The rolling American political scandals 2006 thread

- George Allen (R-VA) called an East Asian student "macaca" at a campaign event, which sounds offensive. Both he and his opponent have also been accused of being racist in the past, but I am not entirely clear on this one.

- Don Sherwood (R-PA) choked his mistress in an apartment. His wife wrote a creepy letter saying "nah, we cool."

- A woman made a 911 call from a Starbucks bathroom saying that Jim Gibbons, a Republican running for governor in Nevada, was trying to rape her.

- Curt Weldon (R-PA) and his daughter had their houses raided and are being investigated by the Justice Department for influence-peddling and arms-dealing in Eastern Europe.

- Bob Ney (R-PA) plead guilty to accepting bribes from Jack Abramoff, but has not resigned from his seat in Congress. There are also tons of other Abramoff things I'm missing.

- Heather Wilson (R-NM), a member of the same Congressional Missing and Exploited Children's caucus that Foley was head of, destroyed a file saying that her husband had tried to have sex with a 16-year-old back when she was the Secretary of the New Mexico Children, Youth and Families Department. She also served for three years on the Congressional Page Board.

- And everyone's pushing the rumor that Jerry Weller (R-IL) had sex with a female page. Weller is married to the daughter of the miltary dictator of Guatemala. This may not turn out to be true, but...how bout that marriage, huh?

Here's another scandal:

Ohio Senate candidate Sherrod Brown didn't pay his taxes! Oh wait... the RNC made that one up.

Antoin "Tony" Rezko, 51, also is charged in a separate indictment with aiding millionaire campaign contributor Stuart Levine to squeeze investment firms seeking state business for kickbacks. A hearing on those charges was set for late Thursday afternoon.

Bond on the first charge was set at $1.5 million.

Rezko was arrested Thursday at O'Hare International Airport after he returned from Syria to face charges of fraud and extortion, federal officials said.

Rezko, whom Blagojevich has described as a friend, as well as a fundraiser, was born in Syria and moved to the U.S. as a teen. The father of three, who lives in suburban Wilmette, has no prior criminal record.

Rezko is accused of mail fraud, wire fraud and other charges in an elaborate scheme to squeeze millions of dollars out of companies, including a $1.5 million contribution to "a certain public official" from a company seeking state business. A person familiar with the investigation, who spoke only on condition of anonymity because the probe is ongoing, has said the unnamed public official is Blagojevich.

The indictments came more than a year after federal authorities began investigating allegations of fraudulent hiring practices by top officials in the governor's office. The governor has not been charged with any crime and has denied wrongdoing.

Levine has been under two indictments in the federal investigation of state government corruption. His attorney, Jeffrey B. Steinback, has said he is cooperating and expects to plead guilty. Joseph J. Duffy, Rezko's attorney, has said that the attempt to shake down investment firms never happened and was made up by Levine.

"But Reid has nothing on House Republicans, who appear to be perfecting the art of "earmarking" money in federal spending bills to boost their real estate interests. Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) earmarked funds for construction of a parkway near land he owned, which he later sold for a $2-million profit. Rep. Charles H. Taylor (R-N.C.) directed $11.4 million in federal funds to a highway-widening project that just happened to make it easier to get to resort acreage and subdivisions that he owns. Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Corona) directed federal money to projects near his Riverside County property that he later sold for about twice the purchase price. Earmarking in another highway bill put $1.28 million to work improving land near a development owned in part by Rep. Gary G. Miller (R-Diamond Bar)."

State investigators on Friday searched the campaign office of a Republican congressional candidate whose campaign mailed thousands of intimidating letters to Hispanic immigrant voters.

About 10 uniformed California Department of Justice agents arrived with a search warrant and could be seen opening cabinets, scouring desks and packing up a computer inside the storefront campaign office of Tan D. Nguyen, a Vietnamese immigrant trying to unseat a popular Democratic incumbent.

Nguyen has acknowledged that his campaign sent the letter, which wrongly said immigrants could be jailed if they vote. But he has resisted calls from leaders in his own party to quit the race, saying he did not approve the letter and had not known about it.

Cannonfire has been busy connecting the dots around Weller and manages to link in fundamentalist organizations, Oliver Stone, and the Clinton destabilization efforts.

http://www.chicagoreader.com/features/stories/jerryweller/

!!!

Closeted candidates, lying under oath, illegal land deals, etc.

Take yer pick.

“I am innocent, and there is no way in hell that I am going to withdraw,” Nguyen said. “I am not going to quit this race, and I am going to win this race.”