My mirth meter just jumped up a few notches. It appears that Democratic archdonor Norman Hsu has skipped his court date and absconded. Nothing says "this was an honest mistake" like jumping bail.
Frank covered much of what needed to be said about this criminal previously. The good part is that now that he is on the run, Hsu will not be buried by some new iteration of the Larry Craig story, or whatever else Democrats would like to focus on. The story officially became sexy, which is very hard to do with campaign finance scandals. Congratulations, Democrats.
Of course, maybe I am just a bit jaded and Democrats will come out in force to demand the head of Hsu and everyone that ever took a check from him, just like they did with Jack Abramoff. There is really no difference between the two, save that sometimes Abramoff shuttled money towards the other party whereas Hsu was straight ticket. That, and Hsu was a wanted fugitive at the time the bulk of his donations were made.
I would assume that the "culture of corruption" label just became extremely bipartisan, except that Republican housecleaning has begun much earlier.
20 comments:
Dear Framer,
My name is John and I work on the Congresspedia.org wiki - a non-partisan wiki reporting project on Congress. I saw that you were posting on corruption in Congress- something we follow closely. We'd like to put you on our Arizona blogroll. Can you email me at SunlightUser2 [at] Sunlightfoundation.com?
Thanks,
John
Oh, I'd love to see Hsu collared and tried. Illegal donations are still illegal, regardless of party affiliation.
Hmmm. The plot thickens. Wouldn't be surprised if they find Mr. Hsu dead on a park bench in Washington, DC but he's probably run back to his Chinese PLA cohorts.
Why does China keep popping up in Clinton campaigns? Do they need to buy more satellite and ballistic missile technology?
Probably to the same degree Iran needs to buy more missiles and military equipment.
You are preaching to the choir, Framer. If someone were in a hurry to find some scumbags, they should look at the upper echelons of the Democratic and Republican parties, the big donors, and the US Congress.
Dog the Bounty Hunter can have at them, for all I care.
I concur with Duke. Many a cohort of the Clintons have conveniently disappeared...or wound up pushing up daisies. Of course, it is just another (and another and another)of those inexplainable coincidents.
The United States is systemically corrupt. Like Mexico, like Saudi Arabia, like Pakistan, Jordan, and many of our allies and current enemies. Our systemic corruption is nonpartisan, not Republican, not Democrat based. We are Americans first, and partisans when it comes to preferred social circles and matters of class identity.
Eighty percent of both national conventions are paid by the same corporations and lobbyists. This is not bipartisan, its nonpartisan.
Hsu and Abramoff are similar financial fixers, with similar clients and similar goals to both peddle and buy influence.
Hillary depends on large donors, as do most Republicans, and some Democrats.
The small donors from the Internet are fueling Ron Paul, Mike Huckabee, Barak Obama, Kucinich, Gravel, and to a lesser extent, Edwards.
This gives them some breathing room, away from the smoke filled corners that both parties frequent for 'filling coffers.'
The large donors still have the moxie to fix national conventions and media access, but the movement of independents away from both parties will certainly favor the small donor candidates, this time out.
The major difference between Republicans and Democrats is that 20% of the social issues are argued (ad infinitum) while the rest of the cake is cut in the exclusive convention salons, paid for by the corporation lobbyists.
The people that actually vote on the floor of the conventions DO NOT have access to the lobbyist salons.
Only major party players get in, while the people with funny hats pretend to democratically vote for their candidates and planks.
The salons are where the action is, and mere convention goers do not have much input into this process.
The solution to the systemic corruption of both parties is to enact voluntary public campaign financing and to support the small donors that allow more diversity and choice.
We are nonpartisan in matters of Israel, bomb delivery, automobiles, and corporate welfare.
Our electoral college is a proxy democracy, an ersatz confection that sweetens the status quo, while poisoning the majority's will.
Wait for the fun when Frank Antenori takes money from some ringer, and then has to 'expain' his lack of any true relation to this hypothetical, yet probable lobbyist.
Taking $5 contributions from small donors can actually prevent vampires and werewolves from running a campaign.
We need protection from the Hsus and Ambramoffs on a national level.
Arizona has a working solution. Not perfect, but better than the big check donors.
Only a Republican would think of this story as officially 'sexy.'
Must be some kind of DSM IV fetish.
With such a wide stance of what sexy is, its hard to tell the difference between implicit and explicit sexy.
But campaign finance scandals smell of sex, compared to... the Rape of Iraq.
Hmmm. Frank Antenori seems to be getting a lot of attention from Mr. Anonymous (time stamp - 8:36).
Since the word on the street is that Mr. Antenori, Mr. Sposito, Ms. Collins and most likely Mr. Peate will be running traditional campaigns and the only candidate running on clean elections money is Mr. Gowan (The Don Quixote of sodomy eradication), one has to wonder if Mr. Gowan, or his operatives, see Mr. Antenori as a little bit of a threat to their perceived "3rd time is the charm" victory plans.
I don’t think Mr. Gowan has to worry about Mr. Antenori, Gowan lost the election and all future elections last year with his ad-homonym attack on Rep. Marianne McClure. Showing he has no class as well as a lack of knowing where to address his campaign literature.
He has joined the ranks of perennial candidate Joe Sweeney’s and the rest of the kook fringe of the GOP.
Frank has blustered his way into politics. And now he must play nice with the Kolbe Republicans, if he wants to melt into the status quo.
I like Frank. Frank makes me laugh. I think his take on Muslims is hilarious and full of paranoia.
But Frank is not yet status quo, merely a mid level manager of a missile factory that happens to mass produce suicide bombers, as both blowback and collateral damage.
I do not even know the other candidates, but I do respect Frank's honesty. I hope he doesn't become campaign financing sexy, but chooses to serve the little guy against the big R bidnessmin.
Frank has a narrower stance on most social issues than his fellow fellows, so he is popular with more independents, who will be of no use to him if he opts out of public financing.
We can be assured that any of the Republicans elected will be sworn to obstruct the Governor, rail against Mexicans, and act like they support authoritarian, harsh on human measures against anyone not voting in line with their ideological quest for ritual purity.
And they will be mighty white. Not wimpy.
Anon,
I must be out of the loop more than expected. What exactly was Frank's take on Muslims?
He gave a lecture on his experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq for us a few months back at the Pima County Republican Club.
I saw a lot of pictures of him fighting along side Kurds and Afghan Tribesmen, who last I checked I think are Muslim.
He showed the utmost respect for them and seemed to have confidence that the majority of Muslims weren't of the blood thirsty type.
So I'm curious if you're inventing this "take on Muslims" much like you guys seem to invent everything else.
Also, I really hope you're not David Gowan or in anyway associated with his campaign because you just called the 11,000 emplyees of Raytheon (the vast majority of whon are "little guys")suicide bomb producers. You do know that a large majority of these "suicide bomb" makers live on the East Side of town (Vail/Rita Ranch) and the vast majority of them happen to be Republican? Not smart for a guy running in a district that has a large Raytheon, active duty and military retiree population (DM and Fort H).
I think you just wiped out about 50% of the Republican voters in LD30.
You guys tried to slander the hard working Rep. McClure with your insults and it backfired.
I encourage you to attack Mr. Antenori on his record of being a war criminal and a suicide bomb maker and see just how far that'll take you.
Scotty!!!! Please beam me up!! It's not even 2008 and the idiots are already on the loose!
Raytheon missiles that kill combatants and their collateral families breed hatred, which in turn inspires the desperate suicide bombers. More missiles on civilians causes more revenge, until you have the USA more hated internationally than the communist Chinese. This is the stupid result of our stupid wars. Americans do not understand the incredible destruction our aggression has caused. Wrong thinking creates wrong results.
The Global War on Terror is an ad hominem attack on Muslims, that makes little distinction between Farsi Shia, or Arabic Sunni. If Frank spoke Arabic and Farsi fluently, he might have some genuine credibility regarding our enemies, and our friends.
Frank may fight side by side with paid Moslem mercenaries, but the GWOT makes little distinction between Iranis and Iraqis, seeking targets that have little linkage to the real threats of Al Qaida (but happen to have an oil infrastructure).
We don't even bother to declare war before we unleash covert actions that in turn create a climate of... conventional, overt terror. Wrong thinking creates wrong choices.
The USA is losing the War on Terror, and is losing its notions of right and wrong when we use blind aggression in place of intelligence. We do not understand the cultures we are destroying. Nor do we seem to care about much about our lethal notions of success.
Are we smarter in fighting terrorists now, or are we encouraging rage and hatred worldwide with our ham handed jolly green giants?
Frank is a good soldier for both the missile factory and our war against oil containing Moslem nations that have little in common except their differing beliefs in Allah.
Our warlike national security has turned our country into a homeland. We can do much better, and we should be smarter when it comes to manufacturing warmachts for profit and jihad.
Anon,
Based on your opening statement, I guess we would never be attacked if we never made weapons to protect ourselves.
Quite a concept. Can you convince the terrorists that this is the case?
Most US weapons are for offensive use, our defensive strategy is a bad joke based on cold war defense industry pork barrels. It provides expensive arms that can destroy a nation, but not defend it.
We are half of the entire world's military expenditures, and it is not making us safer. Its causing an arms build-up that is creating alliances between Russia and China, and other scared nations.
Fighting terrorists with cruise missiles is like fighting gangsters with napalm. The damage to innocents is inexcusable.
Only a war loving people bent on revenge would support such tactics.
Our strategy of terror from above does nothing to secure our county, but it makes us a homeland filled with militant hate.
America was kinder before 9/11. And more Christian too.
And, I might add, the economic damage that other nations can do to us is astounding. And that is now, not in ten years. Why should they take us on militarily when they can only lose?
It is dollar hegemony, not military hegemony that is keeping us safe, for the time being. China could give us a recession tomorrow with a swipe of the pen. And don't feel too warm and fuzzy about being the world's best consumer. That isn't the main reason why China buys our currency, T-Bills, and sorry ass mortgage backed securities. It's a great deal more complex than that.
Hsu was collected in CO yesterday, which is good news.
By the way, given the complaint about Hsu, who, in the end, has no official connection to any campaign, I presume you are even more up in arms over the indictment of Romney campaign staffers for donation irregularities?
There is something to what anon says about cruise missles and fighting terrorism. There is no correlation. Our military, General Petreus and his co-authors, agree. Take a look at his co-authored book on "counter-insurgency". While I am no fan of war, but in but the rarest of circumstance, their approach is anything but that of wiping out villages with heavy arms.
All the weapons and bombers in the world will not stop a determined, small band of terrorists, from forging an isolated attack on Americans or others. Good intelligence, good diplomacy, and setting an example to the world of what freedom is supposed to be carries with it the legitimacy that so many in the GOP flout and tout, but ignore so often in their actions (Guantanamo, torture, spying on Americans, pre-emptive war, etc.).
One question to the anon that touts the lobbyist world as ruling America...in the sincerest way...I ask:
Why is it that so few lobbyists and corporate types, money or not, have the power to stop the votes of so many?
Or are the many really fairly satisfied as a whole and the angry are the few?
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