Andy Martin and the mad madrassa story

Political gadfly Andy Martin, once known as Anthony Martin-Trigona, may have a tie to that notorious chain e-mail, FW: Let us remain ALERT, which made the allegation, since proven to be false, that Sen. Barack Obama, attended a madrassa run by Wahhabi radicals in Indonesia.

From The Nation:

Despite the fact that CNN and others have thoroughly debunked the smear, the original false accusation has clearly sunk into people's consciousness. One Obama organizer told me recently that every day, while calling prospective voters, he gets at least one or two people who tell him they won't be voting for Obama because he's a Muslim. According to Google, "Barack Obama Muslim" is the third most-searched term for the Illinois senator. And an August CBS poll found that when voters were asked to give Obama's religion, as many said Muslim as correctly answered Protestant.

Oh yeah. And the e-mail continues to circulate.

"Everybody started calling me" when the e-mail first made the rounds, Andy Martin told me. "They said, 'Hey, did you write this?' My answer was 'they are all my children.' "

Martin, a perennial political candidate, is one of the declared Republican candidates hoping to oppose Dick Durbin next year.

Technorati tags: Obama politics Barack Obama Democrats election 2008 Illinois