Laundering Ralph Reed – Commentary by Jim Dean

Folks,
It has taken a little time but they finally are getting around to using the "L word".

The retired intelligence community people have watched all this with a bit of humor, all this massive investigation of what they could see instantly was a well oiled money laundering scheme. And it was a pretty good one at that.

Religious and other non profits were used as fronts to launder the Indian casino cash into political operations. They married the most powerful political leaders, like DeLay...old friends like Ralph Reed and Grover Norquist...trusted staff members like DeLay's Rudy...and even their wives. Abramoff was what is called in the Intel biz as the 'cutout', the make believe independent.

They never conceived that anyone could lay a glove on them. All that power, money, those life long relationships, top aides, wives....where would they find a thread they could pull? That thread was Abramoff, who went crazy.

The wife thing was used because spouses cannot be made to testify against each other. But they can be used as bargaining tools to get a plea and make someone roll over. I can promise you that the Feds are squeezing Rudy, Delay's ex chief of staff, that they will bury his wife under a ton of years if he does not roll over on DeLay. His wife, by the way, got $50,000 a month from Abramoff on one of their half million dollar deals.

When you see these people proclaiming that they have done nothing wrong, they may actually be telling you the truth about how they feel. In their world/minds, doing this is not wrong...if it is them doing it. If it were you and I...well...that would be a different matter.

It's called elitism, and the country is rife with it, from the Dems or the Repubs...religious sanctimonious pundits...chambers of commerce...multinational conglomerates...to old retread civil rights dinosaurs (or their wives now). They all think they should be able to do whatever they damn will please because they are superior beings and this is their right.

This is not a new problem. What has changed is that once upon a time we used to have honest crooks. They were crooks, knew it, and never pretended to be anything else. Today's crooks...well...they don't like the crook label. They prefer to be considered community, religious or political leaders and representatives.

Crookdom and K-street lobbyists decided to shack up at the Watergate. Abramoff ran back and forth to the drug store for the condoms, keeping the change, and we got _____. Well, you know what we got.

Whether we are tired of it or not...we shall see.

Jim Dean is the producer of Heritage TV and a member of the Georgia Heritage Council.

Source: Cox News Service Story Panel begins new inquiry on ex-lobbyist Cox News Service WASHINGTON — Another Senate panel is considering investigating whether ex-lobbyist Jack Abramoff abused nonprofit groups that were linked to his influence-peddling operation. The Senate Finance Committee, which recently obtained documents in the Abramoff case from the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, will review the documents as part of its “ongoing, broad-scale look at whether tax-exempt groups are misused for financial or political gain,” said a statement released by the committee’s chairman, Sen. Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican. The possible new line of inquiry — reported Tuesday in Roll Call, a paper that circulates on Capitol Hill — could have repercussions for Ralph Reed, a former ally of Abramoff who is running for lieutenant governor in Georgia. Reed received as much as $5 million in fees for running anti-gambling campaigns in Alabama, Louisiana and Texas. At least some of that money was funneled through private groups, such as Americans for Tax Reform, founded by another longtime Abramoff political ally, Grover Norquist. It was later disclosed that the source of those payments to Reed was money from casino-owning Indian tribes, Abramoff clients who wanted to tamp down competition. Reed, who rose to political prominence as leader of the Christian Coalition’s Washington operation before moving to Georgia to become a Republican consultant and past state party chairman, repeatedly has denied any knowledge of the source of the funds. Abramoff has pleaded guilty to several charges of conspiracy and corruption as part of a scheme that defrauded Indian tribes of millions of dollars in overcharges. The Senate Indian Affairs Committee has led the congressional investigation so far, and heard testimony from some involved in the lobbying scandal.