Former defense contractor and current convicted criminal Mitchell Wade spent $2,800 on a dinner with Rep. Katherine Harris (R-FL) and offered to throw a campaign fundraiser for her as he was attempting to gain her support for $10 million in federal money, according to the Orlando Sentinel. House rules prohibit members from accepting any gift or meal worth more than $50 from corporate officials or lobbyists. Harris also received $32,000 in illegal campaign contributions from Wade. Harris' explanation for the dinner has been less than satisfactory:
In her interview Wednesday, Harris acknowledged for the first time that Wade had paid for the dinner at Citronelle, reversing a statement from her congressional spokeswoman earlier this year. But in the interview, Harris also said her campaign had, at some point, "reimbursed" the restaurant. When asked how she could have reimbursed a business that was owed no money -- Wade paid the bill that evening -- she abruptly ended the interview and walked off. Her spokesman called back an hour later and asked a reporter not to publish anything Harris had said Wednesday night about the dinner. On Thursday, Harris' campaign released a two-paragraph statement that differed from her explanation a day earlier. It stated that Harris thought her "campaign would be reimbursing" her share of the meal but later found out that hadn't happened. To resolve any questions, the statement said, "I have donated to a local Florida charity $100 which will more than adequately compensate for the cost of my beverage and appetizer."The meal was so expensive because Mitchell Wade's favorite wine happens to be a $1,000 bottle of French bordeaux. Harris clearly should not have let Wade open that wine as Massie Ritsch of the Center for Responsive Politics put it: "Once the Bordeaux is out of the bottle ... you can't put it back." And finally, the key sentence to take away from the story: "The Department of Justice would not discuss the details of that night." Continue reading
Mid-Morning News:
- If you're looking for a job you might want to become friends with Rep. Curt Weldon (R-PA), says Ken Silverstein at the new Harpers.org blog. Or you could become one of his daughters.
- Another U.S. contractor in Iraq pleads guilty, this time for bribery. According to the Washington Post, "Philip H. Bloom admitted his part in a scheme to give more than $2 million in cash and gifts to U.S. officials in exchange for their help in getting reconstruction contracts for his companies. Bloom's firms won $8.6 million in reconstruction deals, with an average profit margin of more than 25 percent."
- Tom DeLay is like Waldo. He's in every page (scandal) - you just have to look hard enough to find him. From the Houston Chronicle. Continue reading
Coming soon!
We are certainly in count down mode here, battening down all our hatches for our launch next Wednesday. We're putting the final initial touches on the Congresspedia. We're lining up an extensive ad buy -- buying space on 175 blogs, ranging from Talking Points Memo and Daily Kos to Real Clear Politics and Blogs For Bush and buying the name of every single member of Congress on Google ad words! Our press kits will include really nifty Congresspedia mouse pads which surely we will use later as prizes. Bill Allison is working hard on just the right initial distributed journalism assignment and Larry Makinson is polishing his first tutorial on money and politics. Paul Blumenthal has been reading widely for his feature In Broad Daylight, our one stop must-read for what's being reported today on what's happening in Congress. There's more to report but have to keep this short because I am being bugged by our communication team -- Group Gordon -- to make some pre-press calls. More later!
Continue reading27,000 to 1:
Yikes, I wouldn't want to face those kind of numbers. According to the Sacramento Bee, Rep. John Doolittle (R-CA) is going to have to:
Rep. John Doolittle's practice of paying a 15 percent fundraising commission to a company owned by his wife violates the ethical standards of the industry, a national group of fundraising professionals told the congressman this week. The 27,000-member Association of Fundraising Professionals said in a letter to Doolittle that its long-standing ethics code "explicitly prohibits percentage-based compensation" and urged his campaign to cease doing so with Julie Doolittle's company, Sierra Dominion Financial Solutions.Of course, Doolittle's top aide and political advisor Ricahrd Robinson says that their percentage-based compensation is "common in the industry, but it is consistent with the history of Congressman Doolittle's own campaigns." The head of the Association thinks otherwise:
Association head Paulette Maehara said she was so alarmed when she read the campaign's explanation for the practice in a weekend story in the Washington Post that she wrote Doolittle's office to complain. She said she also would have written Julie Doolittle except that her company is not publicly listed. "This is absolutely not the standard in the industry," she said. "Fundraisers can charge a flat fee, an hourly fee or a combination of both. We do support incentive compensation as long as it is not based on the percentage of the money raised."The controversy surrounding Julie Doolittle's fundraising, which has netted her $180,000 in commissioned fees since 2003, may cause her to move to a flat rate fee. Continue reading
Ryan Fallout:
Patrick Collins, prosecuting attorney in the Gov. George Ryan corruption case: "Public officials have a duty of honest services; that is, to serve the people and not their private interests. Anybody who hears this, if they want to serve their private interest, they ought to go get a job in the private sector." Read more reactions to Ryan's conviction and what it means for politics and Illinois in this Chicago Tribune article.
Continue readingThree Cities, Three Scandals:
Here's an interesting piece in Slate comparing the three scandals of Abramoff, Pellicano, and Jared Paul Stern and how they each reflect on their respective city. Of course, here in Washington we could care less about wiretapped Hollywood stars or bribery on Page Six. But we do care about influence being bought and sold:
Washington's scandal is about influence, a commodity bought and sold there as it is nowhere else. ... Much as his former colleagues may try to deny it, Abramoff's practices were not a departure from the way Washington ordinarily does business, but rather a too-brazen expression of it. Nearly all lobbyists-for-hire brandish their connections at the White House and on Capitol Hill to impress their clients. They grease the skids with campaign donations, favors, and fancy entertainment. Stylistically, they tend to echo Abramoff's ostentatious religious piety, his humorless self-regard, his regrettable wardrobe choices. Though a horrible cartoon, Abramoff also represents the reality of Bush's Washington. His distinguishing, fatal error was to draw too much attention to himself while doing on a grander scale what thousands do there every day.Continue reading
PAC appeal
George F. Will's interesting column, on the race to fill the open seat in Colorado's seventh district, brought to mind a piece of paper that crossed my desk a few weeks back. It's a fax, much like the dozens of others that are sent each week to the offices of Washington's lobbying firms and Political Action Committee directors, asking the insiders in the corridors of power to pony up money. First the Will column: If I can give a Cliff notes version of it, it goes something like, "A true Reaganite conservative is facing a Republican base demoralized by Congress' big spending, President Bush's big spending and missteps (i.e., Harriet Miers abortive Supreme Court nomination), but still might win because the bitter primary fight between the two Democratic hopefuls, Ed Perlmutter and Peggy Lamm, are wearing each other out in the run up to the August 8th primary.
Continue readingDon’t Let the Door Hit You…:
The title from the Texas Monthly political obit of Tom DeLay.
Continue readingNationals Suffer From Abramoff Fallout:
Hilarious article by Buster Gunning on the empty luxury suites at Washington Nationals games since "king of lobbyists" Jack Abramoff's fall from grace. Here's a key graph:
Washington Nationals' officials are scrambling to figure out a way to fill the expensive suites. One idea that saw marginal success was the “Adopt a Politician for a Day” campaign where various politicians in need of kickbacks lined up outside of the stadium in hopes of being auctioned off to the highest bidder who would then purchase one of the many lavish suites available.Continue reading
DeLay Conspiracy Charge Thrown Out:
An appeals court judge has thrown out a conspiracy charge brought against Rep. Tom DeLay (R-TX) but has maintained the more serious charge of money laundering, according to the Associated Press. Paul Kiel at TPM Muckraker writes, "The appeals court's decision clears the way for a trial date being set. The main event shouldn't be far off -- I'd expect it sometime in late summer." They have the indictment if you'd like to read it.
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