Wampum

Yesterday, I wrote about former McCain nemesis Grover Norquist's capitulation to the Straight-Talk Express, clearly in exchange for McCain subverting the Senate Indian Affairs Committee investigation into Jack Abramoff, but I'd forgotten about the third Musketeer, Ralph Reed. Fortunately, at least one other blogger has McCain's SIAC misdeeds on her radar:

CNN's last debate before Super Tuesday gave overt preference to John McCain and Mitt Romney, while Ron Paul, and Mike Huckabee were given precious little time to speak.

This is the same CNN that has recently placed the former director of Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition, Ralph Reed behind a CNN news desk as a news analyst.

Such realizations were simultaneously odd and seemingly unrelated, until I looked closer at "Honest" John McCain, Candidate for President of the United States of America.

As chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, John McCain directed the Congressional investigation of the Indian gaming scandal which stole over $80 million from American Indian Tribes. The scandal led to the imprisonment of Lobbyist Jack Abramoff, Congressman Bob Ney (R-OH), and a number of other lobbyists and federal officials, yet some people criticized McCain for failing to call people like Ralph Reed (who were near the center of the scam) before the committee to testify.

As a result of this investigation, McCain refers to himself as an "agent of change," yet he limited the scope of the gaming investigation to lobbyists' improper gifts. Now if the lobbyists were guilty of giving improper gifts, trips and money, a natural follow-up question for McCain could have been, "who received those gifts?" Why were members of Congress (usually the recipients of such favors) not investigated? Why wasn't Ralph Reed brought before the McCain investigation? After all, wasn't he paid $4 million to shut down an Indian casino by Reed's friend and convicted felon, Jack Abramoff?

As I tried to answer my own questions, I found that McCains' reluctance to get to the bottom of the scandal is predictable, especially in light of how McCain has financed his political career.

Maybe Ralph Reed will raise such questions to McCain as a news analyst for "the most trusted name in news," CNN.

Why is Reed at CNN instead of in prison with Abramoff?

Posted by MB Williams at 10:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

And most likely, criminal.

First, a bit of a recap.

Back in 2004, despite NOT being the chairman of the committee, John McCain took control of the investigation on Senate Indian Affairs into Jack Abramoff's purchase of influence over Interior Department officials for his lobbying clients. In fact, McCain's announcement of opening the investigation sent then Chairman Ben Nighthorse Campbell into the emergency room with chest pains. See, Campbell knew Abramoff was key in a whole host of Republican scandals, and even scratching the surface was likely to send more than a few corrupt GOP partisans to jail. A few days after his heart-attack scare (turned out to be indigestion,) Campbell announced his retirement from the Senate. McCain, however, undaunted by his colleague's concerns, pressed ahead and subpeonaed nearly 20,000 emails and documents from Greenberg Traurig, Abramoff's lobbying firm. Abramoff, it turns out, was one of the Bush operatives behind the 2000 South Carolina smear campaign against McCain, and McCain has always been known to hold a grudge. It would take some mighty exceptional reparations to mitigate the sting of the 2000 campaign, and McCain soon found he held all the chips.

Less than two months after subpoenaing Abramoff's documents, and in the midst of George Bush's 2004 re-election campaign, McCain's chief adviser, John Weaver, met secretly with Karl Rove to "iron out their differences." McCain was apparently pleased enough with the negotiations to hit the campaign trail with Bush in June, a month after the Weaver-Rove meeting. At the same time, McCain began to quash the investigation into Abramoff in the Senate Indian Affairs committee. Within a few months, rumors abound that McCain was now Bush's chosen successor for 2008.

But even the title of heir apparent didn't completely wash away of the pain of 2000, especially when McCain realized that his long-time nemesis, Grover Norquist, was Abramoff's partner-in-crime. After the November election, McCain turned up the heat on Norquist, threatening him with subpoenas for documents and testimony before the Committee. Norquist just thumbed his nose at McCain, and in the end, must have held too many aces in his pocket, as McCain never called him before the committee, despite very damning evidence of criminal activity.

But it now appears the ever-defiant Norquist succumbed to extortion as well. This morning, I came across this tidbit buried in a NY Times piece on McCain:

Since his victory in the Florida primary, the growing possibility that Mr. McCain may carry the Republican banner in November is causing anguish to the right. Some, including James C. Dobson and Rush Limbaugh, say it is far too late for forgiveness.

But others, faced with the prospect of either a Democrat sitting in the White House or a Republican elected without them, are beginning to look at Mr. McCain's record in a new light.

"He has moved in the right direction strongly and forcefully on taxes," said Grover Norquist, an antitax organizer who had been the informal leader of conservatives against a McCain nomination, adding that he had been talking to Mr. McCain's "tax guys" for more than a year.

The conversion is complete. John McCain subverted justice to gain the crown. Long live the king.

(NB: Here is the longer version I wrote back in 2006, when I first discovered the Weaver-Rove meeting, incorporated into the larger issue of the Indian Trust scandal.)

Posted by MB Williams at 11:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Statement by Elouise Cobell, Lead Plaintiff, Cobell vs. Kempthorne

BROWNING, MONT., Jan. 30 -- Elouise Cobell, lead plaintiff in the class action lawsuit over the federal government's mismanagement of the individual Indian Trust, expressed delight with today's ruling by U.S. District Judge James Robertson in the 11-year-old litigation.

"This is a great day in Indian Country," she said after the judge's ruling was released in Washington. "We've argued for over ten years that the government is unable to fulfill its duty to render an adequate historical accounting, much less redress the historical wrongs heaped upon the individual Indian trust beneficiaries. Instead of truthfully seeking to remedy the government's admitted historical mismanagement, the government elected to fight plaintiffs every step of the way.

Judge Robertson has settled the debate in favor of plaintiffs and found that an adequate historical accounting is, in fact, impossible. "Plaintiffs look forward to Judge Robertson's scheduling of a hearing 'determining an appropriate remedy' in light of their [government's] failure to render the court-ordered accounting."

In his ruling, Judge Robertson declared: "My conclusion that Interior is unable to perform an adequate accounting of the IIM [Individual Indian Money] Trust does not mean that a just resolution of this dispute is hopeless. It does mean that a remedy must be found for the Department's unrepaired, and irreparable, breach of its fiduciary duty over the last century. And it does mean that the time has come to bring this suit to a close."

For additional information:
Bill McAllister
703-385-6996 (media only)

Posted by EBW at 06:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Freudenthal went with the right-wing nutcase:

John Barrasso new U.S. Senator from Wyoming
Friday, June 22, 2007

This morning Governor Dave Freudenthal announced the appointment of state senator John Barrasso to the United States Senate seat vacated by the death of Senator Craig Thomas.

Barrasso is an othopaedic surgeon from Casper who has served in the Wyoming Senate, as Wyoming Republican Party Committeeman and Treasurer, among other positions.

Well, well, well, I was wrong. Maybe this means Sansonetti's indictment is closer than we know.

Posted by MB Williams at 01:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)