There's a very compelling candidate running for the open seat in NY-26. You may have heard of him; Jon Powers is widely seen, certainly among the netroots, as the type of candidate that we want to send to Washington. Some highlights of Jon's bio include his military service in Iraq, his career as a teacher, and his founding of a charity to bring relief to Iraqi orphans of the war our country started there.

Here's a screenshot of his web site.

And here's a screenshot of a spoof web site put up by one of his opponents in the Democratic primary, one Jack Davis.

That latter site is presently being advertised on Daily Kos. It's the kind of thing put up by people who want to steal your credit card information.

I've previously pointed out what a scumbag Mr. Davis is. This episode confirms the diagnosis. His spoof web site, just for starters, infringes copyright. The last time we've seen anything this egregious and this illegal was when we caught Roger Stone and cohorts spoofing the web site of a San Francisco direct mail firm to cover their tracks during their attempts to discredit Eliot Spitzer.

The similarity of the Davis site to phishing sites - sites set up by criminals to look like the web sites of banks, credit card companies, and the like, inviting you to verify financial information, which is then harvested and criminally exploited - is perhaps more than an awkward coincidence. This kind of stuff potentially gets prosecuted, as it should be.

However, even if this falls short of that level, the residents of the 26th District may want to consider whether they want a Congressman who steals (and lies, from what I've seen of the content). Because this site is theft, pure and simple.