The Company They Keep
House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and a number of other Republican (and some Democrat) lawmakers are in for, at best, some undesirable publicity following the indictment in Florida of super-lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Abramoff lobbied primarily for tribal casino interests, but that work apparently does not directly relate to these fraud charges.
Now I have to admit that if I were a congressman and was offerred a free golf tour of Scotland and only had to vote a certain way on some Indian gaming bill that no one really gives a crap about, I'd be sorely tempted to take the deal myself. But a US congressman - never mind the Majority Leader - surely must have some background-checking resources at his disposal. DeLay should have been able to find out (as this Forbes article outlines) that Abramoff and his partner were involved in a rather fiery business dispute with Konstantinos "Gus" Boulis when Boulis "was murdered at the age of 51 in a hail of gunfire in Fort Lauderdale, Fla."
He might also have found out that Abramoff's partner's "mother was murdered in the doorway of her Staten Island home in an apparent robbery attempt. Chris Paciello, a Miami night club owner and a reputed associate of the Bonanno crime family, later pleaded guilty to the murder." Another tidbit perhaps worth knowing about Abramoff's partner is that he was involved in a suit with the murdered man's estate claiming that "in the weeks before Boulis' death Kidan wrote three $10,000 checks to Anthony Moscatiello, a man once indicted for racketeering along with a brother of gangster John Gotti."
I don't know whether DeLay is crooked beyond what one would normally expect from a congressman. Earlier this year he called reports of his relationship with Abramoff "just another seedy attempt by the liberal media to embarrass me." It doesn't appear that the liberal media have to try to hard.
Now I have to admit that if I were a congressman and was offerred a free golf tour of Scotland and only had to vote a certain way on some Indian gaming bill that no one really gives a crap about, I'd be sorely tempted to take the deal myself. But a US congressman - never mind the Majority Leader - surely must have some background-checking resources at his disposal. DeLay should have been able to find out (as this Forbes article outlines) that Abramoff and his partner were involved in a rather fiery business dispute with Konstantinos "Gus" Boulis when Boulis "was murdered at the age of 51 in a hail of gunfire in Fort Lauderdale, Fla."
He might also have found out that Abramoff's partner's "mother was murdered in the doorway of her Staten Island home in an apparent robbery attempt. Chris Paciello, a Miami night club owner and a reputed associate of the Bonanno crime family, later pleaded guilty to the murder." Another tidbit perhaps worth knowing about Abramoff's partner is that he was involved in a suit with the murdered man's estate claiming that "in the weeks before Boulis' death Kidan wrote three $10,000 checks to Anthony Moscatiello, a man once indicted for racketeering along with a brother of gangster John Gotti."
I don't know whether DeLay is crooked beyond what one would normally expect from a congressman. Earlier this year he called reports of his relationship with Abramoff "just another seedy attempt by the liberal media to embarrass me." It doesn't appear that the liberal media have to try to hard.
posted by ziel | 8/12/2005 11:11:00 PM
1 Comments:
Sure Delay has the background-checking resources.... But, I´m sure, given his above the law attitude, he felt it wasn´t necessary. As the say in Texas, "get a rope." I hope he hangs himself with his own.
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