Ehrlich Aide Ousted Over O'Malley Rumors

[MountainLaurel]

Well gee. A Repuke spreading vicious lies via FreeRepublic gets what he deserves. If I could stand the bile over there, I'd have to go visit and gloat my ass off.

Now, will Ehrlich apologize? News at 11.

Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley yesterday accused agents of Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.'s administration of spreading false rumors that he had an extramarital affair, and Ehrlich responded hours later by dismissing a longtime employee.

The mayor, a Democrat considering a bid for governor in 2006, said he believes that the widespread and persistent rumors were part of a "concerted and orchestrated and sustained" effort and called on the Republican governor to apologize to his wife and children.

snip

"The cowardly and hurtful, insidious and vicious nature of this sort of character smear is that there is so little that you can do to defend your family and the integrity of your marriage against these sorts of attacks without aiding those whose primary goal is to spread these falsehoods," he said. "It's a very insidious thing."

Steffen discussed the rumors on the conservative Web site FreeRepublic.com during the summer of 2004. He posted them under the name NCPAC, a reference to one of his early employers, the National Conservative Political Action Committee.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9313-2005Feb8.html