Cops: Sweeney way over limit
Police say former congressman had blood-alcohol level more than twice the legal threshold when pulled over.
By SCOTT WALDMAN, Staff writer
November 12, 2007

CLIFTON PARK -- Former U.S. Rep. John Sweeney's blood-alcohol content was more than twice the legal limit, State Police said, when troopers charged him with drunken driving after he swerved on the Northway early Sunday.

Sweeney was heading northbound in his 2004 BMW sedan when at 1:19 a.m. he abruptly swerved out of the center lane just south of Exit 9, police said.

Lt. Scott Coburn said officers noticed a smell of alcohol on Sweeney's breath. Sweeney allegedly failed a standard field sobriety test. A subsequent test showed his blood-alcohol content was 0.18 percent -- more than twice the state's legal limit of 0.08 percent, police said.

The 52-year-old Republican faces misdemeanor charges of driving while intoxicated and aggravated DWI. The second charge -- tied to the allegation the one-time STOP-DWI coordinator for Rensselaer County was twice the legal limit -- carries a maximum penalty of a year in jail.

"I regret the occurrence," Sweeney said in a statement given to the New York Daily News. "I deeply apologize to my family and friends. I take full responsibility and I am hoping to work for a fair resolution."

Conviction for aggravated DWI can require a driver to have an ignition interlock on a vehicle. The convicted driver would be required to blow into an alcohol sensor that would prevent the car from starting if the driver is intoxicated.

The arrest, first reported at 2:03 p.m. Sunday on timesunion.com, was the latest embarrassment for a one-time congressional rising star -- President Bush dubbed him "Congressman Kick-arse" for his aggressive style -- whose re-election campaign was derailed last year by allegations of domestic violence. A police report published by the Times Union six days before the election described Sweeney and his then-wife, Gayle, as intoxicated.

During the campaign, Sweeney denied he was intoxicated at a Union College fraternity party after photographs surfaced of him at the event.

Sweeney's attorney, E. Stewart Jones, said his client does not have a drinking problem and said Sweeney, who was defeated by Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand last year, would try to resolve the matter as quickly as possible.

"He is a private citizen," Jones said. "This is a private matter."

Sweeney is scheduled to appear Wednesday night in Clifton Park Town Court. Jones said Sweeney would follow whatever demands the court put on him.

A person with knowledge of the incident said there was a 23-year-old woman in Sweeney's car, though police refused to say who he was traveling with.

Before being elected to Congress in 1998, Sweeney held top positions in Gov. George Pataki's administration and in the state GOP. He is widely credited with helping Rudolph Giuliani win the 1993 New York City mayoral race and Pataki win the governor's race the following year.

But his final congressional campaign was pocked by controversies that allowed Gillibrand to overcome an 80,000 Republican enrollment advantage in the 20th Congressional District and win the seat.

When the domestic violence allegation surfaced just before the election, the Sweeneys rebutted reports in the Times Union and New York Daily News by claiming the police documents had been fabricated. But as the couple headed to divorce court in July, both Sweeney and his wife traded allegations of physical abuse.

Sweeney claimed he lied about a December 2005 police call at his home to protect his wife because, he said, she was intoxicated and had assaulted him.

Earlier this year, Gayle Sweeney told the Times Union that her earlier denial had been "coerced" and that Sweeney had been verbally and physically abusive during their marriage. A divorce was granted in September.

In 2001, Sweeney slammed a Jeep into a utility pole on his way home from the Willard Mountain ski area, cutting power to a portion of Washington County. At the time, State Police said Sweeney took his eye off the road to adjust the radio and lost control on the gravel on the right shoulder. No charges were filed.

Staff writer James M. Odato contributed to this article. Scott Waldman can be reached at 454-5080 or by e-mail at swaldman@timesunion.com.

Source: Sweeney passenger a shock.
Arresting State Police officers in DWI case surprised to find a woman on ex-congressman's lap
ROBERT GAVIN, Staff writer
November 14, 2007

Clarification: An earlier version of this story reported a different age for the woman who was in the car with Sweeney. Our investigation has now confirmed that she is 24 years old..

State Police received an unexpected surprise when they stopped former Rep. John Sweeney on the Northway early Sunday -- a female passenger on his lap, a law enforcement source said Tuesday.

When troopers began following the ex-lawmaker north on I-87, just south of Exit 9, they assumed the Clifton Park Republican was driving alone in his 2004 BMW, said the individual, whose identity is being withheld by the Times Union.

The 24-year-old woman, who has not been identified, was on Sweeney's lap, the source said....

Huckabee Squashed Charges Against His Son For Stoning, Hanging Dog
December 16th, 2007

Lambert over at Corrente noticed this little tidbit that Mike Huckabee definitely doesn’t want to have brought up:

Here’s the barebones story of how 18-year-old Mike Huckabee’s son, David, and 17-year-old Clayton Frady killed a dog when they were Boy Scouts, and got fired for it. From the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in 1998 (as quoted in DogBlog):

[David Huckabee,] the younger son of Gov. Mike Huckabee and another teen were fired last month from jobs at a Boy Scout camp after the killing of a stray dog.[..]

So, how and why did David Huckabee (and Clayton Frady) kill the dog?

The original story isn’t clear in the lead (the admissions and the details come as you read down). Still from the Democrat Gazette:

The dog was killed [passive voice] July 11 at Camp Pioneer near Hatfield.[..]

I believe the following is the faxed description of the “particular process.” It’s on a reputable site, Utopia Animal Rescue, which is run by, of all people, Kinky Freidman:

(Miller County, Arkansas) Two boy scout counselors, 17 year old Clayton Frady and 18 year old David litickabee [sic], the son of Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, have admitted to catching a stray dog during their summer session at Camp Pioneer in Hatfield, AR, and hanging the dog by his neck, slitting his throat and stoning him to death.

Lambert notices that Michael Isikoff’s coverage of the story for Newsweek is particularly lacking in investigative curiosity on how David Huckabee killed the dog, which as you can see above, really does color the event.

Digby’s on top of this too. The Huckster’s son seems to be a real winner and his father tried to cover up his sick, twisted behavior — the same kind of behavior that landed former NFL star Michael Vick in prison.

Childhood precursors [to Psychopathy]

Psychopathy is not normally diagnosed in children or adolescents, and some jurisdictions explicitly forbid diagnosing psychopathy and similar personality disorders in minors. Psychopathic tendencies can sometimes be recognized in childhood or early adolescence and, if recognised, are diagnosed as conduct disorder. It must be stressed that not all children diagnosed with conduct disorder grow up to be psychopaths, or even disordered at all, but these childhood signs are found in significantly higher proportions in psychopaths than in the general population. Conduct disorder, as well as its subcategory Oppositional Defiance Disorder, can sometimes develop into adult psychopathy. However, conduct disorder "fails to capture the emotional, cognitive and interpersonality traits - egocentricity, lack of remorse, empathy or guilt - that are so important in the diagnosis of psychopathy."[71]

Children showing strong psychopathic precursors often appear immune to punishment; nothing seems to modify their undesirable behavior. Consequently parents usually give up, and the behavior worsens.[72]

The following childhood indicators are to be interpreted not as to the type of behavior, but as to its relentless and unvarying occurrence. Not all must be present concurrently, but at least a number of them need to be present over a period of years:

* An extended period of bedwetting past the preschool years that is not due to any medical problem.
* Cruelty to animals beyond an angry outburst.
* Firesetting and other vandalism. Not to be confused with playing with matches, which is not uncommon for preschoolers. This is the deliberate setting of destructive fires with utter disregard for the property and lives of others.
* Lying, often without discernible objectives, extending beyond a child's normal impulse not to be punished. Lies that are so extensive that it is often impossible to know lies from truth.
* Theft and truancy.
* Aggression to peers, not necessarily physical, which can include getting others into trouble or a campaign of psychological torment.

The three indicators—bedwetting, cruelty to animals and firestarting, known as the MacDonald triad —were first described by J.M. MacDonald as indicators of psychopathy.[73] Though the relevance of these indicators to serial murder etiology has since been called into question, they are considered relevant to psychopathy.

The question of whether young children with early indicators of psychopathy respond poorly to intervention compared to conduct disordered children without these traits has only recently been examined in controlled clinical research. The findings from this research are consistent with broader evidence - pointing to poor treatment outcomes.

Ex-Michigan congressman Siljander indicted
by The Associated Press
Wednesday January 16, 2008, 5:32 PM


West Michigan Congressman Mark Deli Siljander, 1986

WASHINGTON -- A former Michigan congressman and delegate to the United Nations was indicted Wednesday as part of a terrorist fundraising ring that allegedly sent more than $130,000 to an al-Qaida and Taliban supporter who has threatened U.S. and international troops in Afghanistan.

Mark Deli Siljander, a Republican from Three Rivers when he was in the House, was charged with money laundering, conspiracy and obstructing justice for allegedly lying about lobbying senators on behalf of an Islamic charity that authorities said was secretly sending funds to terrorists.

A 42-count indictment, unsealed in U.S. District Court in Kansas City, Mo., accuses the Islamic American Relief Agency of paying Siljander $50,000 for the lobbying -- money that turned out to be stolen from the U.S. Agency for International Development.

Siljander, who served in the House from 1981-1987, was appointed by President Reagan to serve as a U.S. delegate to the United Nations for one year in 1987.

He could not immediately be reached for comment today. His attorney in Kansas City, J.R. Hobbs, had no immediate comment.
Mark Siljander, 1986.

The charges are part of a long-running case against the charity, which had been based in Columbia, Mo., and was designated by the Treasury Department in 2004 as a suspected fundraiser for terrorists.

In the indictment, the government alleges that IARA employed a man who had served as a fundraising aide to Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaida leader and mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The indictment charges IARA with sending approximately $130,000 to help Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, whom the United States has designated as a global terrorist. The money, sent to bank accounts in Peshawar, Pakistan, in 2003 and 2004, was masked as donations to an orphanage located in buildings that Hekmatyar owned.

Authorities described Hekmatyar as an Afghan mujahedeen leader who has participated in and supported terrorist acts by al-Qaida and the Taliban. The Justice Department said Hekmatyar "has vowed to engage in a holy war against the United States and international troops in Afghanistan."

The charges paint "a troubling picture of an American charity organization that engaged in transactions for the benefit of terrorists and conspired with a former United States congressman to convert stolen federal funds into payments for his advocacy," Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Wainstein said.

Siljander founded the Washington-area consulting group Global Strategies Inc. after leaving the government.

The indictment says Siljander was hired by IARA in March 2004 to lobby the Senate Finance Committee in an effort to remove the charity from the panel's list of suspected terror fundraisers.

For his work, IARA paid Siljander with money that was part of U.S. government funding awarded to the charity years earlier for relief work it promised to perform in Africa, the indictment says. Under the grant agreement, IARA was supposed to return any unused funds after the relief project was wrapped up in 1999.

Instead, Siljander and three IARA officers agreed to cover up the money's origins and use it on the lobbying effort, the indictment charges.

In interviews with the FBI in December 2005 and April 2007, Siljander denied doing any lobbying work for IARA. The money, he told investigators, was merely a donation from IARA to help him write a book about Islam and Christianity, the indictment says.

In 2004, the FBI raided the Islamic American Relief Agency-USA group's headquarters and the homes of people affiliated with the group nationwide. Since then, the 20-year-old charity has been unable to raise money and its assets have been frozen.

The charity has denied the allegations that it has financed terrorism. IARA in Columbia has argued that it is a separate organization from the Islamic African Relief Agency, a Sudanese group suspected of financing al-Qaida. A federal appeals court in Washington ruled in February that there was a link between the two groups.

In an indictment handed down in March, the charity and four of its officers were charged with illegally transferring $1.4 million to Iraq from March 1991 to May 2003 -- when Iraq was under various U.S. and U.N. sanctions.

The indictment also alleges that on 11 separate occasions the defendants transferred funds from the United States to Iraq through Amman, Jordan, in order to promote unlawful activity that violated Iraq sanctions.

In all, Siljander, IARA and five of its officers were charged with various counts of theft, money laundering, aiding terrorists and conspiracy.

"By bringing this case in the middle of America, we seek to make it harder for terrorists to do business halfway around the globe," said John Wood, U.S. attorney in Kansas City.

GOP's McKee Resigns After Home Is Searched
By Philip Rucker
Saturday, February 16, 2008; Page B05
Washington Post Staff Writer

Robert A. McKee, a long-serving Republican delegate from Western Maryland, announced his resignation yesterday after authorities, who say they are conducting a child pornography investigation, seized two computers, videotapes and printed materials from his Hagerstown home.

First elected to the House of Delegates in 1994, McKee was chairman of the Western Maryland delegation and sponsored legislation to protect minors from sexual predators. McKee, 58, also resigned yesterday from his post as executive director of Big Brothers Big Sisters of Washington County, a child mentorship program where he has worked for 29 years.

"For me, this is deeply embarrassing," McKee said in a statement. "It reflects poorly on my service to the community."

The FBI's cyber-crimes unit and the county sheriff's office are reviewing the materials seized from McKee's home Jan. 31, federal and local authorities said.

"No charges have been filed as of this time," Sheriff Douglas W. Mullendore said.

Mullendore declined to elaborate on what he called a child pornography investigation and said authorities have not searched the delegate's office in Annapolis.

McKee's resignation will take effect at 8 p.m. Monday. He said in his statement that he will cooperate with authorities.

"In the meantime, I have entered treatment," McKee said, without providing specifics. "My primary focus is to get well and stay well. I know this can only happen with the support and prayers of my family and friends and the help of professionals."

The delegate's resignation came after the Hagerstown Herald-Mail reported yesterday that local authorities had obtained a warrant to search his home. McKee was at the State House on Thursday morning but skipped a committee hearing that afternoon and was absent from a floor session yesterday.

McKee, who is considered a political moderate, has sponsored bills this year dealing with minors, including the Child Protection From Predators Act and a proposal to collect DNA samples from sexual predators. McKee has sponsored several other sexual offender and child abduction bills in previous years.

For decades, McKee has been involved in youth athletics and children's groups, according to his General Assembly biography. He has served in officer positions in two Little League groups and as secretary of a parent and child center advisory committee.

During the 1970s, McKee was a reservist in the U.S. Navy. He is a former chaplain for the Hagerstown Jaycees and is a trustee and community services chairman at First Christian Church.

"In the long run, I hope and pray that my work in the local community for the last three decades will speak louder than the challenges I now face," McKee said.

House Republicans convened an emergency meeting yesterday to discuss the situation. Minority Leader Anthony J. O'Donnell (Calvert) said he had not spoken with McKee since news broke about the investigation and said he would not speculate on the investigation.

"It's troubling," O'Donnell said. "But look, in this country, we afford our citizens the right to hear details."

House GOP leaders issued a statement saying the Washington County Republican Central Committee will meet soon to select a replacement.

McKee served on the Ways and Means Committee and was well respected by his colleagues, said Del. Sheila E. Hixson (D-Montgomery), the committee's chairwoman.

"He's capable, works well, represents his party and constituents well and is very well liked by the committee leaders in both parties," Hixson said.

Judge quits after DUI bust
Fed jurist reportedly in drag when stopped
By O’Ryan Johnson
February 16, 2008
http://bostonherald.com/news/regional/gene...ticleid=1073879


A 63-year-old Massachusetts federal bankruptcy judge has resigned a week after he was arrested for driving under the influence in New Hampshire while reportedly wearing a woman’s dress, heels and stockings, and carrying a purse.

Judge Robert Somma, a Newbury resident, pleaded no contest to the drunken driving charge in New Hampshire and agreed to have his license suspended for 12 months, the Manchester Union Leader reported.

“He decided with the media coverage the way it had been, it was best to put this behind him,” Gary Wenta, circuit executive for Boston’s First Federal Circuit, told the Herald.

Wenta said Somma worked in private practice for years in Boston before he was appointed to the bench by President Bush in December 2004. He will remain on leave until he resigns on April 1, after roughly three years on the job.

“He’s a highly respected member of the bar and remains so,” Wenta said. “He was serving a 14-year appointment. This will leave him without a pension.”

The Union Leader reported yesteday that Somma crashed his Mercedes into the rear of a car stopped on Elm Street after leaving a bar in the city last week.

When cops arrived, the paper reported, Somma was wearing a cocktail dress, fishnet stockings, women’s heels and fumbled through a purse for his driver’s license.

Somma had a hard time keeping his balance, smelled of alcohol and slurred his speech, the paper reported, citing the Manchester police report. He failed a field sobriety test and took a breath test at the station that registered a blood-alcohol level of .12.

He told police he drank two gin and tonics at a Manchester bar. He said he came to New Hampshire because his wife was out of town and nobody knew him in the city, the paper reported.

A phone call placed to Somma’s home was not immediately returned yesterday. The Manchester Police Department also did not return a call for comment.

During his career, Somma has hosted numerous legal talks at the Boston Bar Association. He was called on frequently for legal workshops when bankruptcy laws recently changed to help lawyers maneuver through new regulations.

DeLuca steps down as Senate Republican leader

Posted June 13, 2007
Updated 5:25 PM

(Hartford-WTNH)_ State Senator Louis C. DeLuca announced today that he has resigned his position as Senate Minority Leader.

"After careful consideration, and out of respect for this institution and for my caucus, I have decided to step down from my leadership position," said DeLuca, ® Woodbury.

Senate Minority Leader Pro Tempore John McKinney (R-Fairfield) will assume leadership responsibilities until the Senate Republican Caucus meets to elect a new leader.

DeLuca said that by stepping down today he is making sure that his "personal issue does not overshadow all of the good work we've done and will do as a caucus."

DeLuca, a 9-term lawmaker and the highest ranking GOP member, was arrested on a conspiracy to threaten charge. He was accused of arranging a threat for a man he believed was abusing his granddaughter.

The arrest started with an investigation into racketeering activities and mob ties in the trash-hauling industry. A wire tap revealed that DeLuca had met with a convicted felon with known Mafia ties to intervene in his granddaughter's situation.

DeLuca said he approached the man after Waterbury Police Chief Neil O'Leary said he could do nothing about the alleged domestic abuse without a formal complaint by DeLuca's granddaughter. O'Leary said that DeLuca never mentioned the abuse.

Son of Arizona Senate President Ken Bennett offered plea deal in assault case
Monday, April 03, 2006

PHOENIX (AP) - Two young men charged with sodomizing 18 boys at a youth camp last year have been offered a plea agreement that may net them little jail time and no record of sexual assault.

Clifton Bennett, 18, the son of Arizona Senate President Ken Bennett, and his co-defendant, Kyle Wheeler, 19, were charged in January with 18 counts of aggravated assault and 18 counts of kidnapping for the incidents, which happened at a youth camp last June. The younger Bennett confessed to police that he and Wheeler sodomized the 11- to 14-year-old boys with broomsticks and flashlights in at least 40 incidents, court documents show.

Yavapai County prosecutors now say they'll drop all but one assault charge and likely recommend little or no jail time if Bennett agrees to plead guilty.

Wheeler has been offered a similar deal but faces an additional assault charge for choking three boys until they passed out.

The plea agreements were presented in court last week and could be finalized Monday.

The plea deal infuriated parents of some of the boys, who say their sons were sexually assaulted and traumatized. They want Bennett and Wheeler to face sexual-assault charges, undergo mental evaluations and do more jail time.

The boys have had trouble going to the bathroom, sleep with clothes on, are afraid at night, and have undergone sexual-assault counseling, parents said.

"Our biggest concern is that these kids are going to do it again," the mother of an 11-year-old Tucson boy told The Arizona Republic. "My son had something shoved up his butt seven or eight times. If that's not sexual assault, what is?"

Prosecutor James Landis told a judge at last week's hearing that the "broomsticking" was a hazing ritual and a punishment, not sexual assault.

The plea agreement describes the assault charge as "a non-dangerous, non-repetitive offense."

Landis told the judge the case was never viewed as "sexual in nature," partly because prosecutors could not prove the two young men had sexual intent.

But legal experts, sex-crimes prosecutors and victims'-rights lawyers say the acts clearly fit the definition of sexual assault.

"They could have been charged with sexual assault," said Sue Eazer, supervisor of the Pima County Attorney's Special Victims Unit. "Sexual assault is oftentimes not motivated by sexual desire."

Requiring proof of intent in a sexual assault case is a "red herring," according to Andrew Vachss, a New York lawyer specializing in child cases who is also a best-selling author on the subject. He said intent in this case is being used as an excuse to cut a deal.

"The bottom line is you don't have to prove sexual intent when you have such gross assault," Vachss said. "It looks like one of the most sweetheart deals of all time."

He implied it is unlikely a jury would agree with the prosecutors.

"Let the perps tell a jury, 'I inserted a foreign object into the rectums of little boys, but I had no sexual intent.'"

The prosecutor referred questions to Yavapai County Attorney Sheila Polk, who said she was ethically barred from talking about the case while it is active.

The 18 boys were chosen to attend the weeklong student government leadership skills camp in Prescott because they were among the state's top student leaders.

Records show the defendants were assigned to stay in their cabin and announced that campers who broke rules would get a "brooming" soon after the boys arrived. A police report of the incidents wasn't made until six months later, when one of the boys told a school official.

Bennett apologized for his role in court last week, saying he was "trying every way he can to rectify the situation."

His father, Sen. Ken Bennett, R-Prescott, sat behind him. A Prescott native and businessman, he hasn't spoken about his son's arrest except to issue a brief statement expressing concern as a parent.

Lawyers for the younger Bennett declined to comment but wrote the county attorney saying he "took responsibility for his role, showed remorse and admitted that this "hazing' was inappropriate."

The letter said Bennett was an honor student and active member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who plans to go on a mission in September.

"A felony conviction for assault will make his desire to complete his mission impossible," they wrote.

Prosecutors told parents they plan to ask for five days in jail on the one count for each defendant, said Lynne Cadigan, a lawyer for two victims. They could face a maximum two years in prison under terms of the plea deal, but the judge could reduce the charges to a misdemeanor and no jail time.

GOP Congressman indicted for extortion, money laundering
Nick Juliano
Published: Friday February 22, 2008

Republican Rep. Rick Renzi has been indicted for extortion, wire fraud, money laundering and other charges related to a land deal in Arizona.

A 26-page federal indictment unsealed in Arizona accuses Renzi and two former business partners of conspiring to promote the sale of land that buyers could swap for property owned by the federal government. The sale netted one of Renzi's former partners $4.5 million.

Nearly a year ago, as RAW STORY reported, the embattled congressman denied newspaper reports and rumors that he planned on resigning, as the FBI probed. The congressman did relinquish all three of his House committee assignments, including his seat on the House Intelligence Committee. He has since decided not to run for re-election.

Renzi also is a co-chairman of Republican presidential candidate John McCain's Arizona leadership team. And the Arizona Senator aided Renzi's re-election bid.

Speaking to reporters at a campaign stop in Indiana Thursday, McCain, an Arizona senator, demurred when asked about the indictment.

"I'm sorry. I feel for the family; as you know, he has 12 children," McCain told reporters, according to the Associated Press. "But I don't know enough of the details to make a judgment. These kinds of things are always very unfortunate.... I rely on our Department of Justice and system of justice to make the right outcome."

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) is reportedly urging Renzi to resign, according to The Hill. "I have made it clear that I will hold our members to the highest standards of ethical conduct," Boehner is quoted as saying in a statement. "The charges contained in this indictment are completely unacceptable for a member of Congress, and I strongly urge Rep. Renzi to seriously consider whether he can continue to effectively represent his constituents under these circumstances."

Renzi was under FBI investigation before the 2006 mid-term elections, but the Justice Department delayed approving necessary investigation tools for federal investigators in Arizona before November.

In April 2007, federal agents raided a Sonoita, Arizona business owned by Renzi's wife, Roberta. At the timeSpeculation mounted that former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales may have intervened to slow down the probe before Renzi was re-elected.

The AP summed up the indictment as follows:

The extensive legal document says Renzi refused in 2005 and 2006 to secure congressional approval for land swaps by two unnamed businesses if they did not agree to buy [former Renzi business partner James W.] Sandlin's property as a part of the deal.

Renzi had previously owned some of Sandlin's property, the indictment says.

In early 2005, one of the businesses seeking surface rights for a copper mining project in Renzi's district failed to buy Sandlin's land. As a result, the indictment says, Renzi allegedly told the business, "No Sandlin property, no bill."

At the time, Sandlin owed Renzi $700,000 out of the land's selling price of $800,000. Renzi also allegedly concealed his business relationship with Sandlin, even though the company had expressly asked if there was one.

Meanwhile, Renzi allegedly pushed the land on a second firm, an unnamed investment group, that was trying to secure a federal land swap. If the firm accepted Sandlin's property as part of the transaction, Renzi allegedly said investors would receive a "free pass" through the House Natural Resources Committee, according to the indictment.

In April 2005, the investors reluctantly agreed to the deal.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, an independent ethics watchdog, listed Renzi in its annual "Beyond DeLay" report on corruption in Congress.

Developing...

Polygamist Cult Awarded US Defence Contracts
Monday, April 14, 2008

We all know by now that the word "vetted" doesn't appear in the Bush administration's dictionary but it sure would have come in handy more than a few times.

McClatchy reports that two firms linked to the polygamist sect that was recently raided in Texas were awarded millions in small business loans and military contracts.

Steve Barlow, human resources manager for NewEra, said last week that it would be inappropriate to comment, "Given everything that's going on. I could only give you the company motto: 'Good parts on time.'. "


And just how do they make those 'good parts on time'?

According to the article, there's been a lawsuit filed against NewEra that answers that question:

John Nielsen, who worked for the company when it was Western Precision in Hildale, said in a 2005 affidavit that he and other FLDS members were made to work for little or no wages, even as the company was bringing in lucrative government contracts and other work.

At the same time, $50,000 to $100,000 in company profits were going each month to FLDS "and/or" Jeffs, Nielsen said in the affidavit, filed as part of a civil lawsuit.

He said he and other sect members thought their working for free or for extremely low wages would bring them redemption. Instead, Nielsen said in the affidavit, he was found to be "wanting" by the sect's leadership, ordered off the property and separated from his five young children and his wife. She was "reassigned" to another man, becoming the fourth of his six wives.

"It broke my heart," Nielsen said in the affidavit. He declined to comment when reached by phone Friday.


Slave labour - which somebody obviously knew about since that suit was filed in 2005. Yet, nothing was done - just as governments have let abusive polygamist cults there and in Canada get away with staying veiled in secrecy for decades.

Who knows what will come out of these investigations now? One person put it bluntly:

"There's a lot of bad sh*t in there," said a high-ranking official with the federal Justice Department who did not want to be identified because of the sensitivity of the case.


It's time to rip those places apart and stand up for the victims once and for all.

And it's also time for the US government to stop looking the other way when it hands out contracts. But then what do you expect from an administration that just renewed Blackwater's contract despite the objections of the supposedly 'sovereign' Iraq government? Human rights always take a back seat to US military concerns.

Fringe GOP candidate spends Hitler's birthday with neo-Nazis
Nick Juliano
April 21, 2008

An outlandish long-shot seeking the Republican nomination for an Indiana congressional seat spent Sunday at a neo-Nazi gathering celebrating the birth of Adolf Hitler.

Tony Zirkle is running for the 2nd District GOP nomination, but he has no support from local party officials, and the front-running candidate there refused to even participate in a recent debate with Zirkle, for fear of legitimizing his candidacy.

Zirkle said he would speak to any group that invites him, and that he admired the American National Socialist Workers Party's concern about "prostitution of young white women," according to WSBT-TV. Overthrow.com, a Web site associated with the "white advocacy" organization, reported that Zirkle "spoke on his history as a state’s attorney in Indiana, prosecuting Jewish and Zionist criminal gangs involved in trafficking prostitutes and pornography from Russia and the Zionist entity."

The comments were forcefully denounced by other local Republicans, the station reports.

"I cannot believe that in 2008 anyone could think so backwards," Luke Puckett, another GOP candidate for 2nd District congressman, said in reaction to Zirkle’s comment.

“The ‘R’ next to Tony Zirkle’s name does not stand for Republican. It stands for ‘repulsive,'" Chris Riley, chairman of the St. Joseph County Republican Party, told WSBT-TV. "The Republican Party stands for two basic principles: individual freedom and government accountability. Nazi socialism and fascism is the polar opposite of those two principles so for him to align himself with this puts him at the opposite end of the political spectrum from Republicans. And the visual images of Tony Zirkle standing in front of a Nazi flag are nauseating and repulsive."

A look at Zirkle's Web site suggests his common ground with the neo-Nazis extends even further. He cites Hitler in his section on the War on Terror, and has expressed anti-Semitic views elsewhere.

Zirkle's outlandish views have made him a frequent target of political satire blog Wonkette. And he's swiftly dismissed as a "fringe lunatic" by fellow Republicans.

Previously, Zirkle has questioned whether racial integration was a good idea, and he's proposed sending sex offenders to the guillotine.

The suggestion that pornography "pimps" be subjected to the guillotine came during a 2006 campaign against then-incumbent Chris Chocola. He garnered 30 percent of the vote in that primary. Chocola decided not to run again after losing to Democrat Joe Donnelly.

Zirkle's message doesn't seem to be eliciting much beyond mockery so far this year. Only six people showed up for a recent debate featuring Zirkle, which Puckett skipped. At a discussion board on his campaign Web site, Zirkle is virtually the only author. Less than half of the 11 posts (all started by Zirle) generated any respone, and only one other person posted anything at all.

Deborah Jeane Palfrey; Brandy Britton
Police: 'D.C. Madam' commits suicide
Tribune wire reports | Tribune staff reporter
2:19 PM CDT, May 1, 2008

TARPON SPRINGS, Fla - A woman police believe to be convicted Washington escort service operator Deborah Jeane Palfrey committed suicide, officials said Thursday.

Police said the body was found in a shed near Palfrey's mother's home Thursday morning. There was a suicide note, but police did not disclose its contents or how she killed herself.

Police did not immediately have additional comment when reached by telephone. Palfrey's attorney, Preston Burton, did not return a telephone call and e-mail message.

Palfrey was convicted April 15 by a federal jury of running a prostitution service that catered to members of Washington's political elite, including Sen. David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican.

She had denied her escort service engaged in prostitution, saying that if any of the women engaged in sex acts for money, they did so without her knowledge.

She was convicted of money laundering, using the mail for illegal purposes and racketeering. Palfrey faced a maximum of 55 years in prison and was free pending her sentencing July 24.

Prosecutors said Palfrey operated the prostitution service for 13 years.

Her trial concluded without revealing many new details about the service or its clients. Vitter was among possible witnesses, but did not take the stand.

Vitter, a first-term senator who is married and has four children, has acknowledged being involved with Palfrey's escort service and has apologized for what he called a "very serious sin." But he avoided commenting further.

One of the escort service employees was former University of Maryland, Baltimore County, professor Brandy Britton, who was arrested on prostitution charges in 2006. She committed suicide in January before she was scheduled to go to trial.

Last year, Palfrey said she, too, was humiliated by her prostitution charges, but said: "I guess I'm made of something that Brandy Britton wasn't made of."

She should have incorporated rather than merge.
The legal protection afforded might have stimulated her business.

The End of the Republican Party

Cute kid - hope she didn't inherit the conservative gene ...Yes - I admit - I’ve enjoyed blogging about the rise and fall of Vito Fossella (R-NY). He’s a major-league sh*tbag who got caught driving drunk and, as it happens, has a second family just outside of DC (pictured). Now that’s GOP family values! And if you don’t believe the “sh*tbag” charge, get a load of this:

His socially conservative positions were in sync with his mostly white, heavily Roman Catholic district, which covers all of Staten Island and a small wedge of Brooklyn. He opposes abortion, favored President Bush’s tax cuts and voted with the Republicans 88 percent of the time last year, according to Congressional Quarterly.

Not enough for you? He also lied to his girlfriend - said he’d split with his wife.

Like any good Republican, Vito initially refused to resign. But now it appears he’ll be gone by Monday - perhaps, as Atrios said, to spend more time with his families.

Will there be any Republicans left next year?

UPDATE - More Republican family values:

The rich father and uncle of shame-faced, two-timing Staten Island Rep. Vito Fossella have been making sure his gal pal and love child are well taken care of in Virginia, sources close to the disgraced politician said yesterday.

“Uncle Frank and Vito Sr. were bankrolling the kid,” said one highly placed Republican official.

Who's McCain Really Keeping His Distance From?
By Kate Klonick - June 5, 2008, 5:40PM


Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is making himself scarce for the National Republican Congressional Committee's annual fundraising award dinner with President Bush on June 18.

The Hill speculates that McCain is attempting to distance "himself from the man he wants to replace," but as we noted yesterday there's another attendee who McCain might want to avoid.

The dinner with President Bush is part of a two-day celebration for winners of the NRCC's "Republican Congressional Medal of Distinction." Springboro, Ohio, City Councilman Michael W. Hemmert will be one of the people accepting this distinction, despite two sets of drug charges (cocaine and marijuana) for which he's currently receiving treatment in lieu of conviction.

The NRCC declined to comment when we asked if Hemmert was still invited to the event.

The wife U.S. Republican John McCain callously left behind
By Sharon Churcher
Last updated at 1:45 AM on 08th June 2008

The is the old model Carol McCain.

Now that Hillary Clinton has at last formally withdrawn from the race for the White House, the eyes of America and the world will focus on Barack Obama and his Republican rival Senator John McCain.

While Obama will surely press his credentials as the embodiment of the American dream – a handsome, charismatic young black man who was raised on food stamps by a single mother and who represents his country’s future – McCain will present himself as a selfless, principled war hero whose campaign represents not so much a battle for the presidency of the United States, but a crusade to rescue the nation’s tarnished reputation.

McCain likes to illustrate his moral fibre by referring to his five years as a prisoner-of-war in Vietnam. And to demonstrate his commitment to family values, the 71-year-old former US Navy pilot pays warm tribute to his beautiful blonde wife, Cindy, with whom he has four children.

But there is another Mrs McCain who casts a ghostly shadow over the Senator’s presidential campaign. She is seldom seen and rarely written about, despite being mother to McCain’s three eldest children.

And yet, had events turned out differently, it would be she, rather than Cindy, who would be vying to be First Lady. She is McCain’s first wife, Carol, who was a famous beauty and a successful swimwear model when they married in 1965.

She was the woman McCain dreamed of during his long incarceration and torture in Vietnam’s infamous ‘Hanoi Hilton’ prison and the woman who faithfully stayed at home looking after the children and waiting anxiously for news.

But when McCain returned to America in 1973 to a fanfare of publicity and a handshake from Richard Nixon, he discovered his wife had been disfigured in a terrible car crash three years earlier. Her car had skidded on icy roads into a telegraph pole on Christmas Eve, 1969. Her pelvis and one arm were shattered by the impact and she suffered massive internal injuries.

When Carol was discharged from hospital after six months of life-saving surgery, the prognosis was bleak. In order to save her legs, surgeonshad been forced to cut away huge sections of shattered bone, taking with it her tall, willowy figure. She was confined to a wheelchair and was forced to use a catheter.

Through sheer hard work, Carol learned to walk again. But when John McCain came home from Vietnam, she had gained a lot of weight and bore little resemblance to her old self.

Today, she stands at just 5ft4in and still walks awkwardly, with a pronounced limp. Her body is held together by screws and metal plates and, at 70, her face is worn by wrinkles that speak of decades of silent suffering.

For nearly 30 years, Carol has maintained a dignified silence about the accident, McCain and their divorce. But last week at the bungalow where she now lives at Virginia Beach, a faded seaside resort 200 miles south of Washington, she told The Mail on Sunday how McCain divorced her in 1980 and married Cindy, 18 years his junior and the heir to an Arizona brewing fortune, just one month later.


This is the new model, Cindy McCain.

Carol insists she remains on good terms with her ex-husband, who agreed as part of their divorce settlement to pay her medical costs for life. ‘I have no bitterness,’

she says. ‘My accident is well recorded. I had 23 operations, I am five inches shorter than I used to be and I was in hospital for six months. It was just awful, but it wasn’t the reason for my divorce.

‘My marriage ended because John McCain didn’t want to be 40, he wanted to be 25. You know that happens...it just does.’

Some of McCain’s acquaintances are less forgiving, however. They portray the politician as a self-centred womaniser who effectively abandoned his crippled wife to ‘play the field’. They accuse him of finally settling on Cindy, a former rodeo beauty queen, for financial reasons.

McCain was then earning little more than £25,000 a year as a naval officer, while his new father-in-law, Jim Hensley, was a multi-millionaire who had impeccable political connections.

He first met Carol in the Fifties while he was at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis. He was a privileged, but rebellious scion of one of America’s most distinguished military dynasties – his father and grandfather were both admirals.

But setting out to have a good time, the young McCain hung out with a group of young officers who called themselves the ‘Bad Bunch’.

His primary interest was women and his conquests ranged from a knife-wielding floozy nicknamed ‘Marie, the Flame of Florida’ to a tobacco heiress.

Carol fell into his fast-living world by accident. She escaped a poor upbringing in Philadelphia to become a successful model, married an Annapolis classmate of McCain’s and had two children – Douglas and Andrew – before renewing what one acquaintance calls ‘an old flirtation’ with McCain.

It seems clear she was bowled over by McCain’s attention at a time when he was becoming bored with his playboy lifestyle.

‘He was 28 and ready to settle down and he loved Carol’s children,’ recalled another Annapolis graduate, Robert Timberg, who wrote The Nightingale’s Song, a bestselling biography of McCain and four other graduates of the academy.

The couple married and McCain adopted Carol’s sons. Their daughter, Sidney, was born a year later, but domesticity was clearly beginningto bore McCain – the couple were regarded as ‘fixtures on the party circuit’ before McCain requested combat duty in Vietnam at the end of 1966.

He was assigned as a bomber pilot on an aircraft carrier in the Gulf of Tonkin.

What follows is the stuff of the McCain legend. He was shot down over Hanoi in October 1967 on his 23rd mission over North Vietnam and was badly beaten by an angry mob when he was pulled, half-drowned from a lake.

Over the next five-and-a-half years in the notorious Hoa Loa Prison he was regularly tortured and mistreated.

It was in 1969 that Carol went to spend the Christmas holiday – her third without McCain – at her parents’ home. After dinner, she left to drop off some presents at a friend’s house.

It wasn’t until some hours later that she was discovered, alone and in terrible pain, next to the wreckage of her car. She had been hurled through the windscreen.

After her first series of life-saving operations, Carol was told she may never walk again, but when doctors said they would try to get word to McCain about her injuries, she refused, insisting: ‘He’s got enough problems, I don’t want to tell him.’

H. Ross Perot, a billionaire Texas businessman, future presidential candidate and advocate of prisoners of war, paid for her medical care.

When McCain – his hair turned prematurely white and his body reduced to little more than a skeleton – was released in March 1973, he told reporters he was overjoyed to see Carol again.

But friends say privately he was ‘appalled’ by the change in her appearance. At first, though, he was kind, assuring her: ‘I don’t look so good myself. It’s fine.’

He bought her a bungalow near the sea in Florida and another former PoW helped him to build a railing so she could pull herself over the dunes to the water.

‘I thought, of course, we would live happily ever after,’ says Carol. But as a war hero, McCain was moving in ever-more elevated circles.

Through Ross Perot, he met Ronald Reagan, then Governor of California. A sympathetic Nancy Reagan took Carol under her wing.

But already the McCains’ marriage had begun to fray. ‘John started carousing and running around with women,’ said Robert Timberg.

McCain has acknowledged that he had girlfriends during this time, without going into details. Some friends blame his dissatisfaction with Carol, but others give some credence to her theory of a mid-life crisis.

He was also fiercely ambitious, but it was clear he would never become an admiral like his illustrious father and grandfather and his thoughts were turning to politics.

In 1979 – while still married to Carol – he met Cindy at a cocktail party in Hawaii. Over the next six months he pursued her, flying around the country to see her. Then he began to push to end his marriage.

Carol and her children were devastated. ‘It was a complete surprise,’ says Nancy Reynolds, a former Reagan aide.

‘They never displayed any difficulties between themselves. I know the Reagans were quite shocked because they loved and respected both Carol and John.’

Another friend added: ‘Carol didn’t fight him. She felt her infirmity made her an impediment to him. She justified his actions because of all he had gone through. She used to say, “He just wants to make up for lost time.”’

Indeed, to many in their circle the saddest part of the break-up was Carol’s decision to resign herself to losing a man she says she still adores.

Friends confirm she has remained friends with McCain and backed him in all his campaigns. ‘He was very generous to her in the divorce but of course he could afford to be, since he was marrying Cindy,’ one observed.

McCain transferred the Florida beach house to Carol and gave her the right to live in their jointly-owned townhouse in the Washington suburb of Alexandria. He also agreed to pay her alimony and child support.

A former neighbour says she subsequently sold up in Florida and Washington and moved in 2003 to Virginia Beach. He said: ‘My impression was that she found the new place easier to manage as she still has some difficulties walking.’

Meanwhile McCain moved to Arizona with his new bride immediately after their 1980 marriage. There, his new father-in-law gave him a job and introduced him to local businessmen and political powerbrokers who would smooth his passage to Washington via the House of Representatives and Senate.

And yet despite his popularity as a politician, there are those who won’t forget his treatment of his first wife.

Ted Sampley, who fought with US Special Forces in Vietnam and is now a leading campaigner for veterans’ rights, said: ‘I have been following John McCain’s career for nearly 20 years. I know him personally. There is something wrong with this guy and let me tell you what it is – deceit.

‘When he came home and saw that Carol was not the beauty he left behind, he started running around on her almost right away. Everybody around him knew it.

‘Eventually he met Cindy and she was young and beautiful and very wealthy. At that point McCain just dumped Carol for something he thought was better.

‘This is a guy who makes such a big deal about his character. He has no character. He is a fake. If there was any character in that first marriage, it all belonged to Carol.’

One old friend of the McCains said: ‘Carol always insists she is not bitter, but I think that’s a defence mechanism. She also feels deeply in his debt because in return for her agreement to a divorce, he promised to pay for her medical care for the rest of her life.’

Carol remained resolutely loyal as McCain’s political star rose. She says she agreed to talk to The Mail on Sunday only because she wanted to publicise her support for the man who abandoned her.

Indeed, the old Mercedes that she uses to run errands displays both a disabled badge and a sticker encouraging people to vote for her ex-husband. ‘He’s a good guy,’ she assured us. ‘We are still good friends. He is the best man for president.’

But Ross Perot, who paid her medical bills all those years ago, now believes that both Carol McCain and the American people have been taken in by a man who is unusually slick and cruel – even by the standards of modern politics.

‘McCain is the classic opportunist. He’s always reaching for attention and glory,’ he said.

‘After he came home, Carol walked with a limp. So he threw her over for a poster girl with big money from Arizona. And the rest is history.’

Woman details abortion, relationship with "pro-life" congressional candidate

A woman who dated congressional candidate Mike Erickson seven years ago said she asked him directly whether he wanted to have a baby. He shook his head...

By Janie Har and Steve Mayes
Newhouse News Service

Erickson, a Lake Oswego businessman, is the Republican candidate in Oregon's 5th Congressional District.

A woman who dated congressional candidate Mike Erickson seven years ago said she asked him directly whether he wanted to have a baby. He shook his head no, she said, and paid for her abortion.

In interviews with The Oregonian newspaper, the Oregon City woman said she met Erickson in September 2000 and that she had the abortion in January 2001. They saw each other afterward, she said, even going on a trip to Mexico in March, before the relationship ended. She spoke on the condition that only her first name, Tawnya, be used.

Erickson agrees that he gave Tawnya $300 for medical help, and a ride to a doctor's office, but said he didn't know she was pregnant or planned to get an abortion.

Erickson, a Lake Oswego businessman, is the Republican candidate in Oregon's 5th Congressional District and is running on an anti-abortion platform. The charge that he provided money to Tawnya nearly derailed his campaign for the May 20 primary and could hobble his chances in the Nov. 4 general election against state Sen. Kurt Schrader, D-Canby.

Tawnya, now 34, recalled sitting with Erickson that January, parked across from the abortion clinic.

"I asked him, 'Are you sure you don't want a baby?' " she said. "He shook his head. I opened the door, got out bawling and crossed the street and walked up to the clinic."

Erickson, 45, said he dated Tawnya "for a couple of months." He told The Oregonian he didn't remember many details about their relationship, including where they met or when they dated. He said she betrayed no emotion during the car ride.

"Did I pay for an abortion? Absolutely not," Erickson said.

"She was having some financial troubles," he said. "She asked for some money to go have a doctor's appointment — not knowing what that was — and whatever happened, happened, I guess. I didn't even know she had an abortion."

Erickson has campaigned on a strict anti-abortion platform that favors abstinence education and adoption over abortion. His opponent in last month's primary, Kevin Mannix, spotlighted the abortion story in a mass mailing to voters a week before the election. Mannix did so without Tawnya's knowledge or consent.

Tawnya reluctantly agreed to talk after repeated requests from The Oregonian. She said she was motivated in part by seeing Erickson tell his version to television reporters before the primary election.

"I'm just sick to my stomach watching him be interviewed on the news completely lying about everything," she said.

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The record shows an abortion was performed Jan. 30, 2001. She paid $300.

The record also shows she was accompanied by Kristi Oetken, identified on the form as her best friend.

Working single mom

Tawnya was 26 years old when she met Erickson, then 37.

She was a single mom of a 3-year-old girl, earning $13.77 an hour at a Milwaukie, Ore., warehouse and living in a small apartment. She let her ex-boyfriend move in to help care for their daughter.

Erickson prospered as president of AFMS, a fast-growing business that advises companies on ways to lower their shipping expenses.

They met at Mount Angel's Oktoberfest in September 2000, according to Tawnya and her friend Joy Johanson, who was there. Erickson handed her his business card. His title — president — impressed her. She called him.

They dated, Tawnya said, and spent time on his houseboat at Portland's Macadam Bay Club, cooking meals and playing hide-and-seek with her daughter.

She couldn't recall exactly when she learned she was pregnant or when she told Erickson. But she did tell him, she said.

"I just remember him being fairly solemn about it. He didn't tell me I had to get an abortion. He didn't force me," Tawnya said.

But he also wasn't going to marry her, she said, and she didn't want to raise another child on her own.

She scheduled the appointment and said she asked Erickson to take her there. He stopped at an ATM to withdraw $300 to give her. During the drive, he told her that because of work he couldn't stay, she said.

Oetken held her hand during the procedure and drove her home afterward.

Johanson, who worked with Tawnya at the time but hasn't stayed in touch, said she never spoke to Erickson about the abortion. But Johanson was relieved when Tawnya told her that Erickson would take her to the clinic and pay for the procedure.

"He took her and dropped her off, so she started freaking out," Johanson said. "It enraged Kristi that he just ditched her like that."

The abortion first cropped up two years ago when Erickson ran against U.S. Rep. Darlene Hooley, a Democrat who is retiring after her current term.

Tawnya, a registered Republican, said she received a campaign flier with a photo of Erickson next to a baby, touting his endorsement by the anti-abortion group Oregon Right to Life.

The mailer made him out to be "some sort of safe haven for babies, and honestly, it made me sick," she said.

She called Oetken, who sent an e-mail to several news outlets calling Erickson a hypocrite and offering to tell their story. The e-mail was copied to Erickson and Hooley.

Erickson denied the allegation in a statement to reporters who inquired about Oetken's e-mail.

No news stories appeared. Tawnya said she wasn't ready to talk about her abortion then.

He tells different story

Erickson gives a far different account of events.

He said he thinks that a week or two before the appointment, Tawnya called asking for help with money to see a doctor. A day or two before the appointment, he said, she called to say she had car troubles and needed a ride.

He said he didn't ask her why she needed to see a doctor, saying he didn't want to pry. "I knew her pretty well but not like — it wasn't my girlfriend — but it was somebody that I had a relationship with," Erickson said.

Erickson didn't wait around. "She said her friend was picking her up and they were going to do something at the mall, or something like that."

Erickson said that he does not remember seeing Tawnya again after she left his car.

"I think we talked on the phone once or twice [afterward], and none of this ever came up. [We] never dated again," Erickson said.

The relationship ended, he said, when he learned she was sharing her apartment with her ex-boyfriend.

But Tawnya and Johanson said Erickson accompanied them on a Mexican getaway in March 2001, after the abortion. They showed documentation and photos of the trip.

Erickson said he believes the trip took place before the medical appointment, but he couldn't provide a date.

"She flew down there with her girlfriend. I was there with three other friends. It happened to be we were down there around the same time. That's true," he said.

Copyright © 2008 The Seattle Times Company

Taxpayers pay $20K for Hastert travels
06/23/2008 05:36:34

Congressman Dennis Hastert spent $20K on taxpayer funded trips in his last year in office.

By The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Illinois Congressman Dennis Hastert managed to visit seven nations and run up a tab of just over $20,000 in taxpayer-funded overseas trips in his last eleven months in office. That's according to a review of congressional travel records by The Associated Press.

The McHenry County Republican and former House speaker had no leadership role in Congress in his final year. He retired in December.

Hastert said in August he would not seek re-election. Just days earlier he returned from a $14,000, nine-day trip to China and Japan.

Other trips involved the United Kingdom, Belgium, Denmark, Germany and Colombia. Their cost was kept down by use of military planes.

Spokesman Brad Hahn says Hastert went on some trips to gain more knowledge on energy issues to prepare for a role in crafting energy legislation in the House, a role that he did not end up getting.

Congressmen Tim Johnson and Jerry Weller did not travel to any foreign countries while on the job in 2007, according to the study.

Senator Dick Durbin made taxpayer funded trips to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Qatar, Kuwait and Jordan. He received $1,195 in per diem, but spent $827.16 and returned the rest to the U.S. treasury.

The Bud Dwyer Effect
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Welcome to Pottersville

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you America’s last honest and courageous Republican, Bud Dwyer.

I’m sure we all remember or have read about Bud Dwyer, the Republican Pennsylvania state treasurer who was framed by his own and about to be sentenced on corruption charges.

In an infamous press conference on January 22, 1987, Dwyer pulled out a loaded .357 Magnum revolver and blew his brains out on state-wide television. Far from yet another corrupt, cowardly Republican making a dramatic, grandstanding gesture to avoid the stain of scandal, Dwyer, instead, did the most selfless and courageous thing any man could do for his family.

Dwyer was very well aware of the fact that a felony sentencing would’ve immediately resulted in his termination as state treasurer. Therefore, Dwyer committed suicide in his final seconds in office so his wife and children could collect his $1.28 million in survivor benefits plus his pension which had been eaten up in needless legal expenses.

It changed the way the press covered traumatic news events but not necessarily in a good way: Rather than considering how such a spectacle could affect children (there was a blizzard in Pennsylvania and kids were home watching TV), the AP, for instance, decided to use color film instead of the black and white with which they’d documented Dwyer’s suicide. Black and white film doesn’t capture blood all that well. Consider it the Bud Dwyer Effect (Not the Ion Dissonance “song” performed in their parents’ kitchen).

However, Robert “Bud” Dwyer had some valuable lessons to impart to his fellow Republicans, lessons in life and politics that have gone unheeded. Among them:

# Don’t take the envelope offered to you under the table. Dwyer was accused and convicted of accepting $300,000 in bribes in the CTA scandal, despite no evidence being submitted proving that charge. Rather than accept a plea bargain to one guilty plea of bribery, which would’ve involved five years of prison, Dwyer rejected it, vehemently protesting his innocence even in the final seconds of his life.

# Honor Thy Family.

Bud Dwyer didn’t start up another family in another state without first properly separating from his first one and then get caught driving while plastered on his way to visit them. He also certainly didn’t press his wife for a divorce while she was recuperating from cancer surgery.

He didn’t solicit for gay sex in public toilets and with male prostitutes after railing on and on about the evils of gay marriage and gay rights.

Do Not f*ck the Children, Bud also taught us.

# The Class of 9/11.

Mass General Hospital did a study of Boston-area children who had not lost a loved on 9/11. They discovered that a certain percentage of children exposed to the footage were traumatized by the events just from seeing them on TV. Another, more stunning development came to light: The children watching video playback of the planes hitting the towers for weeks and months on end thought they were watching the Twin Towers getting hit over and over and over again, that America was under siege for all that time. Children, we’re just now beginning to understand, cannot up until a certain age distinguish between live TV and playback. A small child believes everything they see on television is live.

# Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment: Thou Shalt Not Speak Ill of a Fellow Republican, a dictum that Dwyer carried out to its horrendous extreme. Dwyer, being offered bribes by the head of CTA, an accounting firm that was caught bribing state officials to secure a contract to tally up overpayments to the FICA system, knew that other Republicans were on the take. His co-defendant got only a year in prison but Dwyer was looking at 55 years plus a $300,000 fine.

Dwyer made his only mistake here. He knew damned good and well what was going on, since he was offered that bribe and he should’ve turned in the real rats of his state’s party after distancing himself from it. Yet he remained silent and let them turn him into a scapegoat, legally unable to defend himself, when the sh*t finally hit the fan.

Sadly, this is the only lesson that Republicans have heeded from Bud Dwyer.

Tap your foot twice if you're for marriage
John Aravosis (DC) · 6/27/2008
Friday, June 27, 2008

As you may recall, the Republicans in Congress want to amend the US Constitution with anti-gay language that would supposedly "ban gay marriage." In fact, the amendment would likely rescind state and local laws that outlaw job discrimination against gays and provide gay partners with health benefits, and it would likely rescind laws protecting unmarried women from things such as being beaten to a bloody pulp by their boyfriends (this actually happened in Ohio, where the state court found that the local anti-gay-marriage amendment invalidated state laws covering the domestic abuse of unmarried women). Anyway, who is on the very short list of Senators introducing the "Marriage Protection Amendment" in the Senate? Why none other than foot-tapping Senator Larry Craig (R-IA), and whore-mongering Senator David Vitter (R-LA). You'll recall that the very-married Larry Craig was caught tapping his foot alongside a really hot male cop in an airport bathroom. And the very-married and very-family-values-proclaiming David Vitter, we now know, has repeatedly frequented female hookers.

So there you have it. Two of the Republicans' biggest marriage hypocrites - Larry Craig, who was accused of trying to have sex with a man (who was not his wife) in a bathroom, and David Vitter who has been repeatedly accused of frequenting hookers (who also were not his wife) - want to amend the Constitution to "protect" marriage.

Perhaps you all should call Larry Craig's and David Vitter's offices and ask them the following:

Senator Larry Craig
tel: 202-224-2752
Message: Can a married guy give handjobs and blowjobs to other guys in bathrooms and still defend heterosexual marriage?

Senator David Vitter
Phone: (202) 224-4623
Message: How many whores does a married guy have to sleep with before he's no longer defending marriage? And does the price of the whore matter?

Oh, and please do report back in the comments how your phone calls went with Craig's and Vitter's offices.

Craig’s List: Former Oregon GOP bigwig who owes millions to fraud victims continues donating cash to McCain, other Republicans.
BY NIGEL JAQUISS
[July 9th, 2008]

Former Oregon Republican Party chairman and one-time gubernatorial candidate Craig Berkman owes millions to some of Portland’s wealthiest investors—but that hasn’t stopped him from making generous political contributions to Sen. John McCain and others.

Last month, in Multnomah County Circuit Court, a jury found that Berkman had defrauded local investors—including timber baron Peter Stott, real-estate heir Jordan Schnitzer and former barge line owner Peter Brix—and a large British Columbian public pension fund.

Jurors concluded Berkman, 66, defrauded investors and must pay them a total of $28 million for using their money as his own and lying to them about the failure of various companies in which he invested.

Their verdict came as a humbling defeat for Berkman. Once known as Oregon’s leading venture capitalist, Berkman admitted to WW two years ago that after two decades of making impossible promises to investors, he dipped into their funds for personal use (see “The Talented Mr. Berkman,” WW, Jan. 25, 2006).

In a financial statement [PDF] Berkman submitted at trial, Berkman claimed personal assets of $6 million and liabilities of $18 million—before the $28 million judgment against him.

But despite his personal indebtedness of $12 million, Berkman opened his wallet often in this election year from his adopted 12,000-square-foot lakefront home in Florida.

Records show Berkman, who was Oregon’s GOP chair from 1989 to 1993 and placed second in the party’s 1994 gubernatorial primary, continued his longtime pattern of hefty political contributions.

Over the past year, according to Federal Election Commission filings, he and his new wife, former New York beauty queen Mary Ann Farrell-Karlsson, have given $50,000 to Republican causes.

The biggest individual beneficiary was McCain, a campaign finance reform advocate in the years after he was caught up in the “Keating Five” scandal in 1989.

Berkman maxed out his donations to McCain, the eventual Republican presidential nominee. Records show he gave McCain $2,300 in July 2007 for the primary and another $2,300 in March 2008 for the general election. He also gave $4,600 to McCain’s “compliance” funds in 2008 for a total investment of $9,200.

Rumors Swirl On Possible Alabama AG Troy King Gay Sex Scandal, Possible Resignation
by: plainsmanpolitico
Thu Jul 10, 2008 at 02:17:44 AM EDT

FishbowlAmerica.com: The rumor mill in Montgomery is swirling of news of a potential resignation by Republican Attorney General Troy King, amid rumors that he was caught by his wife having sex with a male aide and subsequently banished from his home by his wife.

King, a potential GOP frontrunner for Governor in 2010, succeeded Bill Pryor, one of George W. Bush's most controversial judicial nominees. In addition, King was also an early endorser of John McCain.

While at face value it smells of a whisper campaign on the internet, much like the recent whispers about MO governor Matt Blount, a number of reputable Alabama blogs are reporting, in the very least, that the rumors are there and widespread.
Rumors Swirl On Possible Alabama AG Troy King Gay Sex Scandal, Possible ResignationThe Locust Fork Journal:

A spokesperson for Alabama Governor Bob Riley denied that Attorney General Troy King is preparing to resign in the wake of a massive rumor campaign that has yet to be fully confirmed. The word is, according to multiple sources in Montgomery and elsewhere, that King was recently caught by his wife in a gay affair with a male aide and banished from his home.

According to Tara Hutchison in the executive office of the governor they have heard of no plans in the works for King's resignation. She said she had not heard that he had been kicked out of his home because of a gay affair.

Governor Bob Riley's press office refused to return multiple phone calls from this independent press outlet even though some sources accuse Riley of perpetrating the leak. The attorney general's press office also declined to return phone calls seeking comment.

The Locust Fork News and Journal heard about this a couple of weeks ago from a Montgomery lawyer, and have had numerous contacts with people trying to confirm the truth of the rumor.


Left In Alabama (Mooncat):

I just heard from a very reliable source that Troy Boy is resigning as Attorney General. No report of King's official reason, but the unofficial reason almost certainly involves the rumors swirling around Montgomery that he was recently caught in embarassing misconduct. The resignation may be enough to keep King's personal life out of the papers, but I don't look for him to run for governor in 2010.

I'm almost sorry to see him go -- Troy was like a caricature of the Republican party. Never met a death sentence he didn't like, against sexual gratification, publicity hound, etc. ... life as an Alabama blogger will be harder without Troy King.

Phil Gramm May Be Gone, But His Porn Lives On
Posted July 15, 2008 | 05:42 AM (EST)

Phil Gramm's recent disparaging of "a nation of whiners" complaining about a "mental recession" did more than offend the sensibilities of economically struggling Americans. His gaffe also served as a reminder that McCain had appointed one of the most reactionary, venal, and destructive political figures in recent times as his top econ man. By Sunday, the damage to the McCain campaign had grown so severe it announced that Gramm's role had been significantly reduced.

"No Rig Was Too Big For Them To Handle."

Phil Gramm attempted to invest $15,000 in "Truck Stop Women." His money ultimately helped produce a film portraying Richard Nixon wandering nude around the White House.

Gramm was an accident waiting to happen. Indeed, his gaffe represents little more than a scrap in the massive heap of wreckage he has left in his wake. Gramm's own presidential campaign in 1996 was among his most high-profile casualties. In order to win a whopping total of 8 delegates, the charisma-challenged Gramm had to spend $20 million, or about $2.5 million per delegate. This experience curiously translated into a job as one of McCain's key political advisors.

But first, Gramm returned to the Senate, where he was lobbied intensely by one of his major campaign contributors, Enron. Enron enjoyed easy access to Gramm's office; the senator's wife served on Enron's board of directors and Ken Lay was his 1992 campaign co-chair. Gramm rewarded his financial angels in 2000, slipping the "Commodity Futures Modernization Act" into a omnibus spending bill just as Congress headed off for summer vacation. His amendment instantly enabled the creation of a shadow banking system -- "weapons of financial destruction" in the words of Warren Buffet -- that directly contributed to the current mortgage foreclosure crisis. Millions of Americans have suffered as a result of Gramm's machinations.

While the destruction Gramm has caused is felt across the country, little is known about the seedy business schemes that preceded his political career. Before Gramm joined the Christian Coalition's Ralph Reed to call for the defunding of the NEA, before he attacked an opponent for taking money from a gay rights group, and before he was interviewed by the white supremacist Southern Partisan magazine, Gramm was an avidly active investor in soft-core pornography movies.

Gramm's journey into porn began in 1973, when his brother-in-law, George Caton, rushed to tell him about an exciting low-budget soft-core production called "Truck Stop Women." A promo poster for the film boasted of its buxom stars: "No Rig Was Too Big For Them To Handle." Caton, who was in charge of fundraising for the production, asked Gramm to become an investor. To entice his brother-in-law, Caton showed him scenes of Playboy Playmate of the year Claudia Jennings displaying her bare essentials (she is naked throughout much of the film).

These scenes "really got Phil titillated," Caton told journalist John Judis in 1995. Gramm enthusiastically cut Caton a check for $15,000. Because the film was oversold, however, Caton returned his brother-in-law's money, offering him an investment opportunity in an upcoming feature.

Republican Senator William Philip Gramm from the family values state of Texas.

The following year, Gramm sent Caton a check for $15,000, this time to finance the production of "Beauty Queens," a soft-core flick about pageant judges having sex with contestants. But at the last moment, the director of "Beauty Queens," Mark Lester, decided to shelve his production to make the sequel to his "Tricia's Wedding," a comedy starring the drag queen troupe, The Cockettes.

Gramm contributed at least $7500 towards the sequel, a satire of the Nixon White House called "White House Madness" that featured the crazed president wandering around the White House in the nude. Gramm never saw that money again. Shot in ten days on a soundstage crudely modeled after the Oval Office, "White House Madness" tanked at the box office.

Like the rest of Gramm's endeavors, his soft-core porn career was a complete disaster.

Cocktober can't come soon enough
07/25/2008

You'll admit that summer has sucked as far as GOP perverts are concerned. Hasn't been much to post about, so I'm reduced to this:

Peter Hong, a longtime Republican operative in Minnesota, was arrested Wednesday afternoon on a charge of soliciting prostitution in St. Paul.
...
Hong has been in and out of the Republican side of Minnesota politics since the mid-1990s, when he surfaced as a genial bulldog campaign press secretary for former Sen. Rod Grams, R-Minn. He served as a spokesman for Gov. Tim Pawlenty's campaign in 2002 and for the Bush-Cheney campaign in Minnesota in 2004.

Most recently, Hong was a point person for presidential candidate Mike Huckabee. Gina Countryman, a spokeswoman for the Minnesota Republican Party, said Hong is not currently working for any Minnesota candidate.

Three diapers out of ten ... if that. If Minnesota wants to stay on top they've got to give us more Larry Craig-type incidents. Standards people!

I always love this post Anti!!! I get a load of laughs at the Repub's and their sexual pickles!!! There is one I heard about that I wish I could remember where I read it, but it concerned a Republican State House woman who made a big stink about homosexuals being worse for this country than a terriorist. Anyway, apparently she got caught for the second time bringing a loaded 360 in her purse, and her excuse this time was because she forgot it was in her purse because she "got out of her routine!" I believe she was from the state of Oklahoma. Thought you'd like to add her to your Rogues Gallery if you could try to see what you find!!! Great Posts!!!!

Kern Gun 'Oversight' At Capitol

By John Greiner/Capitol Bureau, The Oklahoman ~ State Rep. Sally Kern was stopped from carrying a gun into the Capitol today in an incident that she and state troopers describe as an accidental oversight on her part.

Not realizing she had her pistol, Kern started into the Capitol Wednesday, was turned back and allowed to put the weapon into her automobile, she confirmed.

Capt. Chris West of the Oklahoma Highway Patrol said she was asked to secure her weapon outside when guards discovered that she had a weapon in her purse.

"I'm out of the habit of being at the Capitol, had a meeting at 10 a.m.," Kern said.

She put her purse on the security machine that X-rays purses and other bags of people coming into the Capitol. That's when the gun was discovered.

She has a permit to carry a concealed weapon, West said.

"We didn't feel like that was a malicious act," West said.

BREAKING: U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens Indicted in Federal Court
By Kate Klonick - July 29, 2008, 12:48PM

From Reuters:

Sen. Ted Stevens from Alaska, the longest serving U.S. Republican senator ever, was indicted on seven counts related to his holding of public office, a federal law enforcement official said Tuesday.

Late update: It's worth noting that this comes a few days before the one year anniversary of the date federal agents raided Stevens' Girdwood home.

Ted Stevens, 84, has been a frequent character on TPMmuckraker. For a good profile on the indicted Senator, see here.

No one answered at Stevens' Senate Office in D.C. and the answering machine recording said that the office was closed. In a call to his Anchorage campaign office, the staffer who answered responded, "What?" when asked for a comment on the indictment, followed by a long silence. The staffer would not give further comment on whether or not the office knew that the indictment was handed down today.

Late late update: From McClatchy:
The Justice Department will be making a statement at 1:20 to announce the indictment.

The Anchorage Daily News reports that the indictment comes from a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C.

Late late late update: The AP is reporting the indictments are seven counts of false statements.

Our calls to Brendan Sullivan, Steven's attorney, were not immediately returned.

We have a copy of the Stevens indictment titled, United States of America v. Theodore F. Stevens, it can be viewed here.

The seven counts of false statements appear to be referencing seven years of false statements made on his financial disclosure forms relating to gifts he received from former VECO CEO Bill Allen for the renovations on his home in Girdwood, Alaska, among others.

Allen pleaded guilty to giving more than $400,000 worth of "illegal benefits" to politicians and their families in late 2007.

The DOJ Presser just started.

"As a member of the US Senate, Sen. Ted Stevens was required to file financial disclosure forms. . . to monitor or deter conflicts of interest within the US Senate and its membership."


Between 1999-2006 he accepted gifts from VECO, include substantial amounts of material and labor in his private residence. These allegations include addition of new first floor, new bedrooms and bathrooms.

The total amount of gifts is valued at over $250,000.

In a Q&A, it was revealed that Stevens will be turning himself in and will not be arrested. Stevens' attorney received a call earlier today informing him of his client's indictments.

Filing false financial disclosure statement can result in civil and criminal penalties, including up to 5 years in prison.

The DOJ is not alleging bribery or any kind of quid pro quo, and mentioned that the investigation is continuing.

Rep. Sessions held fundraiser at Vegas strip club.»

The Washington Post reports that Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX) held a fundraiser last year at a strip club in Las Vegas. The party was hosted by Monica Notzen, a “Republican consultant who plans parties like this for lawmakers.” In an interview last December, Sessions maintained that the events were a “burlesque show” and not a “strip club” because “she never gets naked.”


SESSIONS: That’s right, we do a Las Vegas fundraiser every year and not only raise money, but see Las Vegas. It’s a beautiful town.

Q:: Forty Deuce is a strip club.

SESSIONS: You know, I’ve never seen that. It is what I would call a burlesque show where there’s a woman who comes out and has a dress on… Uh, she never get’s naked. There’s no nudity, there’s no nudity in there.

As John Aravosis notes, Sessions “scolded Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake for forcing ‘their liberal values upon the rest of the country’ after their infamous 2004 Super Bowl halftime striptease.” According to federal disclosures, Sessions spent more than $5,000 at the club that night.

Co-sponsor of sex education bill charged with sexually assaulting 14-year-old girl
Wednesday, August 06, 2008


Rep. Scott Muschany, R-Fronetenac, who-cosponsored a 2007 bill setting guidelines for how teenagers are taught about sex, has been charged with the felony sexual assault of a 14-year-old girl.

According to a copyrighted story by Tony Messenger in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

Missouri state Rep. Scott Muschany, R-Frontenac, was indicted today in connection with a reported sexual assault of a 14-year-old girl on May 17, the day after this year’s Legislative session ended.

The alleged victim is the daughter of a state employee. The girl’s mother and Muschany -– who is married and has two children -- were romantically involved, the woman said.

A Cole County grand jury returned an indictment today charging Muschany with the Class C felony of "deviate sexual assault." The indictment identifies the victim only by initials. It says that on May 17, Muschany "had deviate sexual intercourse" with the girl, "knowing that he did so without" her consent.

If convicted, Muschany could face a fine of up to $5,000 and a prison term not to exceed 7 years.

The 2007 sex education bill, which was sponsored by Rep. Cynthia Davis, R-O'Fallon, called for "public school course materials and instruction on sexuality and sexually transmitted diseases to be presented to students in a way that portrays the personal, physical, emotional, financial, and psychological risks and consequences of sexual activity and is in accordance with the federal abstinence education law. Charter schools are allowed to determine the policies and the appropriateness of how to present the materials and instruction. School district or charter school personnel or agents are prohibited from providing, permitting, sponsoring, or furnishing abortion services, materials, or instruction to students if that person is a provider of abortion services.

Muschany is not seeking re-election.

Buchanan Under Fire
The Real News
August 21, 2008

ANP: Congressman Vern Buchanan's campaign is under fire as former employees accuse him of corruption

American News Project: Congressman Vern Buchanan, of the 13th district in Florida, is facing increasing trouble in his reelection campaign. A first-term congressman and a long-time autodealer, Buchanan is being sued by a remarkable number of former employees and customers at the very height of the campaign season. So far, seven separate legal complaints have been filed against Buchanan, accusing him of flouting campaign finance laws, defrauding banks and customers, and even smuggling undocumented immigrants into the country to work on his beachfront house. ANP traveled to Florida to investigate the story.

See Video Report

Palin's Daughter Pregnant, Campaign Announces
September 1, 2008 at 12:53 PM

Sarah Palin's 17-year-old , unmarried daughter is five months pregnant, the campaign has announced. Hoping to quell internet rumors about about her youngest son, Palin released the news about her daughter Bristol earlier today.

A statement released by the campaign said that Bristol Palin will keep her baby and marry the child's father. Bristol Palin is five months pregnant, and the baby is due in late December.

"Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned. We're proud of Bristol's decision to have her baby and even prouder to become grandparents," Sarah and Todd Palin said in the brief statement.

"Bristol and the young man she will marry are going to realize very quickly the difficulties of raising a child, which is why they will have the love and support of our entire family," they added.

Fighting rumors, Palin mislead the press about the pregnancy as late as Saturday. Editor and Publisher has the story.

When news broke, it had not yet been reported by her home state papers, which have often been the source for outside media for other background on Palin.

When the Anchorage Daily News did report the news today, it pointed out: "The Daily News had asked Palin's press secretary, Bill McAllister, over the weekend to address rumors that Bristol was pregnant. 'I don't know. I have no evidence that Bristol's pregnant,' he said on Saturday."

The McCain team asserted that he knew about the pregnancy when he selected Palin. She has five children and now a grandchild coming as she hits the campaign trail.

Does Hagee think Todd Palin is ‘worse than an infidel’?»

On MSNBC this morning, McCain campaign spokesperson Tucker Bounds touted the fact that Todd Palin is a “stay-at-home-dad.” Interestingly, radical cleric and erstwhile McCain endorser Rev. John Hagee insists that, in the Lord’s eyes, a stay-at-home-dad is “a bum” who is “worse than an infidel.” “Hell is your future home,” Hagee says. Watch it:

post #30 on this thread is misleading. The church that is talked about is not the church of the logo used to open up that post.

You are the first person I know to confuse Mormons and Evangelicals. They are nothing like each other. To use the logo of the LDS church when talking about an Evangelical is misleading. There is no way around that.

Now to your point about this whole thread. I agree. Just asking to present the argument in the most correct manner you can, otherwise the very people you are trying to change with a message like this will be "turned off" because they will see the misleading part and nothing else. You are basically shotting your message in the foot, unless you put this stuff up here just to hear cheerleading.