Journalists are breaking new ground in the GOP scheme to use the DOJ as a Republican machine to target a major tier of Democratic campaign money: Trial Attorneys.
If sufficiently flushed out and advanced over the next several months, the story, a pattern of at best questionable prosecutions, can be expected to become a major corruption scandal just in time for 2008 elections.
Follow the prosecutions. As in if you know of prosecutions that smell in your area by U.S. Attys, send tips to: scott@harpers.org.
Scott Horton, a human rights atty and writer at Harper’s, has been breaking new ground for months.
Horton’s latest piece, A Minor Injustice: Why Paul Minor?, nails Mississippi and the nexus of a corrupt Mississippi press and a corrupt GOP legal-political machine.
The actual charges filed were almost incomprehensible. Several public integrity prosecutors with whom I conferred told me they were unfamiliar of any similar case raising charges quite like these. They were called “strange,” and “perhaps unique.” Most public corruption cases revolve on a quid pro quo: a public official is asked to do something for some form of compensation or reward. But in these cases there is no quid pro quo, and none is ever alleged.
Horton references a July 26, 2004 NYT piece, “DEVELOPING THE STRATEGIES: FUND-RAISING; Edwards Returns $44,000 In Donations” by RICHARD A. OPPEL JR. AND GLEN JUSTICE.
Senator John Edwards returned $44,000 in campaign contributions on Saturday after learning that the prominent corporate lawyer in Los Angeles who raised the money is facing misdemeanor campaign-finance charges in California.
Turns out that the prosecution before our very eyes in 2004 stinks to high heaven. Writes Horton:
"The Times notes that Paul Minor was the tenth largest donor to John Edwards, with donations totaling $129,000, and it also notes that almost every major attorney donor to the Edwards campaign mysteriously became the target of an aggressive Justice Department criminal investigation."
The prosecutions as they happened over the last several years went reported but unnoticed and unlinked to any suggestions of a political program. Now, that the DoJ has been heavily implicated as a politcal arm of the Bush administration, people are looking into the DoJ, and so should we.
Time magazine has a major piece on corrupt DoJ practices in Alabama (that Horton has covered as well), and that was recently featured at Daily Kos.
To no one's surprise, Karl Rove is the corrupt mastermind. See Karl Rove is the corrupt villain.
Now Karl Rove, the President's top political strategist, has been implicated in the controversy. A longtime Republican lawyer in Alabama swears she heard a top G.O.P. operative in the state say that Rove "had spoken with the Department of Justice" about "pursuing" Siegelman, with help from two of Alabama's U.S. attorneys.
Let's hope that we see more flushing out of the extent of the DoJ program to target democrats.
Investigations by the Congressional Committees on the Judiciary have been blocked by the DoJ and can be expected to be continued to be obstructed. This story will reach the American people via the press only.
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I know Paul Minor. I know for a fact, he did the crime, and he should do the time. He knew he was bribing a judge, because he told me how it was done and that the judge owed the favor. End of story.
ReplyDeleteCareful Tidy. Such baseless accusations, in some countries, result themselves in prosecution.
ReplyDeleteYou may wish to reread the column referenced:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.harpers.org/archive/2007/10/hbc-90001343
And read what charges were actually filed, in light of what objective, non-corrupt discretion would call for in bringing indictments.
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