It’s 9:21 pm and the Boston Globe has published nada on the US Supreme Court overturning the conviction of slime-ball former Virginia governor Bob McDonnell’s conviction for violation of the honest services law. Funny the Globe is front and center with the abortion decision and the gun decision but unlike the other big-time-big-city-broadsheets the Globe acts as if it missed the decision or it is not an important decision.
That’s funny because this decision has castrated Fred Wyshak and his hard-on for creating criminal acts by spinning yarns from well-selected threads of statements, hearsay information, relationships, innuendos, routine and ministerial acts, vengeful opportunities, self-serving deeds and bold face lies.
It has also ruined the Globe’s threat of federal indictment each time it gets a hard-on for wanting more than character assassinations and spins one-sided yarns from well-selected threads of statements, hearsay information, relationships, innuendos, routine and ministerial acts, vengeful opportunities, self-serving deeds and bold face lies.
The decision is unanimous and clear.
This should end his crazy grand jury still hovering over the legislature. Fred Dog wants to indict everyone who voted for Speaker Deleo then somewhere down the line got a wink and a nod from him. Bye Bye Fred.
And now will see The Probation Three’s convictions vacated. Hahahahaha Fred.
How can Fred head the public corruption unit now when he would actually have to look for public corruption? He has no clue. He’s too busy chasing the demons of Irish Catholic kids beating the shit out of him when he was kid or something like that. Anyway, the gestapo in Boston has been weaken some. And that’s a good. thing.
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I take it you people have no problem with WASP-Republican-Yankee-Upper-Crust- Nepostism while I’m sure you’re outraged that Jack O’Brien is innocent of federal crimes because he hired someone on the recommendation of a politician.
Yet here he have a governor giving three of the seven positions on the states top court to people connected through relationships (literally) and taken together show a complete fuck-you attitude and disrespect to the oldest appellate court in the world, our Supreme Judicial Court.
None have appeals court experience. One is the husband of Virginia Buckingham, another the daughter of Wayne Budd, and last a former prosecutor/ friend of Bill Weld’s who’s been sitting in the trial court.
But if someone gets a down-on-their-luck-friend a gig pushing a broom for shit money we call it corruption.
Do you know how many judges on the Appeals Court are absolutely pissed at this? Every single one of them. None of the three are based o merit on qualification. Not a single one. I’ve said it before; pigs get fat and hogs get slaughtered. This is a hog move.
Disgraceful nobody is screaming about this.
Wussies.
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Quiz: True or False, one of the governor’s trial court judge nominations to the SJC got spanked this week by a unanimous decision from the Appeals Court. (That is a lower court than the SJC)
Update: 9:53 and still nothing in Globe on McDonnell decision. Maybe if they ignore Fred Wyshak can act like it’s not there. I mean Boson is what the Globe and Fred Wyshak tell us it is.
. . .the WASP’s are after you.
If Deval Patrick had appointed three politically connected individuals to the SJC, the MA Republican Party would generate enough outrage on this to get at least a half-dozen articles printed in the Globe.
Why isn’t the MA Democratic Party taking some shots at Charlie “most popular governor in the nation” Baker? Part of the reason he is so popular is that the MA Democratic Party isn’t doing this.
Remember “Cadillac Deval”? How about a little payback for that one?
The Massachusetts Bar Association, for example, is pretty happy:
So, EB3, in your book Bob McDonnell & wife did fine to solicit loans, wedding gifts, a Rolex, in order to set up meetings witg state officials and promote a businessman’s product with the state?
Just checking, to be sure I understand your point.
If that’s the standard this Supreme Court goes by, 8-0, then God help us. Those affording $175,000 will get “constituent services” commensurate with their pay. The rest of us, plebes, will get a warm handshake instead.
Call me a cynic, but when the Supreme Court had voted in split decision along party lines in favor of Citizen United – this was because the R party wanted looser rules for political funding than the Ds. The Rs think they can get more money from fewer people than Ds.
When the Supteme Court decided, unanimously, that the Governor was not performing a ‘public act’ setting up meetings with state officials in exchange for $175,000 – this was bipartizan. It means that both Ds and Rs want the Fred Wyshaks of the world off their back, so they can do their business as usual.
It’s called the Supreme Court; it writes fancy arguments for its decisions; but it’s all nakedly political.
I don’t see a problem with the ruling. As I understand it, they said “You can’t prosecute based on appearance. There has to be an identifiable act.”
So the “appearance of impropriety” standard can still be applied by Ethics Commissionss, but prosecutors can only prosecute actions. That seems OK to me.
Setting up meetings with state officials is not an identifiable fact?
The governor says “Can you meet with this guy?” and nothing else happens. You’d send someone to jail for that?
Yup. He was paid to set up those meetings. Put his office up for sale.
Plus I’ve always been uncomfortable with jail for political crimes. Impeachment is the more appropriate remedy for something like this.
But putting McConnell aside for a moment and thinking of the broader implications, I think public officials have the right to presumption of innocence and some sort of standard.
To use a timely example: the Clinton Foundation. I’d want to see a burden of proof on all the charges being thrown around.
Here’s an idea: no gifts of any monetary value, period, for any politician, outside immediate family. I’d support something like that in a nano second, and if people didn’t like it… they can choose not to run.
. . .not that anyone would suspect that it had anything to do with the decision in McConnell.
make no mistake about it. $175,000 worth of gifts and use of a private vacation home was in not doubt by the court. They noted that that Williams was trying to bribe McDonnell, but setting up meetings and influence peddling are “official acts” so it doesn’t count? That’s how I’m reading it.
I completely disagree that to run for office you have to give up your personal life. This is just one more way to keep good people from running. How about disclosing over a certain amount and not assuming nefarious motives behind every relationship?
Being in public office is a choice. If we want to ensure there’s no influence peddling through bribes, small or large, then banning all gifts is the best way to do that.
That doesn’t stop Representative So and So from going to the movies with their friend Sally or Joe, or going out for a nice dinner. It just means Sally or Joe can’t buy the tickets, or pick up the tabs. And if they are so wealthy and/or generous as to want to buy Representative So and So a Rolex or gift them a week at their lake house for a summer retreat… then they can do it when their friend retires, or Representative So and So can pay fair market value for them.
…trying to legislate against human instinct. What, exactly, is the real problem with Sally and Joe picking up their friend’s (who happens to be a Rep.) tab? Whom does it really hurt? How much undue influence is such a transaction really going to have, especially when you consider that just being friends might be enough to subtly influence a decision-maker? Your proposal is way too draconian for my tastes.
> What, exactly, is the real problem with Sally and Joe picking up their friend’s (who happens to be a Rep.) tab?
Well.. You are hitting close, my friend, very close! The Justices are routinely dined, lodged and entertained with the tab being picked up by others:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/02/19/what-supreme-court-justices-do-and-dont-disclose/?utm_term=.641b5d82732d
Colleges & universities are listed as big payers. This was even mentioned by Steven Breyer during the McDonnell arguments… He pointed out that restaurant tabs are routinely picked up even for Justices.
…but institutions are not friends, though a university president might be. I would hope a justice would recuse him/herself from any case to which a friend is a party, regardless of whether that friend had given any gifts lately.
I have long said on these matters, don’t speculate that it looks or smells bad; prove to me that it IS bad.
… was on WBUR today, and he was excellent (as usual) on this topic.
$175,000 for Governor services – according to Mr Silverglate, it should be, at most, something between the Governor and his God. Pure sophistry from Mr Silverglate.
He said the moral aspect was something between the governor and his god. The legal aspect is what’s at issue, and Silverglate said the ruling is a victory for the rule of law.
The only thing defeated here is out-of-control prosecutors.
McDonnell able to be bribed more than $175,000, all made legal by the SC. Great victory for the rule of law indeed.
understand how the law works.
When SCOTUS decides unanimously, the issue is pretty clear. There has to be quid pro quo for a bribe. In this case, there was quid, but apparently no quo. No crime. Morally reprehensible? Yup. The appearance of a conflict of interest? Yup. Bribery? Nope.
When the Supreme Court makes legal decisions based on their offended morals, rather than the law, the U.S. will no longer be a democracy. Congress can always write a statute to prohibit this behavior. Massachusetts conflict of interest law prohibits government officials from taking anything of value over $50 and prohibits the appearance of a conflict of interest. In short, don’t blame SCOTUS for interpreting the law correctly. Blame the law.
important to keep differentiate between a decision that legally correct and an outcome we don’t like. Even if McDonnell was wrong, he has to be found guilty by law, not by political preference. I think we can all see why this should be so. We are a country of laws, not just a country of the people,an for the people, and by the people.
Even if the person has already left office, there could still be an impeachment-like inquest, and if convicted the person could be stripped of his pension, deprived of the privilege of seeking office again, or the like.
The reason the decision was unanimous was that the underlying reason for it had nothing to do with Ernie Boch Jr.’s fantasy reasons. As former Solicitor General Dellinger noted this week, it was because the justices are extremely concerned that federal prosecutors have in recent years been driving military tanks through the loopholes in braidly written laws. THAT’S the reason for the decision. (As a sidelight it also highlights the absurdly lax laws in Virginia in gift-giving in Virginia, which have another casualty: Tim Kaine’s hopes of being VP).
Explain rather than get my name wrong. What are my reasons according to you? I spelled them out in another post but in this post I suggest that one outcome will be the dark and needless cloud Fred Wyshak holds over the MA legislature.
You know Terry, because
I know you gave me the jab to show you are an intellilectually superior a-hole you exposed yourself as a self-impressed obtuse wannabe.
Reading comprehension is bloody important Terrance.