Prankster sites confuse surfers

Political campaigns and pranksters are spinning a Web of spoofs, attacks and downright dirty tricks that is as confusing as it is lively.

Last week, it was Vice President Dick Cheney’s accidentally pointing voters to a Web site critical of the Bush administration. This week, it’s a Maryland congressional candidate who is using his opponent’s name against him.

And many sites that would seem to point to presidential candidates President Bush and Sen. John Kerry actually are parodies that poke fun at both men.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen, Maryland Democrat, has an official campaign Web site bearing his name, but challenger Charles R. Floyd, a Republican, purchased several other variations of Mr. Van Hollen’s name to use them as attack sites.

The sites — vanhollen2004.org, vanhollen2004.net, vanhollen2004.com and chrisvandonothing.com — say Mr. Van Hollen is one of the most liberal members of Congress and one features a phony “pledge” to raise taxes. The sites all have disclaimers and include a link to the real Van Hollen site.

Mr. Floyd yesterday said he would remove the Web sites if Mr. Van Hollen agrees to a debate.

“We’re willing to take them down in the next two weeks if he is willing to step up to the challenge,” said Denise Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Floyd campaign.

The Van Hollen campaign dismisses Mr. Floyd and accuses him of “sleazy politics,” but has learned its lesson about cybersquatting.

“We have bought up a few new sites since this problem arose,” said Chuck Westover, spokesman for the Van Hollen campaign.

Mr. Westover would not say which sites had been purchased, but noted that they are variations of Mr. Van Hollen’s name for future races.

“This won’t have an outcome on the race, but it certainly is something I doubt will occur again in one of the congressman’s campaigns,” he said.

Mr. Floyd used the same tactic against his primary opponent, Robin Ficker.

Last week, during the vice-presidential debate, Mr. Cheney attempted to direct voters to factcheck.org, a nonpartisan site run by the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg Public Policy Center. But the vice president misspoke and sent people to factcheck.com, a for-profit advertising site based in the Cayman Islands.

Factcheck.com got so many visitors that the site began to crash, so its executives directed traffic to a site owned by billionaire Bush-administration critic George Soros.

John Berryhill, a Philadelphia lawyer for factcheck.com, said last week that the site was redirected “to relieve stress on the service and to express a political point of view.”

Mr. Soros was not advised of the switch and did not know it had taken place until after the fact, said a spokesman, Jeremy Ben-Ami.

Dozens of sites are built on variations of candidates’ names, posting instead fictional articles or parodies of the political process.

Bush2004.com, for example, boasts of being “run by guys sitting around in their underwear,” and contains satirical articles about the president. The site pledges to be a “major disinformation resource” this year and also solicits donations for site maintenance.

Kerry2004.org actually is part of the Web site travelwithmargo.com, a travel agent serving the Florida area. The Kerry2004.org address pulls up a screen with several links. One link is to 911hoax.com, a site that features links to stories claiming that the September 11 terrorist attacks were fabricated. Another link is to a message board with negative and positive statements about the candidate.

Gwbush.com takes a surfer to an anti-Bush site. Whitehouse.com is a pornography site; whitehouse.org is a parody site critical of both candidates. The correct site for the commander in chief is whitehouse.gov.

Johnkerryflipflopper.com sells John Kerry flip-flops for $14.99.

Virginia Gov. Mark Warner had such an experience when running in 2001. A Virginia Beach man spent $140 in February 2000 to buy markwarner2001.com and warner2001.com in anticipation of Mr. Warner’s run.

On the sites, the man dubbed Mr. Warner, a Democrat, “Virginia’s false prophet.”

Published reports said the man who owned the sites was planning to vote for Mr. Warner’s Republican challenger and had asked for as much as $20,000 for the Warner sites.

Next year’s gubernatorial candidates in Virginia have learned from the Warner situation — a host of official Web sites using variations of Democratic Lt. Gov. Timothy M. Kaine’s name are active, as are those of Attorney General Jerry W. Kilgore, a Republican.

The Argus of Fremont, Calif., reported last year that state Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, a Democrat, had lost his site to the Seattle-based Council on Political Accountability. Surfers hoping to find Mr. Levine’s site were redirected to overgrow.com, a site dedicated to the cultivation of marijuana.

n This article is based in part on wire-service reports.