve been a tireless Rohrabacher critic since long before she decided to run. Remember, this guy has been my Congressman, and hence my problem and my embarrassment, since I moved back to my old hometown in HB in 1997. Again, every sentence of my post stands whether he actually donned transvestite garb that day or not. (And I will update when I find out for sure one way or the other…)
no where in any of the original reporting on this story does it state that rohrabacher posed as a female. clearly what probably actually happened is that someone misheard “dana” as “diana” before the congressman got there. the oc weekly, etc, spun that simple misunderstanding into the supposed “fact” that the congressman was parading in drag, which certainly did not happen.
What an exquisitely exculpatory theory from “afar.” I doubt you’ve been following the career of Dana much, or have an appreciation both his love of theater and and the mordant black humor of he (or his spokespeople or in-the-know guards) presenting this famed torture apologist as someone “concerned with the atrocious conditions of [Sirhan’s] confinement.” The relevant passages (and I will update if I ever hear back from Koslowski)
Diana’s’ here for you
…Reese [Sirhan’s lawyer] also criticized Rohrabacher’s visit to Corcoran to see Sirhan in early 2007, saying “We got a letter from Sirhan, who was told a ‘Diana’ was coming to see him,” she recalled. “Sirhan didn’t know it was the congressman because the visitor was presented as a woman.”
Reese said Sirhan was told the person was coming to talk about the atrocious conditions he faces in solitary confinement. “So, of course, he said sure, send this person in.”
Reese said no one on Sirhan’s legal team was informed of the meeting, and when Rohrabacher arrived with two aides, she claimed he “repeatedly badgered him to admit he did the killing to clear his conscience. The two aides tape recorded the whole thing…”
Presented as a woman, Diana, worried about Sirhan’s condition… I don’t think the Moxley interpretation is farfetched, but there was obviously subterfuge going on either way, and what the hell is our Congressman out doing such goofy things for anyway, and what else is he up to that we won’t find out about for years?
Vern, to be more specific that’s how you remember it.
Yes, I’m sure you will post the answer when and if you get one. It will be well off the headlines by then, damage done.
Here are the two paragraphs that are pertinent here.:
Somehow I didn’t get the same impression at all. I think Scott was drinking or something when he dreamed it up as some sort of SNL theme and just wrote it down. He’s not at all above that. My humble opinion of his abilities. You simply read Scott’s piece first and were already prejudiced to read it that way. The guards may have simply misunderstood a phone call of written request, or a gate request via phone, the motives of which I have no idea. But the requests would be made prior to visitation, normally.
I didn’t know that you had Dana in your sights before Debbie Cook was running. That’s not a big surprise. It does seem however that since you have been here, and as long as I have known you, you have been a “Cook-ie”. So making that connection, is I hope, understandable. She does claim to be the “green” candidate so her explanation of her high water usage should be interesting.
Yeah, 2002, 2004, 2006, we had real nice people running against Dana who had not a snowball’s chance not to mention zero support from the DPOC. For years lots of people have been trying to get Debbie to run, thinking she’d have the best chance, she finally gave in early this year. She still is getting next-to-no support from the national Party, but boy, you wanna see grass roots, and excitement crossing party lines, you oughtta come out to our office on Beach Blvd.
Dunno about her water usage. People were also surprised that she has investments in oil. I know she hates being pigeonholed as an “environmentalist” as though that is supposed to explain everything she and her husband do. I haven’t seen the water article yet; is that the same one that inspired Art’s post on Pulido and Pringle? And he left out Debbie, maybe because we’re mostly pro-Deb here – what a mensch!
Now I think of it my interest in defeating Dana did start in ’02, when he was such a big cheerleader for the invasion of Iraq, and all the letters I sent to him arguing against it were responded to with the same nonsensical form letters full of Administration propaganda. Then over the years I started learning a lot more crazy things about him. He’s really a fascinating wild character who should not be in Congress, but I would love to someday write his unauthorized biography!
Yes, I’m sure you will post the answer when and if you get one. It will be well off the headlines by then, damage done.
Tell ya what, whatever response I get, I will make a new post with a new headline. It’s a fascinating story drag or not. And I think it’s obvious there was some kind of deceit going on.
Same article, or investigation at least. I posted the link to her water usage history only, but I think you can get to the main story from that page.
“maybe because we’re mostly pro-Deb here” are there a mice in your pocket?
I know Art and Sarah and myself all support Debbie; I assume RV would too although I don’t remember for sure her weighing in, and funny thing about Larry and Thomas, they are always sticking up for Republicans but I’ve never heard either of them make a peep in defense of Dana, who seems to be somewhat of an embarrassment to his party.
During the primary Art, Thomas and I interviewed Dana’s GOP challenger St John, to try to help him a little with his challenge to Dana… now he blogs with us. He has big, legitimate criticisms of Dana and has also criticized Debbie, but really when you listen to him, he is VERY familiar with Dana, but really should learn more about Debbie before he spouts off erroneous GOP talking points about her and gets debunked by a mob as happened a few times in the summer.
Then there’s Carl…
Holy freaking cow, I could never run for elected office. My levels of toilet paper consumption would be fodder for weeks on end!
Carl, admittedly, Debbie’s water usage did pique my curiosity, and I’d love to hear what she has to say about it, but it IN NO WAY attenuates my support for her as Dana’s replacement. I don’t believe Vern has any mice in his pocket, but I’ll tell you what, I have mice in my head wondering how such a reckless buffoon like Rohrabacher has remained in office for so long.