Abramoff Probe May Threaten Leading Republicans as It Expands

[sabra]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=washingtonstory&sid=IN7A1S0UQVI9


Abramoff Probe May Threaten Leading Republicans as It Expands

Sept. 22 (Bloomberg) -- The widening investigation of lobbyist Jack Abramoff is moving beyond the confines of tawdry influence-peddling to threaten leading figures in the Republican hierarchy that dominates Washington.

This week's arrest of David Safavian, the former head of procurement at the Office of Management and Budget, in connection with a land deal involving Abramoff brings the probe to the White House for the first time.

Safavian once worked with Abramoff at one lobbying firm and was a partner of Grover Norquist, a national Republican strategist with close ties to the White House, at another. Safavian traveled to Scotland in 2002 with Abramoff, Representative Robert Ney of Ohio and another top Republican organizer, Ralph Reed, southeast regional head of President George W. Bush's 2004 re-election campaign.

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who once called Abramoff ``one of my closest and dearest friends,'' already figures prominently in the investigation of the lobbyist's links to Republicans. The probe may singe other lawmakers with ties to Abramoff, such as Republican Senator Conrad Burns of Montana, as well as Ney.

[whistle]

1. According to conservative talking heads the blame rests with Clinton admin

[Wordie]

9. LOL...and this SURPRISES anyone??? eom

[truthisfreedom]

17. well of course, because Clinton didn't simply shoot the rethugs in the

head every time he saw one. he was in a great position to do so, of course, on capitol hill.

[reprobate]

44. I think you're right. The nation needs a good cleansing.

[electropop]

29. Hahahahaahaha!

They must be soiling themselves with fright if they are unable to come up with anything more coherent than that. Even the Kool-aiders must be saying :wtf:

[kostya]

41. Amazingly this is just what they are saying...

Get this article from a real conservative Arab-hater:
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=19597

It's spun to put the blame on the Democrats for Safavian's confirmation!! Only the Repugs asked the "hard" questions (but still voted to confirm).

Incredible.

[PassingFair]

54. OMG! I have to shower now...

what a cruddy web site!

[klook]

46. Also with the Scots, for inventing golf (eom)

[sasquatch]

2. Well I'm glad they found the bodies, now prosecute the killers

[wishlist]

3. I have not heard one word on TV about arrest of top Bush official Safavian

I don't understand why none of the network or cable newscasts has mentioned this significant arrest, considering that this guy apparently was in charge of hundreds of billions of government appropriations until just last week. Surely this will get some coverage soon? Really bugs me though that his resignation last week has defused the story with reporters calling him a "former" Administration official. What a joke, the guy had been set up to have a major role in Katrina appropriations last week before his legal troubles came to a head.

[gratuitous]

6. Nothing to see here, move along

Yes, considering the obsessive coverage with everything during the Clinton years, the actual arrest of a Bush administration official who resigned about two hours before he was actually cuffed would seem to be a newsworthy event.

But then, back when I was taking journalism classes, Republican corruption was actually something that got reported on regularly. While it still happens, and now more than ever, newsrooms across the nation have all independently and unilaterally (yeah, right) decided that reporting on Republican malfeasance is no longer something to report on.

[northzax]

25. no good visuals

since the DoJ didn't tell anyone about it until after the arrest

[newscott]

21. Blame the "liberal" media.

[KansDem]

40. Media did write , "He barely had time to resign before he was arrested"

(As I recall)

That statement made my day :)

I wish a video of the arrest was available. Somehow, I'm certain it would show him saying "Wait, officers! Before you slap the 'cuffs on me, I need my right hand free to sign my resignation!"

One can dream...

[UpInArms]

4. WP: DeLay Airfare Was Charged To Lobbyist's Credit Card

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A12416-2005Apr23.html

Sunday, April 24, 2005; Page A01

The airfare to London and Scotland in 2000 for then-House Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) was charged to an American Express card issued to Jack Abramoff, a Washington lobbyist at the center of a federal criminal and tax probe, according to two sources who know Abramoff's credit card account number and to a copy of a travel invoice displaying that number.

DeLay's expenses during the same trip for food, phone calls and other items at a golf course hotel in Scotland were billed to a different credit card also used on the trip by a second registered Washington lobbyist, Edwin A. Buckham, according to receipts documenting that portion of the trip.

House ethics rules bar lawmakers from accepting travel and related expenses from registered lobbyists. DeLay, who is now House majority leader, has said that his expenses on this trip were paid by a nonprofit organization and that the financial arrangements for it were proper. He has also said he had no way of knowing that any lobbyist might have financially supported the trip, either directly or through reimbursements to the nonprofit organization.

The documents obtained by The Washington Post, including receipts for his hotel stays in Scotland and London and billings for his golfing during the trip at the famed St. Andrews course in Scotland, substantiate for the first time that some of DeLay's expenses on the trip were billed to charge cards used by the two lobbyists. The invoice for DeLay's plane fare lists the name of what was then Abramoff's lobbying firm, Preston Gates & Ellis.

...more...

When do they get indicted?

[Tesla]

5. Hopefully they go down, it may be a slow one at a time deal,

but they all will go DOWN!!

[ClayZ]

11. And may the handcuffs be TIGHT! n/t

:kick:

[Carla in Ca]

23. How about some nice shackles

like the ones Susan McDougall had to wear!

[Bernardo de La Paz]

32. Still Proud He's Not Yet Indicted

[Name removed]

7. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[emulatorloo]

12. good to hear. . .hope all goes well w her. . .

I have read your posts about her before. . . .she is in my thoughts as she undergoes this ordeal. . .

[tom_paine]

8. It still amazes me that even tiny parts of the old USA still function

I mean, it is unlikely that it will get anywhere near any of the Inner Circle of the Imperial Family, just like Limbaugh got away with it, DelLay got away with it, the Bushevik Anthrax Assassin walks free, Bin Laden walks free, and many others.

But it is even notable that some of the motions are still attended to.

Our grandchildren won't even have that, just the leaden fist of Tyranny.

Poor bastards. The younger a person is, the more I pity them.

[WCGreen]

15. Limbaugh may still be in trouble....

they just got access to his medical records....

[ninkasi]

26. So do I, Tom

Tom_Paine writes...

"Poor bastards. The younger a person is, the more I pity them."

I never thought I would see being in my sixties as an advantage, but the way the world is, it's my grandchildren I pity.

Edited to add quote

[Wordie]

10. I just emailed this thread to Keith Olberman / Countdown-MSNBC. eom

[Lindsay]

13. Gosh, what a pretty headline!

More arrests, please.

[faithnotgreed]

14. yes - that is nice isnt it

[bostonbabs]

33. the can of worms has opened.....

this investigation is trying very hard to get to the truth .The fact that there are multiple agencies is good too....this will be hard to cover up at this point.....this is the beginning of th end ....or at least a large contribution to it

[stubtoe]

43. This is the silver lining to the 2004 "election"...

Time enough for many, hopefully most, of the chickens from the first term to come home to roost.

Heeeeeere, chick chick chikEEEE!

[yellowcanine]

38. Yes, be still my beating heart. How MANY Repukes will go down?

[Eurobabe]

16. Best news all day

Clear the decks of these corrupt fuckers.

[Demeter]

18. Oh, I Do Hope So!

What happens, though, when we have more Congressmen under indictment than votes for impeachment? Do we get a batch of replacements, so that the business of the country, and the pursuit of justice, can finally get started?

[sofa king]

19. That article was just the first shoe.

And while I know a lot of you aren't going to want to believe this, here's the second:

http://www.detnews.com/2001/nation/0109/27/nation-304816.htm

"In Florida, Michael Hlavsa, chairman of SunCruz Casinos gambling cruise company, said two or three men linked to the hijackings may have been customers on a ship that sailed from Madeira Beach. One name on the passenger list from a Sept. 5 cruise was the same as one of the suspected terrorists, Hlavsa said. SunCruz Casinos turned over photographs and other documents to FBI investigators after employees said they recognized some of the men suspected in the terrorist attacks as customers." --AP, September 27, 2001

Jack Abramoff was co-owner of SunCruz Casinos.

So take a moment to contemplate where this investigation is going, and who is going to do what to make it stop.

[JNelson6563]

22. Wow! That IS interesting!

Well done. :-)

[BeFree]

20. Yeeha! They coming down!

Sometimes the wheels of justice turn slow, but they do turn.

'Course if you're just a little guy it does seem as if they are about to run over you at any second, eh?

Say: where is all this coming from? Is it the indictment of Abramoff from a 'coupla weeks ago? The one where he was accused of Indian giving?

Note: I consider Indian giving as giving Native Americans something with the sole intent of taking it back as soon as possible.

[donkeyotay]

24. This is more than golf in Scotland

This week's arrest of David Safavian, the former head of procurement at the Office of Management and Budget, in connection with a land deal involving Abramoff brings the probe to the White House for the first time. . .

Safavian...was charged Sept. 19 by the Justice Department with making false statements about whether he had any dealings with the lobbyist in the course of Abramoff's attempts to obtain government land.

Anyone know what the land deal is?

[sofa king]

27. The Eshkol Academy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2004/11/13/AR2005040313812.html

817 Hyde Rd. Silver Spring, MD 20902

That address should be either on or near the former White Oak Naval Surface Warfare Center. Safavian greased the deal for Abramoff:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=ad1pedpzWUm8&refer=us

It was publicly revealed at a Senate Indian Affairs Committee hearing on June 22, 2005 that Abramoff was laundering Indian money, via the Capitol Athletic Foundation, to the Eshkol Academy as well as to a sniper training school in the West Bank.

http://www.indianz.com/News/2005/007778.asp
http://www.indianz.com/InTheHoop/archive/008907.asp

All of the above is on the record. In my earlier post I showed the AP story which mentions that Mohammed Atta wound up on Abramoff's boat on 5 September, 2001.

It's also important to note that the charges for which Abramoff was arrested stem from Abramoff's fraudulent purchase of the SunCruz casino line in the spring of 2000, with a side order of money laundering.

http://www.citizensforethics.org/press/newsrelease.php?view=72

At this point, I should probably sequester myself to the facts, but someone's bound to ask, so....

September 5, 2001 is important in the timeline of events because, according to the 9/11 Commission Report, that was the day the terrorists completed their purchase of airline tickets and began laundering their remaining funds back to al Qaeda. The results of the FBI investigation into Atta's presence on Abramoff's boat have not, to my knowledge, been made public by the Bush Administration.

On September 6 and 7, 2001, there were 4,700 put options placed on United Airlines compared to 400 call options on an otherwise neutral news day. The results of that investigation have not, to my knowledge, been made public by the Bush Administration.

http://www.snopes.com/rumors/putcall.htm

Jack Abramoff and Karl Rove had a particularly convenient relationship. Susan Ralston was Abramoff's personal assistant from the mid-90's to 2001. Then, in 2001, she moved to the White House and became Karl Rove's personal assistant.

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/ROVE_AIDE_CALLED_TO_TESTIFY_TOOK_HIS_MESS_0802.html

You'll notice that Raw Story piece suggests that Ralston has since been excommunicated to the President's Advisory Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. However, it's worth remembering that Jack Abramoff was also lobbying against the institution of a minimum wage in the Marianas.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-05-06-abramoff-bush_x.htm

The bottom line: yeah, it's so goddamned worse than you ever dared to think that it hurts. So when the "terrorists" come calling this weekend, you'll start to get an idea about how far this has gone.

[donkeyotay]

30. thanks!

I've followed the SunCruz and casino stories but completely missed the land deal. Very interesting. I don't think they wanted that land in Silver Spring for a school... probably more like for a privatized pentagon or something. I'm not familiar with Silver Spring, but it keeps popping up - donors from there and such. A list of donors to the Capital Athletic Foundation, for instance, includes a mathematician named Alan J. Broder who had a company called White Oak Technology that, if I remember right, was doing something with voting.

Don't know what you meant about this weekend, but isn't a hurricane enough?

[sofa king]

31. Oops, did I say that?

Sorry. See, at this point I have this delusion that justice may threaten to prevail, which would be a total disaster.

It's becoming increasingly obvious to me that those people have already shown themselves to be unconcerned with quaint anachronisms like holding fair elections and not murdering our own people. So I fear that with the walls closing in on them, the conspirators would be spurred on to further action.

My delusion was very specific. I began to fear that just prior to winter the conspirators would blow the oil and natural gas pipelines which supply most of the population centers. I feared that the military would be called in not to restore order, but to block the exits from major metropolitan areas, while food delivery efforts were concentrated on the God-fearing rural areas. And I feared that somewhere in all that chaos, Our Fearless Leader would don a uniform, declare himself First Consul or somesuch, and boldly allow the poor, minority, Democratic third of the country to perish, while invoking a level of authority which would guarantee that such pesky things as elections and court cases need never trouble them again.

But I'm all better now. Now that Karl Rove has been put in charge of the reconstruction effort in the Gulf Coast. Now that revokation of the Posse Comitatus act is being openly discussed. Now that another hurricane is bearing down which threatens to wipe out the other half of the oil refineries along the Gulf.

It was all just a bad dream.

So, that's why I'm making sure to provide linked citations when I can. Because I'm friggin' crazy, and I'm actually hoping that I'm friggin' crazy, because if I am correct there shall be no satisfaction in saying "I told you so."

But on a more serious note: frankly, I think that if those people are going to attempt to usurp what remains of American democracy, the time is now, as in right now, starting this weekend, before the import of the Abramoff investigation dawns on a sure-to-be-enraged public.

[NYC]

49. Will Abramoff talk?

I was getting that impression a few weeks ago.

[drm604]

51. Alan J. Broder

Donkeyotay,
I'm curious about your mention of Alan J. Broder as one of the donors to the Capital Athletic Foundation. What more do you know about him? Was there something in particular that brought him to mind? I'm intrigued by his connection with White Oak Technologies, which is involved in data mining. (Remember that Able Danger was a data mining operation.) If you go to White Oak's website - http://www.woti.com - you'll see a "GSA Advantage!" button which indicates that White Oak is an approved federal contractor. (If you click on that button you'll be taken to a federal government website which lists approved contractors.) Given Safavian's position — he oversaw federal contracts for the Office of Management and Budget - this is an interesting connection. You're recollection of White Oak being involved somehow with voting is somewhat correct. Check out this Federal Election Commission advisory opinion from 1998. It involves a request by Alan Broder, in his capacity as President of White Oak, for permission to use (in their marketing) the results of data mining of the FEC's contributor database. Very intriguing!

[donkeyotay]

59. thanks for the info

Hi, drm604. I don't have any more information on Broder. I just came across him as a donor to Capital Athletic Foundation. The similarity in the names White Oak Technology and White Oak Naval Surface Warfare Center caught my eye. There's another bizarre donor on that list: SPI Spirits (Cyprus) Limited. That'll lead you to a whole sub-story on Russian vodka wars!

[bostonbabs]

35. thank you sofa king! I thought that this story

would sink the ship but I never knew the WHOLE story.It is so much worse than I had anticipated....Israel, murders, 9/11.... Can the American public understand the quagmire of deceit ?...

[sofa king]

37. You're welcome

I've been tailing Abramoff for four years now, and I only put this together myself in the past month or so, thanks to the unceasing collaborative effort of people like the readers of the Democratic Underground. The momentum is increasing.

And, I suspect, it's going to increase even faster, as the puzzle pieces drop into place for mid-level investigators, both professional and private, and their outrage grows.

Today I went back and read the transcript of this interview with Sibel Edmonds, the FBI whistleblower who was gagged by John Ashcroft's "national security" ploy. What Sibel says here coincides very closely with what I believe is emerging in the Abramoff investigation:

"SE: The most significant information that we were receiving did not come from counter-terrorism investigations, and I want to emphasize this. It came from counter-intelligence, and certain criminal investigations, and issues that have to do with money laundering operations.

"You get to a point where it gets very complex, where you have money laundering activities, drug related activities, and terrorist support activities converging at certain points and becoming one. In certain points - and they are separating those portions from just the terrorist activities. And, as I said, they are citing "foreign relations" which is not the case, because we are not talking about only governmental levels. And I keep underlining semi-legit organizations and following the money. When you do that the picture gets grim. It gets really ugly."

http://baltimorechronicle.com/050704SibelEdmonds.shtml

The important thing to remember is that while there is a bright partisan line in this story, most of us are still Americans first. There are a lot of people who were willing to toe the party line when they could make themselves believe that we Democrats were the ones playing political games with the 9/11 attacks, but as it becomes increasingly apparent that the Republican Party leadership is responsible for covering up and perhaps abetting what may go down as the most despicable criminal act in the history of our nation, those people will join us in demanding answers and providing critical information.

Somehow, we must find it within ourselves to forgive the ignorant, partisan, hopelessly misinformed Republicans who did not participate in this heinous crime. The fate of our nation depends on that, should we ever be so lucky as to reclaim our nation in the first place.

[Tatiana]

50. Thanks for the wealth of information, sk.

This thing is so deep, involves so many figures at the heart of the GOP, that I have problems wrapping my mind around it all.

I am sure Sibel stumbled upon *something* regarding Abramoff. And that *something* was related to the 9/11 attacks, and likely our excellent adventures in Iraq.

I want to know how Rove fits into all this. There is a cover-up going on here and I think so many of these Republican scandals emerging are interrelated. A special prosecutor, in my opinion, with supoena authority is warranted.

Kudos to those career professionals who smell a rat and are following the droppings. Hopefully some convictions will result from this.

[Mari333]

28. check this out for weird ties and money exchanging hands...

http://blog.dccc.org/mt/archives/003580.html

[savemefromdumbya]

45. amazing!

thanks for that!!!

[midnight armadillo]

34. BUSH WILL PARDON THEM ALL

Mark my words - you heard it hear first. He'll do it in the last month in office.

[Mist]

39. The Shrub will pardon 50+ guys at once?! Maybe the sheeple

will wake up when that happens, but damn! What a high price to pay, all those Rethugs going free!

[Lasher]

36. Thanks for all the information

It's surprising to see that this important and informative message string only has 35 posts so far. I'm concerned about the hurricane too, but these developments could be even more important. The arrest of Dubya's head of procurement at the OMB is highly significant!

Maybe we won't have to wait until next year to regain control of Congress. Maybe Hot Tub Tom and the rest of the Republicans will be in jail before then.

[xynthee]

42. Safavian is also tied to terrorists!!!

Just saw this on Raw Story. It links to Front Page Magazine, a conservative magazine.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=19597

SNIP:

But Safavian's not just tied to a dirty lobbyist. He's also tied to a convicted terrorist and a suspected terrorist supporter. Lobbying disclosure forms revealed last year that he has been in the employ of Abdurahman Alamoudi, an avowed supporter of Hamas and Hezbollah. Prosecutors have discovered evidence that he has links to al-Qaeda. At the time, Safavian waved aside any affiliation to Alamoudi. He insisted that he was really lobbying for a client named Jamal al Barzinji. That revelation did little to clear Safavian’s name: A federal affidavit identifies Barzinji as the ringleader of a group suspected of aiding terrorists.

[ignatzmouse]

47. Sheltering of Alamoudi Directly Linked to Norquist and Rove

http://www.msnbc.com/news/984616.asp?cp1=1

10-23-2003 "Countdown with Keith"
snip...
John Loftus: "About a year-and-a-half ago, people in the intelligence community came and said-guys like Alamoudi and Sami al-Arian and other terrorists weren’t being touched because they’d been ordered not to investigate the cases, not to prosecute them, because there were being funded by the Saudis and a political decision was being made at the highest levels, don’t do anything that would embarrass the Saudi government. So, of course I immediately volunteered to do it and I filed a lawsuit, against al-Arian charging him with being a major terrorist for Islamic Jihad, most of his money came from Saudi charities in Virginia.
Now, Alamoudi’s headquarters were in the same place, he was raided the same day, on March 20. An hour after I filed my lawsuit, the U.S. government finally got off its butt and they raided these offices. And, the stuff that they’re taking out of there now is absolutely horrendous. Al-Arian has now, finally been indicted, an along with Alamoudi, today.
But, who was it that fixed the cases? How could these guys operate for more than a decade immune from prosecution? And, the answer is coming out in a very strange place. What Alamoudi and al-Arian have in common is a guy named Grover Norquist. He’s the super lobbyist. Newt Gingrich’s guy, the one the NRA calls on, head of American taxpayers. He is the guy that was hired by Alamoudi to head up the Islamic institute and he’s the registered agent for Alamoudi, personally, and for the Islamic Institute.
Grover Norquist’s best friend is Karl Rove, the White House chief of staff, and apparently Norquist was able to fix things. He got extreme right wing Muslim people to be the gatekeepers in the White House. That’s why moderate Americans couldn’t speak out after 9/11. Moderate Muslims couldn’t get into the White House because Norquist’s friends were blocking their access."

9-25-2005 Washington Post an Abramoff here:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/20/AR2005092001758_pf.html

snip..."Safavian told the committee in an April 16, 2004, letter that he and his firm never did any work for Alamoudi. He said the firm lobbied at Barzinji's request to gain U.S. support to free the former deputy prime minister of Malaysia, Anwar Ibrahim, who was imprisoned for six years.

Safavian also told the committee that he had "overlooked" two other clients while preparing his initial submissions for the OMB position. He did not initially mention work as a registered foreign agent for Gabon, a country persistently rated by the United States as having a "poor" human rights record, or his work as a registered foreign agent for Pascal Lissouba, the former president of the Republic of Congo who has been tried in absentia for treason and embezzlement.

Safavian, former chief of staff at the General Services Administration, is charged with three counts of making false statements and obstructing a GSA investigation into his ties with Abramoff. Before joining the government, Safavian worked as a lobbyist with Abramoff, then founded Janus-Merritt Strategies with conservative antitax crusader Grover Norquist."

The Norquist-Rove connection to this is probably just as seedy as the Plame outing. It's time both of these guys were indicted as well.

[Independent_Liberal]

48. Probe may threaten leading Republicans?

God, I hope so. I want to see their party completely crippled.

:)

[Algorem]

52. House Ethics Committee "crippled by internal disputes"?Can't be.

"Ney in the rough?

Last week's arrest of a top White House procurement official who accompanied Ohio Republican Rep. Bob Ney on a golf trip to Scotland prompted renewed calls for a House Ethics Committee investigation.

Democracy 21 President Fred Wertheimer Democracy 21, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that promotes campaign reform, complained the committee has been crippled by internal disputes that prevent it from investigating Ney's ties to Jack Abramoff, the controversial lobbyist who arranged the trip for Ney and David Safavian, who resigned from the Office of Management and Budget after he was accused of lying to investigators.

Ney spokesman Brian Walsh said his boss has sent two letters to the House Ethics Committee offering to answer any questions, but has received no response."

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/insidepolitics/index.ssf?/base/opinion/1127554697276461.xml&coll=2

[dchill]

53. I'd like to shrink Grover Norquist...

to a size that would fit in a toilet, so I could flush him...

[Independent_Liberal]

55. Me too.

:)

[al bupp]

56. Apparently this thread's too old to recommend...

So, I'll just have to give it a kick instead.

Good work, all!

[Tatiana]

57. kick n/t

[AspenRose]

58. Man, I wish I could get excited....but....

DSM
Valerie Plame
Abramoff

...those first two SHOULD HAVE done the administration in, and yet it didn't.....

So I'm exercising caution until I know for SURE these rats are going DOWN.