E-mails posted on a political blog have exposed tension between the Republican running mates for Montgomery County Board of Commissioners over the propriety of taking campaign money from a GOP leader who is a onetime felon.
District Attorney Bruce Castor, running for a seat on the commission, jabbed his running mate, incumbent Commissioner Jim Matthews, for accepting the financial support of Bob Asher, a member of the Republican National Committee who was convicted in a 1986 bribery-related case and who served eight months in prison.
Castor sent several e-mails Friday to the Pennsylvania Progressive - thepennsylvaniaprogressive.com - in response to a blog item that said Asher was raising money for the GOP team. Blogger John Morgan questioned why Castor went along with it, since he had made Asher's backing of an opponent an issue in Castor's unsuccessful 2004 bid for the Republican nomination for state attorney general.
"Believe me, the outrage is there, just not expressed in public," Castor responded. "One correction: Matthews/Castor is NOT accepting Asher money. Jim has his own campaign account (I do not). That is where the money is going . . . I have never taken a dime from Asher or Asher's PAC for this or any other campaign. I simply think it is wrong that a person convicted of political corruption hold a position of such power and influence in the Republican Party."
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Asher, who runs a family candy company in Souderton, was convicted of conspiring with former state Treasurer Bud Dwyer to award a state contract in exchange for a $300,000 contribution to the state GOP. (Dwyer fatally shot himself in the head at a news conference just before he was to be sentenced.)
http://www.philly.com/inquirer/local/20070924_E-mails_expose_Montco_dispute.htmlDwyer's suicide is well-known in PA since he did it front of TV camera's and at least on Pittsburgh station tastelessly broadcast it.