H/T Wes Wagner, former chair of the other LPOregon faction (the one recognized by the Oregon SOS and LPHQ), Kelly House reports at Oregon Live (excerpt):
An Oregon con artist sentenced to prison time for stealing tens of thousands of dollars in electronic merchandise has been arrested in connection with a Virginia woman’s killing.
Eric Saub, 29, formerly of Redmond, has been charged with murder in the shooting death of 25-year-old former Navy sailor Jean Marie Smith in Isle of Wight County on the Virginia coast. Saub also faces charges of using a firearm in the commission of murder, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, possession of ammunition by a convicted felon, identity theft, credit card forgery and using a false statement to obtain credit.
Saub, a former Oregon resident who left the state in 2014, did time at Snake River Correctional Institution after a 2007 conviction for financial fraud that included stealing electronics from the Best Buy where he worked and buying all-terrain vehicles with bad checks. Isle of Wight sheriff’s officials say he is wanted in connection with other charges in Oregon.
Saub was formerly the Vice Chair with Tim Reeves as Chair of the LPOregon faction that is not currently on the ballot in Oregon, authorized signer of their articles of incorporation, and one of the plaintiffs in their lawsuit against what was then the “Wagner faction” (both sides recently elected new leadership). In 2011, then Wagner group Vice Chair Joe Tabor wrote, in part:
…His name is Eric B. Saub, and here is one of several nice stories about his many talents:
http://www.bendbulletin.com/article/20070720/NEWS0107/707200448/
The present LPO vice chair, H. Joe Tabor (myself) has a significantly different background — no criminal record, a registered Professional Engineer, a 5-time Libertarian candidate, winning over 3% of the vote in my U.S. Congressional race in 2008. In fact, the present LPO Board of Directors (called by some in the LNC as the Wagner faction) is made of 9 members includes 7 former candidates (6 who ran as Libertarians), whereas the self-proclaimed LPO State Committee (similarly called the Reeves faction) has no former libertarian candidates among the officers, an officer who was a Republican PCP (Precinct Committee Person) last year, and a county representative member who initiated force and broke a few state laws by grabbing the throat of our treasurer on March 31.
This replacement is only the tip of the iceberg. At present the news media perceive the Libertarian Party as ineffective, but overall composed of nice, well-meaning people. Imagine the national media attention as a crook-friendly party that cannot fix itself, replaces the present, more friendly collective public image. Will this help fundraising? Will this help membership?
This Oregon disaffiliation attempt, led by six on the LNC Executive Committee (EC), Hinkle, Mattson, and others, has been either a collaboration or an act of good faith to help an Oregon political operative, Richard Burke, who has sabotaged Libertarian candidates in favor of their Republican opponents since at least 1994. Many effective and decent people have left the state party because of this man. We know he instigated the recent actions by the EC. I am witness to the years of continuing damage by parliamentary tricks, party reorganizations for power brokering, etc., that Mr. Burke has perpetrated.
It is really telling that Mr. Burke could only find a convicted criminal when he put together a replacement for the state party he is trying to disaffiliate. This can only be because Mr. Burke has very few non-criminal friends among the 2,000,000 or so registered voters in the state of Oregon. It is also telling that while people closer to Burke in Oregon won’t go for his plans, Burke has so many friends in the National organization: at least Hinkle, Matson, and four more of the six EC members who voted for disaffiliation of Oregon, as well as M Carling — the man who helped undermine the Oregon 2009 bylaws, traveling to Oregon anytime Burke needed help in wrecking the state party during party business conventions where bylaws were reviewed and modified.
In IPR comments on a more recent post, Richard Burke replied:
Mr. Wagner is now reduced to assailing his opponents with four-letter words. He is also reduced to trying to undermine the reputations of those of us who worked with Mr. Eric Saub, who was recently arrested and charged with very serious crimes.
Mr. Wagner forgets (or perhaps does not know) that one of my opponents within the LPO years ago, Mr. Jim Bell, did prison time for advocating a marketplace where people would be paid for assassinating federal and other public officials who were thought to have violated their oathes of office. “Assassination Politics,” the concept was called. Bell was also convicted of using false Social Security numbers.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Bell
We could have used Mr. Bell’s associations with other LPO members to undermine their reputations, but we didn’t because Mr. Bell’s LPO associates didn’t support Bell’s criminal actions any more than we support the alleged criminal actions of Mr. Saub.
But this is just how Mr. Wagner does things when folks challenge him. He’s a bully and nothing makes him seem crazier then when he smacks people and they don’t slink away.
By way of background, Mr. Eric Saub had been an effective and well-thought of activist in many Clackamas county circles for several years apart from and prior to his stint in the LPO. Folks knew of his past but thought he had straightened himself out. All of us took a risk by investing some faith in his seeming to have turned over a new leaf. He was very open and forthright about his past and consistantly followed through on his commitments.
If Mr. Saub is convicted, and it must be said that he has not yet been convicted, he will have profoundly disappointed many within and beyond the LPO including myself. If he is guilty, I would submit that such would not be cause for celebration. In any case, his LPO membership has lapsed and he no longer lives in Oregon.
Richard P Burke, Secretary
Libertarian Party of Oregon
Further retorts follow in the comments on that post, and are likely to follow on this one as well.
Cody: “Being a former CP’er, I can tell you that they’ve been a LOT more extreme then that.”
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I can believe that, but my short list was just to show some basics that are considered extreme for the LP.
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The drek Burke dredged in were people who (encouraged by him, apparently) viewed the LP platforms (state and national)
as documents that automatically labeled as “libertarian” anything they could add to them, such as an abortion ban plank, or
prayer in skool.
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B. Tiernan
Hi Bob –
I appreciate your response – thanks! Actually the “or stupid” was in response to “must be”, not “might be”, but that’s okay. I’m glad to hear what you have to say and am glad for the time you took. The battlefield is a cool place to visit – I am glad you enjoyed it.
Best –
Jeff
Has the CP been getting progressively worse? I remember going to a Howard Phillips campaign speech sometime around 2000, and he & the others there seemed pretty normal & reasonable. Of course I was more of a right-winger then than I am now, but it does seem noticeably different.
“The Constitution Party people sound very much
like the kind of people Burke has often brought along to the LPO, i.e.
they sound good on a number of issues and then mention that oh by the
way, abortions should be banned, prayer needs to be back in schools,
and the Ten Commandments need to be in every courthouse.”
Being a former CP’er, I can tell you that they’ve been a LOT more extreme then that.
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Jeff Davidson:
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“Hi Bob – I’m sorry you think I’m stupid.”
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I said you might be.
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“There are a lot of us who care about social justice and free markets, and
believe the latter is the best way to achieve the former.”
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That’s fine and true, so long as it’s accepted that results cannot be
equal at all times or even at any time. That’s an acknowledgement of
reality. I’m suspicious of “social” justice advocacy, which is not
exactly justice as we commonly know it. Attempts to achieve “social
justice” can very easily be attempts to stifle free enterprise by
people who suffer from envy.
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The “stupid” comment refers mainly to the environmental policies
supported by the Greens, which so far as I can tell go far beyond
what any libertarian can support. But on the plus side, I see
Greens as being is many ways more principled Democrats who aren’t
interested in being on the take.
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“Although your comments about the Constitution Party are apt, they are
irrelevant since I didn’t say anything about the Constitution Party.”
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Well then, it was easy to make that assumption since “Constitutionalist”
can be a very broadly defined noun, unlike its use to define a
particular movement. The Constitution Party people sound very much
like the kind of people Burke has often brought along to the LPO, i.e.
they sound good on a number of issues and then mention that oh by the
way, abortions should be banned, prayer needs to be back in schools,
and the Ten Commandments need to be in every courthouse.
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“Your complaint about my identification of Burke with the Root/Tea Party
wing of the LP isn’t consistent with the next paragraph, where you say
that Burke brought in disgruntled GOP folks, presumably from the Tea Party
wing of the GOP.”
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Well, no, you have erred in assuming I specified a specific or near specific
time on this. Burke has been bringing in digruntled Republicans long before
the Tea Party existed. The mid-90s to be more specific.
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“That is the Root strategy. It is one that has been criticized here on IPR
many times. It is also based on Burke’s work with the Western Liberty Network,
which recently sponsored an event featuring Root and his ilk. Burke has also
been part of sponsoring events with the execrable Joe Arapaio.”
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None of this matters (see below).
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”
“I don’t understand what you’re kvetching about, since you seem to agree with me.
Again, your errors of reasoning and/or your internal inconsistency should not
be used by anyone to infer anything about how intelligent you are or are not.”
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There were no errors in reasoning since it was implied, if not specifically
mentioned, that I don’t see Burke as part of that movement because the Tea
Party people are actually principled (not counting some of the organizations
that raise money just for themselves) whereas Burke is just an opportunisitc
sociopath with no principles at all. Therefore his associations don’t
always mean anything to me, nor do they lead me to think less of these
associations merely because they are being used by this schmuck and
don’t know it.
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“From what I’ve read here on IPR, Burke seems to me like a pretty good writer.”
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He’s not. Many who know his work know this. If anything from him sounds
well done, he had help. Lots of it.
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“I agree that the line you quote is poorly written, although all of us have
bad days.”
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Burke was not having a bad _day_ when he uttered that incredibly stupid
sentiment. He was in the middle of a bad decade, after which he began
another decade with the same talent.
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“It’s a matter of opinion – YMMV. ‘Well-spoken’ was not a good word
on my part, since I’ve never heard him speak.”
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Then you’re lucky. But you should have seen his performance in
front of the delegates at the 1994 state convention when he
made his case for being re-elected as Chair – by pretending to be
Errol Flynn in a movie, complete with pantomiming a swordfight
with a sword in each hand, one battling the statists and the other
his opponents in the LPO. It was so embarrassing to watch and
to contemplate that I wish there had been an old lady there
to yell at him to shut up and sit down.
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“I don’t know if Burke is intelligent or not, but he appears to be
smart enough to convince Aaron Starr to drop $100k on a lawsuit that
looked to me to be doomed from the start.”
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That says as much about Arron Starr as it does about Burke. Some
people are blind when it comes to taking what they believe are
vital stances on party infighting. On Burke’s part, his skill
is that of a con artist rather than intelligence. After all,
women who fall for a charmer are not falling for brains.
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If Burke is as intelligent as you think he might be, he’d still be
in charge of the real LPO and the real LPO would have hundreds and
hundreds of dues paying members, including most if not all of the
old-timers who were around when he first oozed in under the door.
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“I wish I were smart enough to convince someone to back my quixotic project
to the tune of $100k.”
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Maybe you should be proud of yourself for not being that dishonest.
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“What *would* be stupid is gratuitously insulting someone who agrees
with you, as I do, on the equities of the Oregon dispute.”
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You still need to be careful how you make that point. As some people
on this forum may know, when people say good things about Burke (often
through being too unfamiliar with the facts in the ground), I start
breaking things in reaction.
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“It’s not that my agreement matters in any way, as I am not an LP member
and I live in Manassas, Virginia.”
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Well that’s okay. I was there myself some time back, at the battlefield,
getting a personal tour by a good friend of mine who used to be one
of the talking heads on TV’s Civil War Journal.
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“It’s that you went out of your way to insult someone who said nothing at
all about your dispute just because he said a couple of mildly nice things
about Richard Burke. It’s stupid, it’s jerky, and it’s kind of pathetic.
That truly doesn’t make you any of those things, since I know how to
separate the person from the opinion.”
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Well, I wasn’t going out of my way at all.
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B. Tiernan
Hi Bob – I’m sorry you think I’m stupid. Let me respond to your points in reverse order.
There are a lot of us who care about social justice and free markets, and believe the latter is the best way to achieve the former. I suspect that Starchild, among others, has written on this. I have seen numerous people respond here on IPR reporting pretty much the same results I did. The phrase isn’t mine – it comes from the website http://www.bleedingheartlibertarians.com I’d encourage you to check it out – you may find that you agree with people like me more than you think you do.
Although your comments about the Constitution Party are apt, they are irrelevant since I didn’t say anything about the Constitution Party. I assume this is merely an error of reading on your part, and will not suggest this error implies anything about how stupid you are or are not. You may infer from that statement that I am passive-aggressive. 🙂
Your complaint about my identification of Burke with the Root/Tea Party wing of the LP isn’t consistent with the next paragraph, where you say that Burke brought in disgruntled GOP folks, presumably from the Tea Party wing of the GOP. That is the Root strategy. It is one that has been criticized here on IPR many times. It is also based on Burke’s work with the Western Liberty Network, which recently sponsored an event featuring Root and his ilk. Burke has also been part of sponsoring events with the execrable Joe Arapaio. I don’t understand what you’re kvetching about, since you seem to agree with me. Again, your errors of reasoning and/or your internal inconsistency should not be used by anyone to infer anything about how intelligent you are or are not. See above, passive-aggressive. 🙂
From what I’ve read here on IPR, Burke seems to me like a pretty good writer. I agree that the line you quote is poorly written, although all of us have bad days. It’s a matter of opinion – YMMV. “Well-spoken” was not a good word choice on my part, since I’ve never heard him speak. See, we all have bad days! 🙂 I was basing that on the generally good use of grammar and word choice in his stuff here. I don’t know if Burke is intelligent or not, but he appears to be smart enough to convince Aaron Starr to drop $100k on a lawsuit that looked to me to be doomed from the start. I wish I were smart enough to convince someone to back my quixotic project to the tune of $100k.
What *would* be stupid is gratuitously insulting someone who agrees with you, as I do, on the equities of the Oregon dispute. It’s not that my agreement matters in any way, as I am not an LP member and I live in Manassas, Virginia. It’s that you went out of your way to insult someone who said nothing at all about your dispute just because he said a couple of mildly nice things about Richard Burke. It’s stupid, it’s jerky, and it’s kind of pathetic. That truly doesn’t make you any of those things, since I know how to separate the person from the opinion.
Best regards –
Jeff Davidson
Wolfefan: “I agree, Jill. He seems intelligent”
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Bob T: Compared to what?
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“and well-spoken”
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Apparently you’ve had little exposure to his skills in this regard.
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“and he’s a decent writer if a little wordy for my tastes.
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Well, no, he’s not. An example of his composition skills is this slogan he came up
with to convince LPO members to vote for NOTA instead of a US House candidate so
that the Republican nominee could win in November: “We’ve already shown that we
can run candidates. Now let’s show that we cannot.”
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“He’s probably too far into the Root/Tea Party wing of the LP for me to be
completely comfortable with.”
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This makes no sense, either. He has very little in the way of principles when it
comes to his brand of Libertarianism. His only consistent view is that he should
be in charge, or at least in charge of the person allegeldy in charge.
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“Constitutionalist and Libertarian are not the same thing, although some seem to
use them almost interchangeably.”
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Those who do are not paying attention. The Costitution Party is ridiculously
religious compared to the LP, and that means it oozes into everything. Having
said that, Burke would be happier in the CP because he often recruited disgruntled
Republicans to join the LPO, and those recruits wanted to change the LPO Platform
to include banning abortions.
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“The various political quizzes always list my top two parties as Libertarian and
Green, so I must be a bleeding-heart Libertarian.”
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Or a stupid one.
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B. Tiernan
I’m Jim Bell, the person referred to in the quote by Richard Burke. Yes, I have been a Washington resident since 1987. (In Oregon 1980-1987) I attended a few Oregon libertarian-type meetings around 1990-97, but intentionally didn’t actively involve myself for the simple reason that I was not an Oregon resident, so I didn’t feel that I had a ‘right’ to involve myself in a position of power or control. ( I saw nothing wrong with merely attending meetings.)
Nevertheless, I simply cannot recall why Mr. Burke would refer to me as his ‘opponent’. I was certainly never his supporter, but at the same time I simply cannot recall taking a public (or even much of a private) position against him in the 1990’s (or later). True, my memories are 20 years old on this matter. If somebody has a recollection of my involvement, or can cite archives that I can read to refresh my memories, I solicit these. My email address is jimdbell1 (at) gee-mail[dot]kom.
I agree, Jill. He seems intelligent and well-spoken, and he’s a decent writer if a little wordy for my tastes. He’s probably too far into the Root/Tea Party wing of the LP for me to be completely comfortable with. Constitutionalist and Libertarian are not the same thing, although some seem to use them almost interchangeably. The various political quizzes always list my top two parties as Libertarian and Green, so I must be a bleeding-heart Libertarian.
Burke is a fascinating personality. His hubris never ceases to astound me. I’m also amazed at how patiently he continues to exlain the same thing over and over again.
Mr. Burke appears to be perfectly willing attack political opponents based on the actions of their supporters. Mark V has posted his radio ad on youtube where he says (from recollection) – “I’m not saying Barack Obama is a Communist. But Communists support him. Do you?” I wonder what his response would be to, “I’m not saying Richard Burke is a convicted thief or an accused murderer…”
Mr. Burke must have known that Eric Saub was a convicted criminal well before entangling himself with him in a law suit. As a defendant it took me about 10 minutes to find the article where Eric Saub was convicted of fraud/theft of electronics: http://www.bendbulletin.com/csp/mediapool/sites/BendBulletin/News/story.csp?cid=1522419&sid=497&fid=151 when he first landed this law suit with my name on it.
Notice that the date of the article is: Published Jul 20, 2007 at 05:00AM WELL BEFORE THE LAW SUIT.
Yet, Mr. Burke still choose to associate with this person, even signed him on as a co-plaintiff in his pursuit to take over the Libertarian Party of Oregon.
So, birds of a feather flock together? Or, was burke so desperate to cobble people to his fake State convention and later to make up the fake State Party, that he was willing to associate himself with a known scam artist and thief, and now murderer.
Refer to prior comment:
https://independentpoliticalreport.com/2015/05/giggles-the-pig-enters-flint-michigan-mayoral-race/#comment-1173644
“Maybe time to collect it all in a book, or series of books?”
No one would believe it!
Maybe time to collect it all in a book, or series of books?
I will leave it to Bob
He is the unofficial party historian of all the last 20+ years of burke ratfuckery thay predates IPR covering him.
One of the reasons I don’t ever even try posting here from a phone. I got what you meant from context, of course.
Well, if you are better at giving the short version, by all means, have at it. Who believes whom would be up to each reader to decide for themselves, but if you don’t elaborate, there’s very little to go on here.
CAN’T
Stupid phone.
Problem is Bob can keep it short.. he will want to tell the whole story about each of them.. then get pissed off when Burke categorically says it is all not true .. even though multiple people in this state lived through it.. he will know there is no real system of presenting evidence that will permit people outside this state from discerning the truth – rinse – repeat.
LOL. Well, if it’s a long list, you don’t have to post the whole thing.
Oh God… Bob will be up all night writing that list and the storied histories of he sees your comment Paulie…
He made no secret that people could win the bets by killing politicians/bureaucrats or paying to have them killed.
Which other close inner circle trustees are you referring to besides Saub?
BurWe could have used Mr. Bell’s associations with other LPO members to undermine their reputations”
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To repeat, Bell was a Washington State libertarian (don’t know if he was registered as such, or even a paid member of that party) and never had much of a presence in Oregon. He had one close friend among the long time Ore Libertarian members who had been around back in the 80s – long before you were around – but was never closely associated with others that I recall. In fact, when I think of all the meetings, newsletter work parties, fair booths, and other get-togethers, I can’t even recall him being around and his name isn’t even thought of when I start listing all of the people who helped to put you in your place.
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What’s important here is that your associates – close inner circle trustees – includes murderers, ex-cons, embezzlers, burglars, thieves, liars, cheaters, and so on.
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And let’s not forget that you were taken to Small Claims Court by one of your own recruits after you did some lousy, unfinished computer work for him. That you “won” because he didn’t show u up means little. Everyone knows that you did shoddy, half-finished work on many projects.
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B. Tiernan
Their court filings are replete with fraud and they were caught spoliating (fancy word for destroy) evidence during discovery.
Obviously the Reeves faction of “LPOR” isn’t too keen on the NAP, making it apparent they’re the fake “Libertarians”.
Burke said:
“Mr. Wagner forgets (or perhaps does not know) that one of my opponents within the LPO years ago, Mr. Jim Bell, did prison time for advocating a marketplace where people would be paid for assassinating federal and other public officials…”
Bell was a long time Washington State libertarian, and never had much of a presence in Oregon. His website was, by the way, not about paying people to assissinate officials but about making bets on who might be assassinated.
Anyway, this should be embarrassing for you. Your one-time fundraising specialist was one Thomas Marks, arrested by the FBI and sent to the Federal Pen for embes=zzling about $100,000. And to think you wanted to trust him with anything to do with LPO funds. Who else are you hiding?
B. Tiernan
Throw the whole lot of the fake LPO in jail and let’s move on with our lives.