Various left-wing bloggers voiced their outrage when blogger/activist Mike Stark got leveled after trying to push his way through to George Allen at a hotel this week. CNN video showed Stark trying to get around campaign staffers to shout at Allen about spitting on his first wife, a charge Allen's former spouse denied and called "baseless". The same staffers tossed Stark to the ground when he refused to back away, prompting accusations of goonery by Allen's campaign.

However, a series of photographs from the event by the Fredericksburg Free-Lance Star shows that Allen's staff had good reason to worry about Stark. He assaulted one staffer in his attempt to get to Allen, something that the CNN cameras wouldn't have caught. Here's a slideshow of Stark's actions before the confrontation that everyone saw on the video (see update below).

Very obviously, Stark had become violent before the altercation we saw on CNN. The staffers afterwards closed ranks around Allen to keep Stark from committing violence against the Senator, and when he continued to push and shove, they physically removed him from the scene. The CNN video provided plenty of justification for the concerns of Allen's staff, and these pictures show that they acted rationally to Stark's irrational behavior.

Nor is that the only smear going on this week in America's dirtiest campaign. Dan Riehl notices a strange allegation by Frank Schaeffer in today's Dallas News. Schaeffer claims that Alen's campaign sent out a broadcast e-mail that called James Webb a "perverted pedophile", and he's leaving the Republican Party as a result.

Now, I have already written about what a mistake Novelgate was, but I've been on the Allen campaign's e-mail list since Day 1, and I never saw anything like this. Neither has Dan Riehl. Dan wonders whether someone sent a hoax e-mail to Schaeffer, or whether Schaeffer has decided to hoax everyone himself; I don't believe the latter could be true, so I'm inclined to believe the former. If someone who supports Allen and has signed up for their e-mail broadcasts has received this e-mail, let me know, but this looks like a last-minute attempt to manipulate voters.

Allen has made mistakes in this campaign, but the Democrats have been nothing short of vicious. They've attacked Allen's mother, they've tried to pry open his divorce records, and they've tried to imply that a couple of summonses for minor infractions amounted to a secret arrest record from 30 years ago. The Democrats have done everything in Virginia except talk about the issues, and that should inform Virginians of what their votes will endorse next Tuesday. I believe Virginians are too smart to support these kinds of electoral tactics, and they will make the right choice -- to return George Allen to the Senate and James Webb to the private sector.

UPDATE: If you came here expecting to see the slideshow, I had to take it down. The Free Lance-Star sent me an e-mail earlier today demanding that I stop using the photographs. Fair enough -- the pictures belong to them, and I didn't think they would object. Just follow the link and look at the first eight pictures in the string.

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