Who is Jason Shih andWhy is His Mug Shot Important?

This is Jason Shih. Jason was arrested last Friday for a plethora of charges, the largest for possession of Ecstasy with intent to distribute. He was also in possession of several tickets to a President Obama event in New Jersey which, his plummeting approval ratings notwithstanding, aren't as plentiful as leaves on the trees.

When he was arrested, Shih claimed to be the the assistant deputy director of Democratic Governor Jon Corzine’s re-election campaign. The Corzine campaign disavowed all knowledge of Shih's existence. However, as Moe Lane put it,

The Corzine campaign wants it made CLEAR that Jason Shih is in no way, shape, or form involved with the releection campaign; that Mr. Shih is certainly not an assistant campaign director or staffer for the campaign; that they have no idea who Mr. Shih would even be, let alone why he would claim such a status; or why he would claim that the car that he was driving at the time of his drug bust was rented by the campaign, or why there were tickets to an Obama rally and other campaign paraphernalia mixed in with the drug paraphernalia.

*ahem*

The mug shot comes from a story at The Leader, the local newspaper in that area. Eric Dondero, whose Libertarian Republican blog has been all over this story with both feet, got permission from the editor for any blogger to run with the shot so long as they gave the paper proper credit. Which I am right now. His blog is the first to run the photo of the alleged Corzine staffer, so do read his entire post.

Since the MSM isn't spending much time covering the story in any detail, I'd like to toss out a couple questions for those erstwhile blogger journalists who might be interested in conducting a little investigation.

1) Shih claims the car was rented by the Corzine campaign. Was it? If so, who authorized Shih to have the vehicle that night and what was he doing with it?
2) Lt. Cece, the backup officer on the scene, noted that Shih had several paychecks from he Middlesex County Democratic Committee, once of which was for him. What position did he hold in the MCDC and what vetting process was used before he was hired?

Thus far, neither the Corzine campaign nor the MCDC have been available to answer those questions. I would think that a determined blogger could spend a day working on getting those answers, don't you? They would prove enlightening.

Guest-posted by Jimmie Bise of The Sundries Shack.