By Frank Arduini
The Maricopa County Cold Case Posse
Sheriff Arpaio with CCCP investigator Mike Zullo
On March 1, 2012 Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s “Cold Case Posse” held the first of two disastrous press conferences to announce the status of their “investigation” into the legitimacy of the scanned image of the President’s birth certificate that had been released almost a year earlier and posted on the Whitehouse.gov website. It was the coming out party for lead investigator Mike Zullo, a retired used car salesman who had decades earlier had careers first a police officer and then a private investigator both of which quickly fizzled. Arpaio had provided Zullo the opportunity to “play cop” again years earlier. But by 2011 Zullo and the Posse had a half decade record of never actually investigating cold cases, relegated instead to transporting prisoners between the court and jail, or serving as bouncers for local bars.
The birth certificate “investigation” changed all that. Within Birthistan, Zullo quickly became a bit of a hero (even while many or most of his supporters insisted on referring to him as “Zulu” when calling into one of the several redundant birther Blogtalk programs). As the proverbial big fish in a tiny puddle, Zullo’s sense of self importance quickly clouded any serious introspection regarding his actual competence as an investigator. Almost out of the gate, Zullo found himself in charge of an “investigation” concerning technological and legal issues that he comprehensively could not understand.
As far as we can tell, it was April of 2012 when Zullo and Gallups first directly linked up. On the 29th of that month, Gallups interviewed Zullo for the first time on his “Freedom Friday” radio program during which the introduction implied they had spoken to each other for the first time only a few days prior. Over the course of the ensuing two years their relationship would grow increasingly symbiotic, with Gallups repeatedly claiming that he “talks to Mike on the phone nearly every day,” repeatedly asserting that he was privy to all of the developing “evidence” the posse was acquiring, and ultimately claiming to have even become “Mike’s Pastor.” On at least one occasion, the two traveled together to the Greater Washington DC area to promote the Posse’s work at CPAC. By March of 2014, Zullo had formalized Gallups’ status as official Posse mouthpiece by announcing that “when I release information about this it will be released to Carl Gallups and through PPSIMMONS.”
It was this relationship with Zullo and the Posse that elevated Gallups into the top tier of the birther aristocracy and took the governor off of his own capacity for self restraint. Faced with the fact that the Posse’s “investigation” had stretched from weeks to months to years, Gallups was compelled to simulate progress when there was actually none, lest the birther faithful grow bored and frustrated. Worse yet, on November 6, 2012 Obama was reelected to a second term in spite of the Posse’s two press conferences and subsequent hand waving across the birthersphere. So much hope had been pinned on the Posse’s finding s preventing exactly that actuality and it had proved incompetent to the task. By winter 2012, the wheels were coming off.
Gallups decided to act.
December 2012: The First “Huge Announcement.”
On December 1, 2012 PPSIMMONS posted a video, narrated by Gallups himself entitled, “Breaking: 2 Huge Announcements on BHO’s Eligibility.” The second of those “huge announcements” was the first of what would become Gallups serial failed promises of an impending break in the eligibility controversy. Gallups breathlessly announced that:
PPSIMMONS has exclusive inside information that a surprising and potentially devastating eligibility event is scheduled to happen before the January 6th Electoral College certification, perhaps by the middle of December. This event most likely will be aired on national cable television and around the world exposing Obama’s ineligibility. The person doing the exposing is a Very Important Person with Constitutional standing to do the exposing of the evidence against Obama. Stay tuned to the PPSIMMIONS channel for all the breaking news on this topic.
The announcement was met with jubilation across Birthistan. Having already lost the election, and with Obama having weathered a lengthy birther campaign of sometimes comical state ballot challenges, the Electoral College certification was seen as the last obvious opportunity for the Cold Case Posse to still make a difference. The added promise of exposure on “national cable television” was like catnip to the masses. Throw in the mysterious “Very Important Person with Constitutional standing” and the buzz was electric.
It worked so well that Gallups decided to do it again one week later. In another Gallups narrated PPSIMMON video titled, “Breaking! Sheriff Arpaio – FULL STEAM AHEAD with BHO Investigation – Surprises COMING!” Gallups announced that:
According to Lieutenant Mike Zullo, the evidence continues to mount and continues to be verified by some surprising and perhaps soon to be announced sources. As PPSIMMONS reported last week we have also received inside information from a confidential but highly knowledgeable source that within the next week or so there will be a huge push forward on the eligibility investigation, lining up before the January 6th date when Congress is supposed to certify the Electoral College votes. According to the US Constitution Congress has the authority and responsibility to verify the eligibility of the candidate that it is certifying by the Electoral College. This huge push forward is scheduled to involve a uniquely qualified VIP whose announcement may wind up on national and international television. Stay Tuned. PPSIMMONS will keep you up to date on all of this information and any other breaking news.
“Within the next week or so” was reasonably understood to mean by the middle of December. And so of course, as December began to draw to a close both the expectation and frustration level among the birther faithful began to rise dramatically. By the first week of January, birthers were wearing out the refresh button on their browsers, desperately waiting for the event that would stop the Electoral Vote certification in its tracks.
It never came.
To be continued …
[RC: This is the second in a series of guest articles by Frank Arduini. Here is Part I.]
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