[Dialogue] Abramoff's Crimes Sign of Deeper Cesspool

Wed Jan 4 20:47:22 EST 2006

Colleagues, a sorrowful read. Peace, Harry 
  _____  

AlterNet

Abramoff's Crimes Sign of Deeper Cesspool

By Robert Scheer, AlterNet
Posted on January 4, 2006, Printed on January 4, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/30381/

Top Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff is set to sing, and his long list of
former buddies in Congress and the Bush Administration are quaking in
anticipation of possible indictments stemming from the consummate Beltway
hustler's crass reign as the king of K Street.

"Casino Jack," a former head of the College Republicans and a
"Pioneer"-grade fundraiser for the Bush 2000 campaign, pleaded guilty to
three felony counts of conspiracy, mail fraud and tax evasion in D.C.
yesterday and is set to appear in Florida today to plead guilty to fraud and
conspiracy on separate charges. Abramoff and other defendants also must
repay over $25 million to defrauded clients and $1.7 million to the IRS.

But most important for the nation is that Abramoff is now detailing the
massive web of corruption he spun inside the Beltway which has already
snared a top Bush official, procurement chief David H. Safavian, on charges
of lying and obstructing a criminal investigation, and reportedly threatens
dozens of other D.C. players.

"When this is all over, this will be bigger than any [government scandal] in
the last 50 years, both in the amount of people involved and the breadth to
it," Stan Brand, a former U.S. House counsel who specializes in representing
public officials accused of wrongdoing, told Bloomberg News. "It will
include high-ranking members of Congress and executive branch officials."

Some of the Wild West feel of this Beltway corruption was captured in
Saturday's Washington Post expose, "The DeLay-Abramoff Money Trail." It
documents in chilling detail how, among other scams, Abramoff funneled a
portion of the millions he had been skimming from Indian casino operators
with a cool million from two Russian energy moguls through a shell
organization called the U.S. Family Network -- and from there into the
coffers of politicians in a position to help his clients.

Ironically touting its commitment to "moral fitness" for the nation, the
front group with the multi-million dollar budget had a single staff member
housed in the backroom of a capital townhouse it owned and rented out to
other organizations linked to Abramoff and Tom DeLay -- the latter's
staffers called it, ominously, DeLay's "safe house." This is apparently why
DeLay felt the need to tout the U.S. Family Network in a 1999 fundraising
letter as "a powerful nationwide organization dedicated to restoring our
government to citizen control."

It was run by Edwin A. Buckham, DeLay's former chief of staff, whose
lobbying firm, the Alexander Strategy Group, carried Delay's wife Christine
on its payroll. But the moral "fitness" of such cronyism pales in comparison
to the scandal of how Abramoff drummed up support for his varied clients
under the cover of conservative morality.

For example, in order to block the ambitions of a rival tribe to the Choctaw
Indians who had paid Abramoff millions, the U.S. Family Network sent a
mailing to Alabama residents warning shrilly that, "The American family is
under attack from all sides: crime, drugs, pornography, and one of the least
talked about but equally as destructive -- gambling. We need your help today
to prevent the Poarch Creek Indians from building casinos in Alabama." The
letter conveniently failed to mention, however, that the U.S. Family Network
had received at least $250,000 from the gambling proceeds of the Choctaws.

In another scam detailed in the Post story (which could be quickly optioned
by Hollywood for a thriller), players in the mafia-dominated Russian energy
industry slid a cool $1 million payment through a now-defunct London law
firm into the U.S. Family Network's account -- which was, de facto, a slush
fund for the Abramoff-DeLay network.

Citing the Rev. Christopher Geeslin, who served as a titular leader of the
U.S. Family Network, the Post reported that Buckham told the reverend the
payment was intended to secure Delay's support on legislation forcing the
International Monetary Fund to bail out the faltering Russian economy
without demanding the country raise taxes on its energy and other profitable
industries. Right on cue, DeLay found his way onto Fox News Sunday to take
up the Russian's viewpoint: "They are trying to force Russia to raise taxes
at a time when they ought to be cutting taxes in order to get a loan from
the IMF," he said. "That's just outrageous." The IMF backed down.

This is just an initial peek into the sordid world being revealed by
Abramoff and two of his key cronies now spilling the beans to federal
investigators. But in the bigger picture, what we are witnessing is the
death throes of the GOP "revolution" which once promised to restore morality
to Washington but instead sank far deeper into the cesspool of corruption. 

Robert Scheer is the co-author of The Five
<http://www.alternet.org/fivelies/>  Biggest Lies Bush Told Us About Iraq. 

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