"Maddow Can't Stop Candidate From Explaining Himself" (with video)

Atlantic Wire with video from MSNBC (18:46):

Thursday night, the congressional candidate Art Robinson appeared on Rachel Maddow's MSNBC program. Robinson is a chemistry professor and the Republican candidate for Oregon's Fourth Congressional District, and will face the incumbent Democrat Peter DiFazio in November. Early in the interview, Maddow tried to ask Robinson about an anonymous donor who's given $150,000 to his campaign. Rather than answer the question, Robinson launched into a minutes-long jeremiad against DiFazio, barreling over Maddow repeatedly as she tried to bring him back to the subject at hand. MORE...

NPR: "Following The Money Behind Mystery Attack Ads" (with audio/text)

NPR with audio (11:10) and text:

Democrat Peter DeFazio is a perfect example of the effects of the Supreme Court's ruling. DeFazio is running for re-election in Oregon's 4th Congressional District. A few weeks ago, he got a call from one of his staffers about a new attack ad. The ad was different from previous attack ads that his opponent, Republican Art Robinson, had been running during the campaign.

"The ad was very sophisticated. I knew it wasn't my opponent's. I would pay money to put my opponent's ad up," DeFazio says.

The Concerned Taxpayers for America turned out to be the group responsible for the attack ad. But neither DeFazio nor his opponent, Art Robinson, knew anything about them. Robinson, who agrees with what the ad says about DeFazio, refuses to distance himself from the group or investigate any further for legal reasons.

"I haven't been trying to find out, because I think that's the legal position I'm supposed to take," Robinson explains.

DeFazio on the other hand was concerned about the group's identity. He did some digging around and found that the Concerned Taxpayers of America actually had a mailing address in D.C.: a town house on Capitol Hill to be exact.

With a group of reporters from the Washington Post trailing closely behind him, DeFazio went to the address he had found and knocked on their door.

"So I go up, knock on the door, no answer," DeFazio recounts. "They had a big mail slot, so I looked through it and I kinda saw what I thought was movement. So I just shouted through the mail slot ... Finally this fellow came to the door kinda reluctantly." MORE...

"Rep. DeFazio: Fire "Timmy" Geithner" (with video)

Sam Stein (HuffPo) with video from MSNBC-ED Show (04:27):

Rep. Peter DeFazio called for the firing of President Barack Obama's top two economic aides on Wednesday for pursuing a recovery plan skewed too heavily towards Wall Street's favor.

The Oregon Democrat told MSNBC's Ed Schultz that he was dismayed with the administration's lack of focus on job creation and insisted it was time to dismiss both White House economic adviser Larry Summers and Treasury Secretary "Timmy Geithner."

"We think it is time, maybe, that we turn our focus to Main Street -- we reclaim some of the unspent funds, we reclaim some of the funds that are being paid back, which will not be paid back in full, and we use it to put people back to work. Rebuilding America's infrastructure is a tried and true way to put people back to work," said DeFazio.

"Unfortunately, the President has an adviser from Wall Street, Larry Summers, and a Treasury Secretary from Wall Street, Timmy Geithner, who don't like that idea," he added. "They want to keep the TARP money either to continue to bail out Wall Street...or to pay down the deficit. That's absurd."

Asked specifically whether Geithner should stay in his job, DeFazio replied: "No.

"Especially if you look back at the AIG scandal," he added, "and Goldman and others who got their bets paid off in full...with taxpayer money through AIG. We channeled the money through them. Geithner would not answer my question when I said, 'Were those naked credit default swaps by Goldman or were they a counter-party?' He would not answer that question."

DeFazio said that among he and others in the Congressional Progressive Caucus, there was a growing consensus that Geithner needed to be removed. He added that some lawmakers were "considering questions regarding him and other economic advisers" -- though a petition calling for the Treasury Secretary's removal had not been drafted, he said.

"[Obama] is being failed by his economic team," DeFazio concluded. "We may have to sacrifice just two more jobs to get millions back for Americans."

Neither the White House or the Treasury Department immediately returned a request for comment.