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The Day the Tide Turned on Daley

ArchPundit July 19, 2005 4 Comments

May well be today. While I’ve often thought he’d pretty much have another teflon scandal, the tone and evidence in terms of the Sorich indictment seems to change that calculus. Dan Mihalopoulos and Matt O’Connor cover the most recent events.

Before these scandals, it always seemed to be several levels removed, but having the patronage chief indicted raises a question of how could Daley not know, and if he didn’t, he should have.

No one ever thought that the City followed Shakman, but the new allegation is one that not only was the city giving lipservice to Shakman, but actually rigging civil service tests which raises the stakes.

O’Connor and Gary Washburn give some reasons why this is different. The most important to me is that it isn’t just some lackey or some clown who got a benefit and had given the Mayor money–it’s a key friend and Bridgeport neighbor. When you read about Daley’s father, people with money were important, but they were the people that let him run the Party and help out those from less wealthy backgrounds. He’d take their money, give them favors, but they weren’t the people for which he was looking out. The people he was looking out for were the working class people in bungalows and those were his friends.

As much as the son is an echo of his father, that same attitude prevails.

When I think of Daley’s administration giving contracts to Rezko or the Duff’s, it makes me mad, but I usually figured Daley kept his fingerprints off of such things. It’s the garbage he expects others to deal with and keep him from having to deal with and there better not be a problem because he’ll have to talk to the press. He does care about the people coming to get jobs from the City. He might not review the lists like his father did every day on the way into the office, but he cares. To show he cares he put a close ally in Sorich in the position and expected him to take care of it. That’s a lot closer than the scandals over contracts and it’s one of those types of scandals that people understand.

It’s hard to imagine that any of these guys turn on Daley so if he did know, they won’t say. I still don’t believe he’s very vulnerable to criminal prosecution if for nothing else trying to untangle his mangled syntax could provide a jury reasonable doubt on whatever he said.

It does, however, seriously open him up politically. I’m still not convinced anybody, but a guy in DC who has his sights set on something bigger than Mayor can beat the guy, but the possibility of a competitive race is certainly strong today.

When Finance Reporting is Weird

ArchPundit July 18, 2005 3 Comments

Look at Illinois AFL-CIO COPE expenditures:

ticket purchase
White Citizens for Jesse

Vallas Report

ArchPundit July 18, 2005 1 Comment

Raised no cash, brother loaned some more money and the campaign account itself is in debt to a tune of $268,522.16

Nothing to see here folks, move along.

Then Again

ArchPundit July 18, 2005 No Comments

You have to not have more stories of donors getting contracts before the diversions like Stem Cells can work.

The Ron Gidwitz Self-Immolation Pool

ArchPundit July 18, 2005 4 Comments

Just how long until he goes up in flames?

A Gidwitz family company manages a hellhole of an apartment complex in downtown Joliet. Gidwitz also partially owns the building. Congressman Jerry Weller, a fellow Republican, recently told the Daily Southtown that the property is an “unsafe, unhealthy, crime- and drug-ridden, outdated public housing project.” Weller has been working with Joliet to shut the place down and turn it into a mixed-income development.

Gidwitz is a well-known philanthropist, and he seems defensive when questioned by the media about the project, claiming that he is trying to do good for the poor of Joliet. But the place is obviously a mess, and Gidwitz admitted to the Daily Southtown recently that he hasn’t even bothered to visit the apartment complex “in a long time.”

With the Joliet paper, local ministers and prominent civic leaders condemning the building as a rat hole ? enough to fill hours of negative TV ads with amazingly frank and damaging quotes ? you would have thought that Gidwitz would have dumped the dump long before he decided to run for governor. But that would have been the easy way out, not to mention the politically smart thing to do.

Instead, Gidwitz, like Hull and Ryan before him, believes he can go his own way. Perhaps he’s hoping that his money will extricate himself from this mess. Money solves a lot of problems in this life, but as Hull and Ryan discovered last year, all the money in the world can’t buy an unknown candidate out of big-time media trouble.

Seriously, what should the pool look like on when Gidwitz drops out? Not that I have any prizes to give out other than bragging rights, but we need to get one going here, before he finds himself on the verge of tears about how politics isn’t accepting of such a simple millionaire.

Speck Killing Anniversary

ArchPundit July 15, 2005 No Comments

Was yesterday and 848 did a bit on it

Whatever happened to the investigation into the Speck video from prison? Oh yeah, nothing.

A Real Basic Question

ArchPundit July 15, 2005 12 Comments

When exactly is it okay to use a CIA employee’s identity to discredit a spouse?

There’s a lot of garbage out there right now, but it seems that this question can’t be answered. If there is a time to out a CIA employee, because of some perceived slight by the employee’s spouse, what’s the general rule this falls under that makes such an action okay?

I promised myself I wouldn’t spend much time on this, but as the situation has developed I’ve been shocked at the excuses given that don’t provide any reason as to what the public good is.

Illinois DNC Members to Bush: Fire Him

ArchPundit July 14, 2005 10 Comments

Leading Illinois Democrats to Top Republicans:
Join us in calling for President Bush to fire Karl Rove.

It’s about time the Illinois Democrats got in the game on this–and see my post below for what’s about to happen–an attack on Patrick Fitzgerald. Now, would any of the Illinois Republicans who have been touting the tough corruption fighter want to step up to the plate and defend him?

President George W. Bush should be held to his word and fire Karl Rove for leaking confidential information about a covert CIA agent according to Illinois Democrats who called on top Republicans to join them in holding Bush to his promise.

?President Bush promised to fire anyone who leaked confidential information. We Democrats are asking top Republicans to join us in holding Bush to his word,? said State Senator Carol Ronen, one of three Democratic National Committee members who called on GOP candidates for Governor to take a stand for ?what is right.?

Karl Rove?s own lawyer, Robert Luskin, admitted to Newsweek that Rove did speak to Time Magazine reporter Matthew Cooper about this same story days before Chicago Sun-Times Columnist Robert Novak disclosed the name of a covert CIA agent. This contradicts earlier White House statements that Rove and other White House staff had no role in leaking confidential information that Bush Administration critic Joseph Wilson?s wife, Valerie Plame, was a CIA agent.

Despite the fact that The White House said two years ago that Rove wasn’t involved in the leak, a recently released July 2003 e-mail made it clear that Rove told Time?s Cooper that the woman “apparently works” for the CIA, according to a report by Newsweek. It added that the woman had authorized a trip to Africa by her husband, U.S. Ambassador Joe Wilson, to check out allegations that Iraq had tried to buy uranium from Niger for nuclear weapons

On June 10, 2004, President Bush agreed that he would fire anyone at the White House who leaked confidential information. On several occasions, White House Spokesman Scott McClellan repeated the promise. Democrats called on the President to keep his word and fire Rove, and called on those considering a run for Governor to do the same.

Alderman Joe Moore, another DNC member, took direct aim at both announced and expected Republican candidates for Governor.

?We are calling on Judy Baar Topinka, Ron Gidwitz, Jim Oberweis, Steve Rauschenberger, Joe Birkett, Bill Brady and others who are considering a run for the highest office in Illinois to adhere to the highest standards of right and wrong and call for the President to fire Karl Rove,? said Moore.

Moore added that Illinois Republicans should take a stand. ?This story was leaked to an Illinois columnist and is being investigated by an Illinois U.S. Attorney. We need to know where Illinois Republicans stand on it. Should President Bush be held to his word or is Karl Rove above the law?? said Moore.

State Senator and DNC Member Iris Martinez noted that while some of the targets have not formally announced, they have been raising money and attacking Democrats in the media. ?Now it?s time for these to show horses to show some real leadership,? added Martinez.

An ongoing investigation by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald of Chicago is focused on whether a crime was committed when someone leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame, whose name was published by the Sun-Times? Novak on July 14, 2003.

According to published reports, disclosure of the identity of an undercover intelligence officer can be a federal crime if prosecutors can show the leak was intentional and the leaker knew about the officer’s secret status.

Novak’s column appeared after Plame’s husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, wrote a newspaper opinion article criticizing Mr. Bush’s claim that Iraq had sought uranium in Niger ? a claim the CIA had asked Wilson to check out. Wilson has said he believes his wife’s name was leaked as retribution.

Of the three, I met Moore briefly at the DNC regional meeting. It was only a short talk, but he was very gracious with his time.

It’s Starting on Fitzgerald

ArchPundit July 14, 2005 2 Comments

I believe we’ll soon seeing the attacks on Patrick Fitzgerald increase with Pat Roberts starting with this one today:

Sen. Roberts (R) just said that Fitzgerald’s investigation had “a lot of leaks.” Is he kidding?

Can anyone identify a leak from Fitzgerald’s investigation? There may have been one, but I can’t think of any and for a DC investigation, that’s remarkable.

A Federal Shield Law

ArchPundit July 14, 2005 1 Comment

Lynn Sweet advocates for a federal shield law for journalists and cites to bills that have been introduced.

“Free Flow of Information Act of 2005”

“Free Speech Protection Act”

I find both of these overly broad. I’m far more comfortable with the Illinois law that is described here:

Under the Privilege, reporters are not required to disclose the source of any information unless a court finds that “all other available sources of information have been exhausted” and that “disclosure of the information sought is essential to the protection of the public interest involved.” 735 ILCS 5/8-907 (2001). The burden of proving these two elements is on the person or entity seeking access to the information.

The problem with both of the proposed bills above is that it allows someone doing something clearly illegal to hide when there the crime is relaying the information. This has significant implications for national security.

Say Philip Agee wanted to disclose the name of US operatives again, but he wanted to avoid prosecution under the current law. All he would have to do is find a person with a web site that covers news and then leak the information to them once he receives a promise of confidentiality. The way both laws above are written, there would be no way to determine the source because such a move is explicitly forbidden.

The Illinois law does provide a level of protection, but if the reporter is the only source of that information, she may be compelled to testify. My reading of the law would mean to me that Judith Miller could have been charged with contempt in Illinois and jailed.

The reason I don’t buy the doom and gloom scenarios that many journalists are trying to make sound inevitable is that Illinois journalists don’t have absolute protection and it is likely that in a state case, Judith Miller would be in jail in Illinois as well, but the Illinois press is doing just fine with anonymous sources.

This to me is over the top:

It is about showing other countries the United States wants to democratize — and for which a free press is essential — how to do it right.

A free press is essential, but it’s still unclear to me that forcing a reporter to testify about an act that they observed removes the freedom of the press. Making the burden difficult to force such disclosure seems like a good way to promote free flow of information, but I see no argument for an absolute protection.

Most anonymous sources aren’t violating any laws and so a shield law is irrelevant in those cases. When a source is violating the law would primarily be violating the secrecy of a Grand Jury by a lawyer, passing confidential information or something similar. Potentially this could keep some whistleblowers from talking to a reporter, but how is that any different than the law at current?

Finally, in cases where a defendent is attempting to present a defense, I’m very reluctant to remove the ability of such a person to subpeona all material that may be exculpatory.

A second part is worrisome to me as well.

A concern among lawmakers — especially those who have been prosecutors — is finding the balance between national security and the need for journalists to protect confidential sources. The bill writers will not want to cover every blogger, and some journalism organizations are uncomfortable in having Congress define who is a journalist. But these issues can be addressed if there is a will.

I’m not certain the issue of who to cover can be easily solved. In fact, by trying to limit who is legally considered a journalist, I’m afraid of a precedent that those who don’t fit that definition may be interpreted by the courts to be regulatable.

Further, if it’s such an important protection, why limit who is covered?

Even more troubling is that I might have different rules depending on where I publish. I write for the Arch City Chronicle a bi-weekly paper on politics in St. Louis. Presumably I’d be covered if I worked on a story for them, but not as a blogger–so what about stories that I both blog about and write paper stories about? And why is my blog a different protection level given it’s where I write most?

My reading of the Illinois statute is I’m covered by the law as a blogger.