Greg Sargent on a roll, confirms lobbyist who heckled Lamont

Oh man, Gerg Sargent is having a hell of a great time going after Joe Lieberman's favorite (hitman) lobbyist, Richard Goodstein.



Greg, you keep reporting like this if I see you in Connecticut next week, the first drink is on me!

So I just reached D.C. lobbyist Richard Goodstein on his cellphone. Goodstein the lobbyist confirmed that he is indeed the guy on the front-page of today's Record-Journal who appeared to be heckling Lamont in a diner.

[...]

As the Record-Journal reported, a man named Richard Goodstein shouted at Lamont: "Are you a Bill Clinton Democrat, or an Al Sharpton Democrat?" Several blogs have since speculated that Goodstein is a corporate lobbyist in D.C.

Well, Election Central just reached out to the office of registered-D.C.-lobbyist Richard Goodstein, got his cell number, and reached him. When I asked him if he was a Lieberman supporter and was the man in the pic on the front of the Herald-Record, he confirmed that, yes, he was a Lieberman backer and that he was the same man as pictured on the paper's front page. Then the conversation went south.

When I asked him if I could confirm that he'd said what the paper said he had, Goodstein asked me why I wanted to do that and whether I worked for the paper. I said I didn't and noted that I wanted to get confirmation of his quotes straight from him.

After a hurried back-and-forth, Goodstein said: "Do me a favor: Email me the last good story you wrote about Joe Lieberman." When I asked why that was relevant, Goodstein said: "Bye. Bye." End of conversation.

Well, at least now we know for certain who the mystery man in the diner was, and that he's the same Richard Goodstein as the D.C. lobbyist Richard Goodstein. But I didn't get to ask him about the nature of the Lieberman supporters' surprise of Lamont or about the nature of Goodstein's relationship to the campaign. I've got a call into the Lieberman campaign about this. Hopefully we'll have more soon.

Why are the best people covering this eleciton from out-of state? Where everyone's favorite senior political reporter, Mark "fire in the belly" Davis when you need him. Still running after that Halliburton story?

Team Joementum: keeping us laughing since Feburary 2006. Pity it's all coming to a crashing end on August 8th...