After yesterday's entry about Karl Rove's lottery notification email, I asked myself, "Who could be the well known political figure involved in the next fraudulent email scheme?" My guess was Harry Reid.
And, sure enough, today I received the following email message, with the subject line "Request for Patriots Act on international fund transfer in your favor." It was from "Sen. Reid of Nevada, Senate Majority Leader."
The body of the email was this:
www.senate.govNaturally, before I agreed to this plan, I wanted to verify that this actually came from Senator Reid's office. I did have a suspicion about its bona fides, because I didn't think the Senate would use Nigeria as its base of operations. I figured it would be a call center in India.
www.congress.org
7TH MARCH, 2008
FROM: -
THE CHAIRMEN AND RANKING MEMBERS OF THE SENATE COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS,
THE SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS, THE HOUSE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS,
AND THE HOUSE COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS.
Approved and Witnessed by -
Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wisconsin
Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wisconsin
White House and House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Illinois,
Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wisconsin, Senate filibuster.
Senate Majority Leader Sen. Reid of Nevada.
ATTN:
Subject Matter - Request for Patriots Act on international fund transfer in your favor
After very long meetings held by the above mentioned officials and the Minister of state for finance including the Board of Directors of the World Bank, the United Nations and the International Monetary Fund, to see to the release of long term debt owed to many foreigners around the globe who have been denied of their funds, the United States Senate has been authorized to handle the urgent release of all funds owed by any of the financial institutions or Government that is a member of the United Nations, this is based on the loans and disbursement agreement signed between the US Government and Governments of these debtor nations, the release of your fund will be supervised by the World Bank representatives in Nigeria to ensure immediate payment in your favor and avoid delay.
From the records of outstanding claims due for payment submitted by the United Nations, your name is next on the list of the outstanding bills to be settled, I wish to inform you that your payment is being processed and will be released to you as soon as you respond to this letter.
Kindly re-confirm the following information to SENATOR JEREMY WILLIAMS the US SENATE REPRESENTATIVE AND HEAD OF THE PAYMENT CENTER IN NIGERIA for final verification of your details so that the funds will be transferred in your favour, please contact SENATOR JEREMY WILLIAMS via email: senate_usgov@keromail.com
1) Your full name
2) Phone number (mobile should be included).
3) The claim amount
4) Your complete Banking details to avoid mistakes
As soon as the above information is received, your payment will be made to you without further delay. Note that the senate officials in NIGERIA have been authorised to handle this payment to keep a clean slate of foriegn debt settlement because some Government officials and individuals have tried to transfer this fund to you but failed due to dishonesty and unneccesary demandfor fees,
You are hereby advised to stop any further communications with any one else or any other financial institution and comply to this to avoid any further delay.
Please note that the United Nations and Government of the debtor country will not be interested in any complaint from you if you fail to receive your fund via this programme or fail to abide by this instruction.
Your urgent attention is expected
Sen. Reid of Nevada
Senate Majority Leader
So I decided to write to Senator Reid in response. His website says he has no real email address and can only respond to requests from Nevadans, from people with ties to the state, or from people who make large campaign contributions in small, unmarked bills.
I gather that's all a brick wall set up so he doesn't have to answer questions from people who question his sanity, but I wasn't sure how to get around it, so I figured I'd post my response here. I know he and his staff are regular readers of Pillage Idiot.
Dear Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid,Maybe one of my other readers can forward this to Sen. Reid, because I suspect we can do a deal.
In response to your email to me earlier today (below) where you offer an international funds transfer under the Patriot Act, I'm uncomfortable with this whole scheme. I realize you have a lot of experience as the leader of the WORLD'S GREATEST DELIBERATIVE BODY, and I see that your plan is approved and witnessed by several leaders of both parties, but maybe you can explain to me why I should do what you tell me to do.
1. First thing is I don't trust things when the Democrats and Republicans work together. If no party is attacking the other, they've probably both lost their senses.
2. I think "Jeremy Williams" isn't a real senator. I think you meant Jerome Williams, who pitched for Washington last year, and the team isn't called the Senators any more. It's the Nationals. Besides which, I'm sure you know what a lousy job Williams did on the mound for the Nats. Based on that, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't entrust my fortune to him.
3. Your idea of running this operation out of Nigeria raises some red flags. What would the Washington Post say? Don't you know that both Sen. Obama and Sen. Clinton are attacking free trade agreements with other countries? Using Nigeria as a base for this could really hurt their position in the November election. Also, did you realize that a lot of Nigeria is Muslim, so how do we know that the funds won't be diverted to support our terrorist enemies? Do you realize how embarrassing that could be for you and the Senate, not to mention for all Americans?
4. You asked me to send you my "complete Banking details to avoid mistakes." I'm wondering what kind of mistakes you intend to make? If you might make mistakes, should I really go along with you on this scheme? Or maybe are you saying that I'm the one who will make a mistake? What I want to ask you, though, is I'm not an expert at computers, but pretty much every one I've heard from says don't give out your personal information to somebody you don't know. So if I'm going to do this thing you want me to do, can we meet in person? I'm free for lunch Wednesday and Thursday next week. I can meet you in the Senate lunch room. I ate there a long time ago, and it was a blast. (That's just a saying. No reason to get jumpy about it.) Can you take me there? I promise I won't eat much. And then I can give you my banking information in person so there won't be any mistakes.
Please let me know by reply. If this will work, I'll give you my unlisted phone number.
Best regards,
Attila P.
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