the scam that rocked the internet

[Chris_]

I just saw that scamdy.com now redirects to the Democratic Warrior forum.

It's flagged as Pornoraphy by the work filter.

[commonguymd]

It's flagged as Pornoraphy by the work filter.

HAHA.  that is funny.  The perpetrators were a crafty bunch.

[Ralph Wiggum]

I just saw that scamdy.com now redirects to the Democratic Warrior forum.

I'm pretty sure that Ben Burch bought the domain.

[commonguymd]

I'm pretty sure that Ben Burch bought the domain.

I do believe you are correct from what I recall.  So foggy in the brain....

[thelaughingman]

I'm pretty sure that Ben Burch bought the domain.

Well, that certainly explains the pornography filter tag.

[thundley4]

I remember Speed Addiction. I remember more when he claimed he went to prison and had a criminal record. I thought it was dubious because who brags about going to prison and having a criminal record.

I've seen lots of DUmmies bragging about their arrests for civil disobedience.

[Ballygrl]

Can we ask what happened to the money Beth raised?

[miskie]

Can we ask what happened to the money Beth raised?

That, my dear Ballygrl, is the question that everyone connected to Scamdy considers, but they are all afraid to ask.

[GOBUCKS]

That, my dear Ballygrl, is the question that everyone connected to Scamdy considers, but they are all afraid to ask.

The DUmbasses were so disorganized, I never thought it was clear where they were sending money. A lot probably went to the round red one, but some went to poor, stupid Beth, some went to the already well-off flyarm, some even went to moonbat radio shows, and some probably went directly to a befuddled Johns Hopkins Hospital. The vast majority of the claimed donations surely never existed. At any rate, it all evaporated, just like the uncounted thousands the DUmmis wasted on the Bev Harris scam.

[franksolich]

The biggest mistake Scamdy made--and it wasn't until near the end that it was corrected--was that those involved in Scamdy assumed Doug's stupid ex-wife had a goal and a plan, and would react as if a rational person.

Man, that was a big mistake.

She never even tried to coordinate the lies (as if she thought she didn't have to), although one time the sensitive lad, the piano-playing primitive, did show up on P-J Comix's DUmmie FUnnies to change a story he'd just told on Skins's island.

I already confessed to this a few weeks ago--my own biggest mistake was when, as recipient of voluminous correspondence from members of democraticunderground and others, I got a great many details about real-estate transactions in which the late red round one had indulged, indicating a measure of unusual prosperity, even for the Bush era.

I'm no real-estate expert, and they were all confusing to me.

And I lapsed, thinking like a primitive.

"I don't understand this, so therefore it's not important."

If I had been thinking rationally at the time, whether or not I understood something, I would've passed it on to someone else who might understand it.  But I was thinking like a primitive at the time.

"I don't understand this, so therefore it's not important."

So I sat on it for several weeks.....

A prominent election-reform activist in Seattle, kept asking me if I had any "good" information, and I kept saying "no"--not out of malice or distrust, but simply because I didn't think this real-estate information was important.  And as it turned out, this prominent election-reform activist could've explained the whole deal to me, as she knew real-estate.

Damn, I was stupid.

One of the biggest unanswered questions involved a communication Doug's stupid ex-wife had with the former owner of our old home, and this same prominent election-reform activist.  About the fifth day into the scam--a week hadn't even passed--Doug's stupid ex-wife contacted both of them, one assumes to ease the pressure of the mockery and ridicule, telling them that the late red round one was really dying and that nothing could be done about it.

This was when the "fund-raiser" was at its height, remember.

The prominent election-reform activist had no credibility with the primitives, and very little with proponents of open and honest fund-raising, but the then-owner of our old home enjoyed enormous trust and credibility, and so could've squelched the whole thing right then and there, with revelation of Doug's stupid ex-wife's admission, but didn't.

For those who weren't around, the main reason decent and civilized people questioned the scam was because the late red round one, in self-posted photographs of himself, appeared to be in the pink of health, ruddy and chubby and robust and all that. 

Anyone familiar with pancreatic cancer knows that deterioration is swift and precipitous, and this guy's photographs showed none of that.

And thus the constant questioning; is this real, or a fake?  Physical appearances made it seem the latter.

He did in fact decline the last couple of weeks, but that wasn't until nearly two months into the Scamdal.

Ah, memories.....of the inept "detective work" of Fat Che, of the "threats" of the bloated cross-eyed Iowa primitive, of the phlegmatic hate of the Polynesian queen the primitive woman bothered by cold weather, of the antics of Leona Helmsley of DUmmieland the "flyarm" primitive, of the inability of the sensitive lad to articulate any discussion of facts.....

Good times, good times.

[franksolich]

Can we ask what happened to the money Beth raised?

It never went through her.

There's significant disagreement even among those who know the real-life facts, about how much was actually raised.  franksolich's theory is that not much was really raised, and most of that came from decent and civilized people gulled by the scam, not from primitives.

The money was directed to the late red round one's Paypal account, which even before the scam showed a substantial "plus" balance, or via mail to his home.  Not a cent passed through the fingers of Doug's stupid ex-wife.

However.

However.

However.

This is only theory, and alas we'll never know for sure, but it looked to me as if the funds were intended for Doug's stupid ex-wife, who was at the time having considerable financial problems.

The late red round one was dying, and knew it.....and so didn't care much.  The late red round one was notorious for his pranks, his practical jokes.

And so one can easily see the "cause" being given to her, as a legacy or something, from him.

In theory, the money once collected was to go from the late red round one to Doug's stupid ex-wife, but alas the late red round one declined too fast, and so the money--a small amount, probably, in my own opinion--wasn't gotten out in time.

If things had been more regular, the funds would've ended up in the late red round one's estate, but probably the late red round one's "husband," termite, who had access to all of the late red round one's assets, cashed the checks and cleaned out the Paypal account before an attorney for the estate could find them.

This is only theory, and we'll never know for sure, given the cerebral decomposition of Doug's stupid ex-wife.

[franksolich]

wow, is that true about Beth - poor, destitute and in a precarious eviction situation?  She lives in a trailer now? Was she the one married to a comic too?  I remember her raking in the dough polluting DU with fundraiser threads, and I think she had some expensive real estate in a posh neighborhood.  Maybe I got her confused with someone else, and I wonder if she bilked Flyarm out of money.   I don't think she did anything other than sponge off her husband and fund raise if I remember correctly.   So darn long ago.   She was a fair to moderate looker as I remember too, but a little polluted in the head.  Just a little.  Haha.

Yeah, you've been out of the loop for a while.

She had to leave her apartment in San Francisco some months after divorcing Doug, and moved in with her mother in a trailer house somewhere in the desert of central California, where she presently resides.

The good-natured Leona Helmsley of DUmmieland, the "flyarm" primitive--now exiled into the Wilderness from Skins's island--had too much savvy to be taken in by the scam, although she did allow Doug's stupid ex-wife to "use" her.

How well one remembers: (a) that the late red round one and Leona were "bestest" of friends. but then (b) Leona was scheduled to go off on a shopping spree in Paris right in the middle of the scam, a point which Doug's stupid ex-wife repeatedly made; "we've got to hurry and raise this money before she has to take off." 

If one of one's "bestest" friends were dying, wouldn't it have been more natural to defer such a trip until later?

Leona, like the late red round one, was just "used," nothing more than that.

[franksolich]

I'm pretty sure that Ben Burch bought the domain.

Yeah, Fat Che did.

I was the owner of the domain for a couple of years, and then let it lapse because the issue was by then stale, and traffic, other than with ISP (internet service provider) numbers ending in ".gov" and ".edu", had declined to nearly nothing.  I just let it lapse, a decision I announced at our old home at the time.

Then some months later, Fat Che bragged on democraticwarrior about how I had "forgotten" to renew it, and crafty Fat Che had snapped it up.

Which of course was nonsense; I had let it lapse, and anyone who wanted the domain name was welcome to it.

With it being in Fat Che's dirty grubby fingers, I knew it would end up being pornographic.

Fat Che was something else, to put it mildly.  He had an obsession about collecting ISP numbers.  He probably used to cut them out with scissors, and paste them into an album, as if collecting postage stamps.

[franksolich]

Yeah, some of his moles were classic back in the day.

It was one of speed_addiction's moles that prompted the lala_rawraw primitive to advise all the other primitives that getting franksolich was what they had to do, as franksolich was "the brains of the outfit."

A perception of myself that left me speechless.

franksolich has always been a follower, never a leader.

It was obvious to everyone--excepting, of course, the primitives--that franksolich was nothing more than the rodeo clown, the "front" to keep the crowd entertained while others wrestle with dangerous beasts.

Others smarter than me did the real work; I was merely the distraction, and I hope, an amusing one.

[Ptarmigan]

The Scamdy Affair from what I remember dragged on to 2006. It was a mess. Talking about a scam and how the money was handled.

[franksolich]

The Scamdy Affair from what I remember dragged on to 2006. It was a mess. Talking about a scam and how the money was handled.

Its finale, really, was in autumn 2005, when someone at our old home, deep-searching the internet, found that "personals ad" by Fat Che, from the mid-1990s.

I wish to God I could remember who it was, who found that.

Everybody--from both the real world and democraticunderground--was at Scamdy that night, and upon seeing that, there was this collective "oh my, this has degenerated into a farce" feeling, after which the whole thing began to wither, kept alive only by fond memories of the event.

[delilahmused]

Its finale, really, was in autumn 2005, when someone at our old home, deep-searching the internet, found that "personals ad" by Fat Che, from the mid-1990s.

I wish to God I could remember who it was, who found that.

Everybody--from both the real world and democraticunderground--was at Scamdy that night, and upon seeing that, there was this collective "oh my, this has degenerated into a farce" feeling, after which the whole thing began to wither, kept alive only by fond memories of the event.

We had some great researchers, though! No matter how many times people pointed out the lies, the daily glaringly obvious lies the DUmmies refused to see the truth (well, Will Pitt did, but then buried his head again). In the end, karma worked...he was done in by a little dog named Ballot who scratched at his stitches and gave him an infection. All could've been avoided had his significant other decided to pay for life-saving surgery instead of a bathroom remodel. Such a tragedy.

Cindie

[diesel driver]

I remember reading about all this on FR and in PJ Comix DUmmie FUnnies.  Frank, PJ, and Charles had ALL the info on this whole thing, including how the DUmmies DIRECTLY blamed conservatives in general, and FR in particular, for exposing the illegal fundraising, the lies, etc. 

I guess Pitt's "scoop" on the sealed Karl Rove indictment is next. 

Damn, has it been 24 business hours already.   

[franksolich]

We had some great researchers, though! No matter how many times people pointed out the lies, the daily glaringly obvious lies the DUmmies refused to see the truth (well, Will Pitt did, but then buried his head again). In the end, karma worked....

Yeah, the famous last words of Fat Che, when sometime in late summer 2005, he announced to the primitives that he was "giving up" on trying to nail us; that everyone would have to wait for kharma to take care of things.

Which, quite obviously, kharma did.

The six years since, none of the prominent Andyite primitives has prospered--Doug's stupid ex-wife getting divorced and moving into a crowded trailer with her aged mother out in the desert, Fat Che losing his home to foreclosure, the sensitive lad in all sorts of trouble and now forced to work in a menial job.....

.....while all of those involved with Scamdy appear to have flourished, even in this lousy 0bameconomy.

I guess kharma does work.

In passing, I have to explain something else, which delilah might remember.

There is a reason she is "Doug's stupid ex-wife," although for a short while before then, "sfexpat2000" (now EFerrari) was "Doug's stupid wife," as she wasn't divorced yet.

You might recall a day in late May 2005, when Doug's stupid ex-wife was all paranoid and rattled that she was being "stalked" (no such thing ever happened), and whining about it all the time on Skins's island.  That particular day, she posted a news-story from an "alternative media" about an employee of the election commissioner in Seattle, who alleged she was being followed by men in uniforms, and her garage and garbage checked by men in uniform.

This individual allegedly had close ties with the late red round one, and Doug's stupid ex-wife said she was one her own dearest, closest, bestest, friends.

After that campfire had been burning for 30-45 minutes, one of our moles posted a news-story from a mainstream source about the same employee of the election commissioner in Seattle; that the individual (who was the same person in both stories) had been arrested that same day, for hiding or distorting ballot results.

As we hoped, a bona fide primitive, a real primitive, noticed the similarity in the name and circumstances, and asked Doug's stupid ex-wife, at the second campfire (the one posted by this side), about the matter.

To which Doug's stupid ex-wife blithely commented: "Who is she?  I never heard of her."

"Doug's stupid ex-wife" looks rather benign and bland in print, but believe me, when I write the word "stupid" in that phrase, I'm also uttering the word with incredulous loathing and contempt for such a pathological liar who said just whatever she felt like saying.  When saying it aloud, I can put real contempt into that word, "stupid."

[franksolich]

I remember reading about all this on FR and in PJ Comix DUmmie FUnnies.  Frank, PJ, and Charles had ALL the info on this whole thing, including how the DUmmies DIRECTLY blamed conservatives in general, and FR in particular, for exposing the illegal fundraising, the lies, etc.

For the record, and I'm putting myself under sworn oath when writing this, despite what the primitives think, P-J Comix and Charles had nothing, nothing at all, to do with the famous Scamdy.

Scamdy was a group of people--at its maximum 16, at its usual 12--drawn from P-J Comix's DUmmie FUnnies, our old home, and members of democraticunderground disgusted with the spectacle.  None of these people were P-J Comix or Charles.

[franksolich]

Since delilah self-disclosed, I guess I can feel free to comment that, in this rather contentious group of people that made up Scamdy, left and right, delilah was the "peace-maker" between the two sides (we had a lot of arguments).

delilah is one Hell of a diplomat, a gracious lady of class and elegance with a special talent for unembittering people.  Water and oil usually don't mix, but damn, delilah made them mix, all to our profit.

And of course franksolich remains very fond of, and grateful to, those from democraticunderground who helped, but alas who cannot be named.....

[franksolich]

We had some great researchers.....

A few times, the research was a little too good--or really, rather more that this cannon was a little too loose.

It was during the Scamdal that I invented the DUmmie ALERTS! that frequently interrupted P-J Comix's DUmmie FUnnies (I never did learn what P-J thought about it, if it was okay with him, or he resented it).

One of the researchers came across a photograph showing the sensitive lad, the piano-playing primitive, looking in adulation at then-Secretary of State for Ohio, Keith Blackwell.  The sensitive lad at the time worked for a music store, and was showing Keith a grand piano.

At least on Skins's island, the sensitive lad showed nothing but contempt for Keith Blackwell, but here was this photograph.....the Adoration of Keith Blackwell (R).

I immediately ran to the DUmmie FUnnies with this photograph.

Sometime later, the sensitive lad whined to freerepublic about the photograph, as it was supposed to be "private" or something, and the owner, Jim Robinson, yanked the whole DUmmie FUnnies thread, and it remains buried today.

On the basis of things historical, that was but a small loss--there were after all many other DUmmie FUnnies threads (still intact to this day), and this was just a small part of the collection, but damn, it had some really good stuff in it.....and was the biggest DUmmie FUnnies of them all, in terms of traffic and comments.

Sometimes this cannon gets a little loose.....

[diesel driver]

For the record, and I'm putting myself under sworn oath when writing this, despite what the primitives think, P-J Comix and Charles had nothing, nothing at all, to do with the famous Scamdy.

Scamdy was a group of people--at its maximum 16, at its usual 12--drawn from P-J Comix's DUmmie FUnnies, our old home, and members of democraticunderground disgusted with the spectacle.  None of these people were P-J Comix or Charles.

Remember this one:  Pitt got pinched, and pissed!
DUmmie FUnnies

[delilahmused]

All in all, I'm glad it's over...though it ended badly for some. I know DUmmies are self-delusional but it's still infuriating to see fellow human beings being so ****ing, glaringly, deliberately stupid.

Cindie

[Chris_]

Remember this one:  Pitt got pinched, and pissed!
DUmmie FUnnies

That was quite illuminating.  Thanks for posting that.