Big Media Spreads the Lie that Abramoff is a Bi-Partisan Scandal

Yes I cringe every time I hear the supposedly liberal, Buish-hating media get this one wrong, and claim that Democrats are involved as well.

This is not a bi-partisan scandal. It only involves the GOP.

Though I wouldn't really care if it was bi-partisan. Whovever partook should be made to pay for the crime.

 

Jim Lehr mentioned Harry reid's invlovement last night. what party does he belong to? and is PBS part of the vast right wing conspiracy, you know, the one that includes Chris Matthews?

 

I don't claim a right wing conspiracy. I just assert there isn't a liberal one.

Jim Lehr is among the best there is. Chris Matthews is far from liberal in his reporting. He never did stop spreading the Myth that Al Gore claimed to have invented the internet. Even after the paper that originally reported it had to issue a retraction, Chris Matthews kept it up. He kept up the line about Kerry voting for the 87 billion(correct vote as events turned out) before he voted against it.(correct again for Kerry as history has shown.) He laughed about that just the other day. Mathews certainly isn't part of any liberal media bias.

 

What is for sale in Washington? Who are lobbyists trying to influence?

People who have the power and access to the president.

Abramoff would have rather cut off his testicles than to give money to the democrats.

And yet the republicans are doing everything to convince Americans that this is a bipartisan scandal.

Please

Sadly Joe America laps it up with a spoon.

I just don’t understand for the life of me why the “liberal media” is doing everything they can to perpetuate the lie.

 

AMEN. This type of reporting gives credibility to "junk science" such as intelligent design or astrology, since journalists keep saying "shouldn't we teach/accept both sides?" Not when one side is blatantly against the facts. It's like saying we should teach 2+2=5 alongside 2+2=4 in math class because hey, we have to cover both sides!

 

That article doesn't make clear what crime took place. It just says he persuaded Indian tribes to pay him large sums of money to be an advisor. What was the actual crime/scandal?

 

No offense, but this story has been in the media for months and you don't know what it's about?

Abramoff defrauded the Indian tribes that he represented. Even though he lobbied for the tribes, he paid off anti-gambling lobbyists to lobby for the opposite cause. He also diverted money from the tribes to other causes against the tribes' wishes.

 

a mcjosh post, this was posted in November of last year --

Would you like to join our 'Nice Try' brigade?

Let me explain.

There is one Democratic member of Congress who is currently the target of a Justice Department investigation, Rep. William Jefferson of New Orleans. There are also various Democrats who received money from Jack Abramoff or his many clients.

But let's get real. The Abramoff story is overwhelmingly a Republican scandal. Abramoff's whole racket was as a paymaster and slush-funder for the DC GOP machine.

Then there are the half-a-dozen Republican members of Congress being investigated for criminal infractions arising out of the Abramoff investigation. Then there are all their staffers.

Then there is Abramoff-Norquist associate David Safavian, chief of procurement at OMB who was arrested and indicted for deceiving investigators in the Abramoff case.

Then there are the GOP capos who skimmed money off the Abramoff geyser or laundered money for him, folks like Grover Norquist and Ralph Reed.

The Duke Cunningham scandal is a Republican scandal, which we'll soon see spreads into the Rumsfeld Defense Department.

The Abramoff scandal tracks into the Interior Department and the GSA.

Then there's Tom DeLay, remember him, former House Majority Leader, now under indictment in Texas. Set aside that he's also implicated in the Abramoff scandal and quite probably the Duke Cunningham scandal as well.

And then in the other body you've got Sen. Bill Frist who is at the center of a criminal investigation into his stock sales. Frist is actually sort of unique in that it's possible he may not be guilty.

Two Republican members of Congress are under indictment.

Prosecutors have already accused two of taking bribes.

These few examples only scratch the surface. And I've left aside the Fitzgerald investigation because it doesn't turn on money but pure old-fashioned abuse of power.

Yet, Republican media types have been leaning hard yesterday and today on reporters to push the bipartisan corruption line, even though the simple facts of the case simply give no basis for it whatsoever.

It's actually close to laughable.

The simple truth is that Democrats in Washington today just aren't in a position to be corrupt on any serious scale for a simple reason: public corruption is almost always about selling power. Got no power and you've just got nothing to sell. Any idiot can understand that.

The level of public corruption coming to the surface in Washington today is not unprecedented. But there's a pretty good argument that you have to go back more than a hundred years to find anything comparable. And it's almost entirely limited to one party, the Republican party, because it all grows out of the same political machine.

But Republicans are pushing their line. And lots of reporters, not wanting trouble, are doing their best to comply.

Like I said, it's almost laughable.

So let's laugh at them.

Find us the best quotes you can of reporters, pundits, commentators and whoever else trying to minimize the undeniable partisan dimension to the multiple and overlapping scandals breaking out all over Washington, DC. We'll post the top ten. Send them to the regular comments email with the headline "Nice Try Brigade".

-- Josh Marshall
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_11_27.php#007132

 

follow the money:

http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=20&artnum=1&issue=20060130

--
Investor's Business Daily
Issues & Insights
The Money Trail

Posted 1/30/2006

Scandal: Sen. Harry Reid has been found with his hands in the Abramoff cookie jar. But is the problem too many lobbyists buying influence or that there is too much influence to buy?

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean, hoping like most Democrats that charges of corruption and the depiction of Republicans as the party of Jack Abramoff will help them retake the House or Senate or both, said on "Fox News Sunday": "No Democrat delivered anything, and there's no accusation and no investigation that any Democrat ever delivered anything to Jack Abramoff."

Ah, but there is, as host Chris Wallace dutifully pointed out.

He asked Dean, "If we find that there were some Democrats who wrote letters on behalf of some of the Indian tribes that Abramoff represented, then what do you say, sir?" Dean responded: "Those Democrats are in trouble" and "they should be in trouble."

As Wallace hinted, one of "those Democrats" is Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid from Nevada, who, when interviewed by Wallace in December about acting on behalf of an Abramoff client who later donated to a Reid-sponsored political group, testily responded: "Don't try to say I received money from Abramoff. I've never met the man, don't know anything."

When Wallace persisted, Reid shot back: "Make sure that all your viewers understand — not a penny from Abramoff. I've been on the Indian Affairs Committee my whole time in the Senate."

What viewers should understand is that a little-noticed AP story last November showed that Reid accepted thousands of dollars from an Abramoff client — the Coushatta Indian tribe.

The Coushattas sent a $5,000 check to Reid's tax-exempt political group, the Searchlight Leadership Fund, the day after Reid interceded via letter with Interior Secretary Gale Norton over a casino dispute with a rival tribe. A second tribe represented by Abramoff sent an additional $5,000 to Reid's group. Reid in total received more than $66,000 in Abramoff-related contributions between 2001 and 2004.

Before the Democrats get on their high horse regarding GOP finance scandals, let us remember that 90% of Senate Democrats took money linked to "Republican" lobbyist Jack Abramoff. That includes nearly $100,000 by Sen. John Kerry and $12,950 by fellow presidential wannabe Hillary Clinton.

As the sad case of Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham, Vietnam fighter pilot and "Top Gun" inspiration, reveals, political corruption is a human condition, not a political one. Absolute power does in fact corrupt absolutely.

Yes, lobbyist-driven contributions have been growing by leaps and bounds. But the cold fact is that during the same period, every facet of American business and American life has been subjected to increasing regulation regarding the environment, hiring practices, workplace hazards, ad infinitum.

The less power politicians have over the economy, the less incentive there is to influence their decisions. The less government spending there is, the less incentive there is to influence how money is spent — and to whom it goes.

Perhaps we should revisit the idea of term limits. There would be less temptation to influence the decision of someone who might not be there next year. The problem is particularly acute in the House of Representatives which, with its gerrymandered districts, has become a veritable House of Lords.

Or perhaps we could simply limit the fundraising that senators and congressman do to residents of their own district or state.

By far the best reform would be to let anybody give any amount to any candidate or related committee. They would just have to disclose it, immediately, on the Internet. As we've said before, nothing disinfects like sunlight.

Return to top of page


© Investor's Business Daily, Inc. 2000-2006. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction or redistribution is prohibited without prior authorized permission from Investor's Business Daily. For information on reprints, webprints, permissions or back issue orders, go to www.investors.com/terms/reprints.asp.

 

That isn't even close to being the same thing. As the original article pointed out Indian tribes were lobbying congressment before JA got involved, and it even lessened after JA got involved. However it didn't stop completely. Harry Reid could be in trouble depending on what letter he wrote, and what the tribe had lobbied for etc. But that still doesn't make the Abramoff scandal bi-partisan. The only link this article tries to make is the same one that is brought up and disspelled in the original article.

 

You guys on the left amaze me with the way you're pulling the hood over your eyes on this one.

 

I've said from the beginning of all of this, "let the chips fall where they may."

If Reid is involved, he should be convicted.

 

A synopsis of indictments or convictions.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/grandolddocket.php

 

Like I said, I don't care if a Democrat is involved. If they are they should go to jail.

What I disapprove of is the media saying that it is a bi-partisan scandal when so far only one party is involved.

 

The money, in the form of direct campaign contributions by Abramoff, is not the scandal here. This is small change. Donations made by Indian tribes are legal, whether given to Democrats or Republicans. Again this is not the scandal.

The real crimes that are going to be sending people to jail and ending political careers involve phony charities and other organizations set up by Abramoff to launder huge contributions that were then used to send Republican politicians and their staff on lavish junkets, pay salaries to their spouses for non-existent work, etc.

And when this all shakes out, you’re not going to see a single Democrat that gets indicted because they were simply not involved with the Abramoff machine at this level.

One of the key characteristics of the Republican K Street project was to EXCLUDE Democrats from this influence peddling process.

 

Jesus, thank you Glynch!

THE PROBLEM IS THAT HE TOLD THE TRIBES NOT TO GIVE TO DEMOCRATS AND USED HIS INFLUENCE WITH THE GOP BACKSLAP BRIGADE TO CASH IN...THank you K Street Project