Opinion: PBF's O'Malley was done wrong

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    PBF Energy Chairman Thomas O’Malley has ended up a victim of the hardball played during presidential elections.

    In a BLOG the Obama re-election effort took a swipe at O’Malley who gave money to Restore Our Future, a “Super PAC” organization raising money for the Romney re-election effort. Its bare bones website allows donors to give $100,000 via credit card.

    Super PACs have no limits on contributions and remain shadowy entities that stir up passions.

    Fox News and the Wall Street Journal ran with  news of the posting   and numerous bloggers followed calling the blog entry an “enemies list” like the one that surfaced in the Nixon administration.

    O’Malley was on ef a number individuals and companies mentioned in the blog that seemed to cobble together various media reports and postings.  He  was blamed for increasing gas prices and being responsible for pollution from their refineries in Delaware City and Paulsboro, N.J.

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    The effort from the campaign has been something of an embarrassment for Delaware, Gov. Jack Markell, a Democrat, who risked a lot of political capital and the ire of a few environmentalists in working on a state financial package that enabled PBF to reopen the Delaware City refinery.

    As O’Malley noted in a letter to the Wall Street Journal, PBF worked with the United Steel Workers to come up with an agreement to reopen the refinery, which has  reportedly become  profitable.  The site  had  piled up $1 million daily losses under former owner Valero just before its closing.

    There is  clearly room for criticizing Super PACs. Then again, the Obama campaign has one of its own, a necessity after the Citizens United Supreme Court ruling that upheld the use of Super PACs

    For its part, Restore Our Future has taken on a softer edge of late, taking down YouTube ads critical of former candidate Newt Gingrich, according to USA Today and funding the ad about Romney leading an effort to find the lost daughter of an employee,

    As for the blog, it remains on the website. Like the anti-Gringrich ad, it should be taken down.

     

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