Patches must be scared. This ran yesterday in the Providence Urinal Bulletin...the local liberal rag........

As a former Navy SEAL, Republican congressional candidate David Rogers knows about sabotage, and he suspects it has hit his campaign to unseat Rep. Patrick Kennedy, D-R.I.

Rogers said today he discovered earlier this week that all 16 lug nuts on his wife's car had been loosened to the point where they could be turned by hand, United Press International reported.

That followed recent "incidents" involving vehicles belonging to his political director and his campaign manager.

Rogers told UPI the vandalism was "extremely dangerous" and could have resulted in an accident.

"It was my wife's car, and she had just driven my kids to school on the same day" the loose lug nuts were discovered, said Rogers, the father of two boys, ages 8 and 6.

He said he did not believe that the three "incidents" were coincidental, but were part of a pattern "too much to ignore."

"Two events would be very difficult for me to believe were intentional," Rogers said. "But three separate people, on three vehicles, on three occasions, in three cities?"

Rogers said his political director, Christian Winthrop, advised him to check his Geo Metro earlier this week after Winthrop discovered three of the five lug nuts on his mother's vehicle were missing, and two were loose.

Winthrop was using his mother's car because his had been taken to a garage after its engine seized up because of a lack of oil, a mechanical problem now also viewed with suspicion.

Computer Stolen

Rogers said that on Thursday night, someone smashed the window of the car belonging to campaign manager Ben Jackson and stole a laptop computer that contained campaign information.

Rogers said, however, he was "not drawing any conclusions" as to who might be guilty of the crimes.

He said police in Pawtucket, Providence and Newport were investigating, but "it's very difficult to do any sort of investigation on something like this. There's really not a whole lot they can do in a case like this."

He said he was at first reluctant to disclose any of this to the media, but "because we were talking about the lives of my wife and kids here," he decided publicity was a good thing.

"It can actually serve as a very effective deterrent, at least that is my hope," Rogers said.

"Nobody really knows exactly what to make" of the apparent vandalism, said Brown University political science professor Darrell M. West, "although whoever did this targeted Rogers, his campaign manager and his political director, so it does seem to be an odd coincidence."

Larry Berman, a spokesman for the four-term Kennedy, son of Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., said "No comment" when asked about the incidents. He noted that the congressman held a solid lead and counted on re-election in November in the heavily Democrat state.

It appears this political season will be even dirtier than usual. As NewsMax reported Tuesday, the campaign of Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, apologized for releasing the transcript of a private meeting for GOP challenger Rep. Greg Ganske