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Chris Good

Chris Good - Chris Good is a political reporter for ABC News. He was previously an associate editor at The Atlantic and a reporter for The Hill.

Van Jones: Campaign Fodder

By Chris Good
Sep 4 2009, 1:24 PM ET Comment

Van Jones, President Obama's green jobs czar, is having a tough week, politically.  First, he had to apologize for calling Republicans "assholes" in February, before joining the administration, after a video of the comment surfaced and conservatives cried foul. Then it was discovered that he signed onto a 9/11 truth pledge in 2004, calling for investigations into whether people in the Bush administration "may indeed have deliberately allowed 9/11 to happen, perhaps as a pretext for war." In a statement last night, Jones said the petition "does not reflect my views now or ever." This morning, ABC's Jake Tapper reported that Jones was on the "organizing committee" of a 2002 march in San Francisco demanding a congressional inquiry into 9/11.

But maybe the worst thing, for him, is that he's now become campaign fodder: Republican 2010 gubernatorial candidate Steve Poizner has cut a web video blasting rival candidate (and former eBay CEO) Meg Whitman for some glowing words about Jones--namely, that she was a "big fan" of some of his climate change and community-enfranchising efforts.
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