Redstate

Posted at 9:12am on Jul. 11, 2008 Blue-on-Blue Watch: NYT versus Charlie Rangel.

Although there's a subtext, here. There usually is, with these things.

By Moe Lane

Let's say that you're a news/media organization, and you have yourself a problem. There's this guy running for President. You loved that the guy was running for President. You got totally into fact that the guy was running, to the point where you pretty much gushed and cooed and did all sorts of really, really embarrassing things on your front page in support of the guy. You did everything that you could to get the guy the Democratic nomination, and lo! - he did.

And then the guy abandoned public financing for the election.

You loved public financing. It was like a starving puppy that you found in a storm drain during a blizzard, all whimpering and scared and alone. You took public financing home and kept it alive, cleaning its sores and giving it its worm medicine, making sure that it had all its shots and got housebroken. And the guy? When he came over, he made you think that he loved public financing just as much as you did... up until the moment where he took a rock and did his level best to bash its brains in. And when you came home to discover what he had done, he shrugged at you. He actually shrugged.

So what do you do?

Well, if you're the Washington Post, you tell your editors to take off the filter that gives the guy his halo. If you're the LA Times, you let your house blogger know that it's no longer Be Kind To The Guy Millenium. If you're ABC News, hey, Jake Tapper suddenly sees himself on TV more often. But if you're the New York Times, maybe you don't have those options. Direct action is going to get squashed before it starts. The people who control your paper don't care about public financing, really. They're still entranced by the guy. So, you can't go after him directly.

But that's actually OK: he has friends.

Read on.

Posted in 2008 | Charlie Rangel | Culture of Corruption | Obamafiles — Comments (10)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 4:03pm on Jun. 24, 2008 How dare John Cornyn demand ethics and disclosure from sitting Senators?

By Jeff Emanuel

Texas Senate Ethics Committee ranking member John Cornyn (R-TX) will introduce an amendment to the controversial mortgage/lender bailout bill that would require Senators to list their residential mortgages as liabilities on their financial disclosure forms.

The amendment, which would take effect next year, would require Senators "to disclose the date the mortgage was acquired, the rough amount, the interest rate, the term and the name and address of the creditor."

According to Roll Call, the proposed amendment, which has reportedly garnered support from at least five other Ethics Committee members, "appears designed to address the fallout from the revelation that Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Chairman Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), the housing bill’s sponsor, and Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) received favorable mortgages from Countrywide Financial."

As reported here before, Dodd, the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, had suspicious dealings with Countrywide Financial, the mortgage lender Sen. Barack Obama -- for whom Dodd has been a pledged Superdelegate since February -- has been railing against on the campaign trail even while appointing another beneficiary of the organization to help vet his potential Vice Presidential candidates.

Despite his shady dealings and preferential treatment from the lender (or perhaps because of it), Dodd's name is on the landmark mortgage-bailout legislation now pending in the Senate, which will bail out Countrywide, among others, using an obscene amount of taxpayer dollars.

Posted in Chris Dodd | Congress | Countrywide Financial | Culture of Corruption | Ethics | Ethics Reform | John Cornyn — Comments (12)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 12:27pm on Jun. 24, 2008 Eric Holder: "Not ethically qualified", and Obama once thought something was wrong

By Soren Dayton

The National Legal and Policy Center has called for Eric Holder to be fired by the Obama campaign. Holder is the co-chair of Obama's campaign and the co-chair of his VP selection committee. According to NLPC:

According to NLPC President Peter Flaherty, Holder is not ethically qualified to serve on the Vice-Presidential selection committee. His track record is not one of independence or objectivity. Instead, he has been guided by politics and self-interest.

That Holder is ethically unfit is not news to Redstate readers. I have written on Holder before. Read on for a recap of old stories, and some shocking new ones.

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Corrupt Democrat Watch | Culture of Corruption | Eric Holder — Comments (1) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 6:19pm on Jun. 19, 2008 Did Rezko's Iraq investments drive Obama's Iraq policy?

By Soren Dayton

Michael Barone notes an NRO piece about Barack Obama's shifting position on Iraq:

It has been documented in National Review Online by Peter Wehner that Barack Obama, far from always taking the same position on the war in Iraq, has in fact taken different positions at different times—don't go in, stay in, get out, roughly in order.

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Culture of Corruption | Iraq | Tony Rezko — Comments (1) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 9:06am on Jun. 19, 2008 Don Young ($-AK) Provides More Reasons to Beat Don Young

By Erick

We have more information this morning that should give you incentive to contribute to Sean Parnell (R-AK) in his bid to unseat Don Young ($-AK).

Have you heard about the A-Team? That's Don Young's list of lobbyists who, in any and all cases, should be put through to him should they call Young's office.

A number of news outlets are reporting on this and other interesting items from a checklist for interns from Young's office. Young's spokeswoman says the list was not the office's official list, but rather a list put together by interns for interns. Anyone who has ever been an intern knows that the intern generated list is by far the most accurate reflection of what goes on in the office.

Andy Roth references one section of this check list:

Read on . . .

Posted in A-Team | Culture of Corruption | Don Young | High Maintenance Congressional Wives | Sean Parnell | Targets — Comments (2)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 1:47am on Jun. 14, 2008 Culture Of Corruption

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

I expect that there will be a lot of attention on this story. At the very least, there should be a lot of attention paid to this story:

Two U.S. senators, two former Cabinet members, and a former ambassador to the United Nations received loans from Countrywide Financial through a little-known program that waived points, lender fees, and company borrowing rules for prominent people.

Senators Christopher Dodd, Democrat from Connecticut and chairman of the Banking Committee, and Kent Conrad, Democrat from North Dakota, chairman of the Budget Committee and a member of the Finance Committee, refinanced properties through Countrywide's "V.I.P." program in 2003 and 2004, according to company documents and emails and a former employee familiar with the loans.

Other participants in the V.I.P. program included former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Alphonso Jackson, former Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna Shalala, and former U.N. ambassador and assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke. Jackson was deputy H.U.D. secretary in the Bush administration when he received the loans in 2003. Shalala, who received two loans in 2002, had by then left the Clinton administration for her current position as president of the University of Miami. She is scheduled to receive a Presidential Medal of Freedom on June 19.

Holbrooke, whose stint as U.N. ambassador ended in 2001, was also working in the private sector when he and his family received V.I.P. loans. He was an adviser to Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign.

James Johnson, who had been advising presidential candidate Barack Obama on the selection of a running mate, resigned from the Obama campaign Wednesday after the Wall Street Journal reported that he received Countrywide loans at below-market rates.

Most of the officials belonged to a group of V.I.P. loan recipients known in company documents and emails as "F.O.A.'s"--Friends of Angelo, a reference to Countrywide chief executive Angelo Mozilo. While the V.I.P. program also serviced friends and contacts of other Countrywide executives, the F.O.A.'s made up the biggest subset.

According to company documents and emails, the V.I.P.'s received better deals than those available to ordinary borrowers. Home-loan customers can reduce their interest rates by paying "points"--one point equals 1 percent of the loan's value. For V.I.P.'s, Countrywide often waived at least half a point and eliminated fees amounting to hundreds of dollars for underwriting, processing and document preparation. If interest rates fell while a V.I.P. loan was pending, Countrywide provided a free "float-down" to the lower rate, eschewing its usual charge of half a point. Some V.I.P.'s who bought or refinanced investment properties were often given the lower interest rate associated with primary residences.

I can't believe that given the position of Senator Dodd as the Chairman of the Banking Committee and Senator Conrad as Chairman of the Budget Committee and member of the Finance Committee, that the granting of these loans to these Senators was an accident. And note the name of Richard Holbrooke on the list of "Friends of Angelo" as well. If he becomes Secretary of State in an Obama Administration, some questions need to be asked, nyet? Relatedly, Matt Stoller doesn't get the point of this story. Comme d'habitude, one might add.

Posted in Culture of Corruption | Friends of Angelo | Miscellanea — Comments (1)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 12:13am on Jun. 5, 2008 Not to pile onto William Jefferson (D, LA-2) (Super-delegate*)...

...Oh, by the way? In his *FREEZER.*

By Moe Lane

...Constant Reader Vladimir is covering the latest controversy between Jefferson and the government. But guess what? Yup, the net's been cast wider (via Instapundit):

Indicted: 4th District Assessor Betty Jefferson
by Gordon Russell and David Hammer, The Times-Picayune

U.S. Attorney Jim Letten announced this afternoon that 4th District Assessor Betty Jefferson, an elder sister of U.S. Rep. William Jefferson, has been indicted on a host of fraud-related charges by a federal grand jury. Also indicted were Jefferson's daughter, Angela Coleman, and her brother, the previously indicted Mose Jefferson.

The charges are the culmination of a probe into charities run by members of the Jefferson family and their allies. In a rare move, the FBI announced it was investigating the nonprofits after a 2006 Times-Picayune story revealed apparent self-dealing at them.

And yes, before you ask: I know that the Democratic Party doesn't actually give a tinker's dam about civic corruption unless they can hang it around a Republican's neck. Jefferson's continuing place in the House Caucus is proof enough of that. But it does make me feel better, at least, to note this sort of thing.

Moe Lane

*Senator Obama, of course: Senator Clinton has more sense. She certainly has more than the DNC, given that they're letting him have a vote in their Presidential selection process.

Posted in Culture of Corruption | Democrats | New Orleans | William Jefferson — Comments (12)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 5:52pm on May 15, 2008 Don Young Votes for Tax Increase

By Erick

John Boehner, Roy Blunt, and the House GOP leadership, having failed to deal decisively and boldly to purge the cancer that is Don Young from the House GOP Caucus, got to witness him vote to raise taxes today. He joined 31 other Republicans who have no real leaders to show them the way.

The tax increase is a .5% increase on individuals who make more than $500,000.00 a year. The Democrats, naturally, called it a "Patriot Tax." They should have called it what it is: the "Rape the Entrepreneurial Class Tax Law" or RECTAL.

You know, I think we, all of us here at RedState, should commit to a project: every work day from now until he is crushed in the primary, write some bad about Don Young. Highlight his arrogance, highlight his scandals, highlight his votes, highlight his corruption, highlight his general jackassery -- highlight all the stuff to make sure when people are Googling him, they find out everyone hates Don Young except Don Young and a bunch of people in the federal pen.

By the way, the Club for Growth PAC put out a press release on this. Yes, they *do* get involved in primaries, Don Young.

Posted in 2008 | Culture of Corruption | Democrats | Don Young | tax increase — Comments (56)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 1:53pm on Apr. 27, 2008 Obama Got $8,000 Per Month in Return for Political Favors

By patriotroom

Promoted from the diaries by Neil. So it turns out he's wussy and corrupted enough to be taking payoffs directly and via his wife.

Here is today's daily teeth-gnashing article for the Democrats. Looks like Obama had a buddy who paid him really well when he needed it back in 2001. State Senator Obama made sure his buddy got paid back, and then some, with taxpayer money. From the L.A. Times.

Read on...

Posted in Culture of Corruption | Liberals | Obamafiles — Comments (14) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:42am on Apr. 14, 2008 Barack Obama: Do as he says, not as he does.

By Erick

Here is what Obama is going to say today.

But if those same candidates are taking millions of dollars in contributions from the PACs and lobbyists, ask yourself, who are they going to be toasting once the election is over?

I’m the only candidate who doesn’t take money from corporate PACs and lobbyists, and I’m here to tell you that you can count on me to stand up for you after this election, just as I’ve been standing up for workers all my life. That’s why I’m running for President of the United States.

Of course, here is what Obama actually does.

Last fall, Barack Obama quietly slipped into the Miami headquarters of a major law firm scarred by the scandals of Jack Abramoff, its once-powerful Washington lobbyist who now sits in jail.

Arriving a little after 10 a.m. on Oct. 1, Obama spent the next three hours schmoozing, speaking in a video conference to branch offices and raising money at Greenberg Traurig, a billion-dollar firm with one of the biggest lobby shops here.

Obama has now raised about $125,000 from Greenberg Traurig employees -- nearly half of it at the time of the event -- more than from any of the other top law and lobby firms.

Symbolically, it was a starkly contradictory event: an appearance by the candidate who crusades most adamantly against lobbyists at the onetime firm of the poster child for out-of-control influence peddling.

Why is it liberals always want us to do as they say, not as they do? Of course he's not a hypocrite. Don't accuse him of being a hypocrite. He's a Democrat. Democrats can't be hypocrites. You actually have to stand for something to be a hypocrite.

Oh wait, does he stand for . . . . Nah. Never mind.

Posted in 2008 | Change | Culture of Corruption | Hope | Lies And The Lying Liars Who Tell Them | lobbyists | Obama — Comments (3)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 3:32pm on Apr. 1, 2008 Rep. McDermott Bravely Loses Millions for Free Speech

That's what he keeps telling himself anyways . . .

By Kevin Holtsberry

Good thing Jim McDermott got Saddam to pay for his trip to Iraq, because it turns out he owes House Minority Leader John Boehner a lot of money:

A federal judge says House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, can collect more than $1 million in his lawsuit against Democratic Rep. Jim McDermott of Washington state.

The decision was issued in a decade-long dispute over an illegally taped telephone call. In the 1996 call, Republican leaders discussed an ethics case against then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga. A Florida couple recorded the cell phone call on a radio scanner and McDermott leaked the tape to two newspapers.

Boehner sued and a federal court found that McDermott had no right to release the calls. The Supreme Court decided in December not to revisit the case.

McDermott claims that his losing and owing over a million dollars is a good thing:

McDermott called the court fight with Boehner “a long and costly battle,” but said the million-dollar judgment was “a small price to pay in defense of so fundamental a principle, and freedom, as the First Amendment.”

Because of the protracted legal challenge, “the First Amendment is stronger today, and shielded by new case law that will buttress its capacity to protect the publication of truthful information on matters of public importance long into the future,” McDermott said in a statement Tuesday. “ Knowing this, I am proud of my role in defense of the First Amendment.”

Rep. McDermott, however, didn't have much luck rallying free speech defenders to his righteous cause:

McDermott has created a legal defense trust fund to cover expenses related to the lawsuit. A report filed with the House clerk shows the trust fund took in about $56,000 in the final three months of last year, for a full-year total of just over $100,000.

Dan McLaughlin summed this case up well a few years ago:

So, if you are keeping score at home, that would be one House Democrat to zero current Congressional or White House Republicans who have been found by a court of law to have participated in illegal domestic surveillance of political opponents.

Remember this next time the Democrats begin spouting off about the rule of law and the culture of corruption, etc.

Posted in Congress | Culture of Corruption | John Boehner — Comments (5)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 11:50am on Mar. 27, 2008 Governor Aníbal Acevedo Vilá, Puerto Rico Democrat, Indicted

Another bad day for the Community-Based Reality

By Neil Stevens

Puerto Rico Governor Aníbal Acevedo Vilá, a Democratic Party superdelegate and endorser of Senator Barack Obama, was indicted today as part of a wide-ranging conspiracy to systematically violate federal campaign finance law and obstruct FBI investigations into his now apparently illegal campaign for Congress (as a non-voting member) in 2000.

So it's official: Let's add another Democrat to Þe Olde Culture of Corruption List.

Read on...

Posted in Aníbal Acevedo Vilá | Barack Obama | Culture of Corruption | Democrats | Puerto Rico — Comments (18)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 9:01am on Mar. 24, 2008 Meet Congressman Jerry Hurckes: He's unelected, not sworn in, and only supposed to be a chief of staff to a real congressman

By Erick

At some point the Democrats begin to own the culture of corruption they once campaigned against and have now embraced. If that point is when their staff begins to embrace the culture of corruption too, then the moment has arrived.

John Stanton, writing this morning in Roll Call ($) provides some news that one would have thought impossible had they been naive enough to believe the Democrats in 2006.

A top aide to Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.) has used his employment with the House to help win local races, repeatedly claiming in campaign literature and public meetings that he is responsible for securing millions in federal earmarks for the village of Oak Lawn, while also racking up thousands in campaign contributions from companies with business before Lipinski’s Congressional committees.

Jerry Hurckes, who worked for Congressman Lipinski's father before the current Lipinski inherited the seat (it all sounds like the House of Lords), has been on the Oak Lawn Board of Trustees in the village of Oak Lawn, IL, since 1999.

Just how arrogant has this staffer gotten?

His positions as a Lipinski staffer sparked a brouhaha in Oak Lawn following a March 11 board meeting during which he castigated the village manager and other board members for meeting with a Washington, D.C.-based Congressional lobbyist, accusing them of attempting to do an end run around [him] and not deal with Jerry Hurckes.

Mr. Hurckes has been campaigning like a Democratic Congressman, vowing to use his position to bring home the bacon. Of course, it is dubious if such actions are legitimate given House Ethics Committee Rules barring staffers from using their positions to make promises for any sort of elected office.

And does the Congressman know his staffer has taken credit for the Congressman's accomplishments? Maybe we should all call Congressman Lipinski at (202) 225-5701 and ask when his chief of staff became Congressman Hurckes.

Posted in Congress | Culture of Corruption | Dan Lipinski | Jerry Hurckes — Comments (4)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 6:37pm on Mar. 13, 2008 Barack Obama: Crook.

I think we've moved past "the appearance of impropriety."

By Leon H Wolf

It appears that Barack Obama, allegedly decent guy and agent of "change" in Washington, requested an earmark in 2006 for $1 million taxpayer dollars for the hospital where his wife works. Said hospital, by the way, gave Michelle Obama a huge raise (nearly $200,000, more than doubling her salary) in 2005 after Barack got elected to the United States Senate. Now, I know that there are lots of ways to talk about transactions like this involving public officials - quid pro quo, etc., but I prefer to call a crook a crook and just say that we're dealing with good, old fashioned, public corruption here.

I am having an especially hard time distinguishing Obama's actions here from those of, say, Duke Cunningham, who is currently in prison. I suppose you might say that Obama injected some more efficiency into the process by eliminating the middle man, but while I'm a big fan of efficient markets, generally speaking, I happen to think that there should not be any sort of market at all for the votes of public officials.

Perhaps these silly notions of ethical propriety are what Obama intends to "change" if he is elected President. If that's the case, I'll take the status quo, thanks. Without the quid.

Posted in 2008 | Culture of Corruption | Obamafiles | official corruption | Quid pro quo — Comments (67)/ Email this page » / Read More »