Curious how we are not hearing the Democrats talk about the Culture of Corruption in their own party:
As lawmakers have increasingly slipped pet projects into federal spending bills over the past decade, one lawmaker has used his powerful perch on the House Appropriations Committee to funnel $250 million into five nonprofit organizations that he set up. Those actions have prompted a complaint to federal prosecutors that questions whether any of that taxpayer money helped fuel a parallel growth in his personal fortune.
The most ambitious effort by the congressman, Alan B. Mollohan, is a glistening glass-and-steel structure with a swimming pool, sauna and spa rising in a former cow pasture in Fairmont, W.Va., thanks to $103 million of taxpayer money he garnered through special spending allocations known as earmarks.
Newsbusters noticed how the New York Times managed to hide the fact that Mollohan is a Democrat until deep in the story, unlike other stories involving Republicans where he practically puts the Republican label on a billboard.
Back to Mollohan:
U.S. Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-W.Va.) has committed over 250 violations of House ethics rules, according to a conservative legal watchdog group.
The National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC) filed a complaint with the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia on Feb. 28, alleging that Mollohan failed to disclose and grossly underreported his assets, loans and interests in certain companies.
After filing a series of Freedom of Information Act requests, NLPC stated that “slowly a picture of Mollohan’s finances emerged that was sharply different from the one being portrayed in the Financial Disclosure Reports.” All members of Congress are required to file the disclosure forms as part of the Ethics in Government Act.
Ken Boehm, chairman of the NLPC, said every report Mollohan filed from 1996 to 2004 had “major errors.”
“The real issue here is not whether Mollohan systematically was hiding financial and real estate assets, and grossly misrepresenting their value. He was. The real issue is why he was hiding those assets,” Boehm said, also pointing out that Mollohan is the ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct — popularly known as the ethics committee.
Of course the one Democrat who was screeching high and low about Abramoff and Delay now defends her partner in crime:
But House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Friday defended Mollohan and argued that Democrats have a history of ethics reform. For months Democrats have been attacking what they call the “Republican culture of corruption” in Congress and at the White House.
“The Speaker (Illinois Republican Dennis Hastert) should join me in directing the Ethics Committee to get to work, and not cast aspersions on the independent and distinguished Ranking Member,” said Pelosi.
She referenced the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal, which has resulted in Abramoff pleading guilty, former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas being indicted and Rep. Bob Ney (R-Ohio) being criticized for his involvement with Abramoff. Pelosi also invoked the name of former Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham of California, who pleaded guilty in a bribery scandal and is in prison.
“Republicans destroyed the ethics process in the House to protect their cronies Cunningham, DeLay, Ney, and other Members implicated in the Abramoff scandal – to name only a few,” Pelosi stated.
“Speaker Hastert and his Republican cohorts are responsible for the most corrupt Congress in history and the American people are paying the price at the gas pump, at the pharmacy, and with record high deficits,” she concluded.
No partisanship there huh? Go off on Republicans but defend a Democrat who is obviously corrupt.
A closer examination revealed that Mollohan and his wife had more than $2,000,000 in real estate investments with a former staffer, Laura Kuhns, and her husband. Kuhns ran a nonprofit, Vandalia Heritage Foundation, which had received more than $28 million in appropriations earmarks with Mollohan?s help from 2000 through 2005. She was also on the board of other nonprofit groups which had received over $100 million in earmarks of federal funds during the same period with Mollohan?s help.
Mollohan?s 2000 Financial Disclosure Report listed his income-producing assets as being worth from $179,012 to $562,000 with liabilities of $170,000 to $465,000. Among the liabilities was Visa credit card debt listed as $45,003 to $150,000.Just four years later, Mollohan?s 2004 Financial Disclosure Report showed him with assets worth $6,313,025 to $24,947,000 offset by liabilities in the $3,665,011 to $13,500,000 range. It also showed him owning an oceanfront beach house on Bald Head Island, NC which was valued at $1,000,000 to $5,000,000. NLPC found that Mollohan was renting the beach house during the summer of 2005 for $11,975 a week.
No wonder the KOSkiddies love her so. She along with her cohorts asked Bob Ney to step down just because his dealings with Abramoff “looked” bad, but she gives a pass to this? Incredible.
So lets see:
Do you think this would be defined as a Culture of Corruption?
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