Are Elites Always Going To Be Above The Law?

Nixon may or may not have made a deal with Jerry Ford, but he got a pardon and never faced a trial, let alone a prison sentence. He said what many politicians feel about politicians who get caught breaking the law: "the punishment of resignation is more than adequate for the crime." Our corporate elites couldn't agree more. Accountability is for poor people with no power, but for elites with lots of it.

Only 15 senators and 5 congressmen have ever been expelled-- and almost all of them were Confederate sympathizers during the Civil War. Censure is a less severe measure, while often-- though not always-- includes a de facto plea bargain in the form of a resignation that keeps the congressmember out of prison. Example, in 1870 South Carolina Republican Benjamin Whittemore, a former military chaplain with a vile-looking Duck Dynasty beard, was caught selling appointments to West Point and Annapolis. He resigned, never faced trial, and ran for Congress again. He won, but Congress refused to seat him. Two other congressmen, John Deweese (R-NC) and Roderick Butler (R-TN)-- who also sported a Duck Dynasty beard--were also censured for selling appointments to West Point the same year. Deweese resigned. Butler refused and it wasn't until 1874 that his constituents made the decision for him. Neither of them was ever tried.

Oakes Ames was another Republican crook from the period, a railroad baron from Massachusetts who was a key player in the Crédit Mobilier scandal, caught illegally selling stock to influential congressmen for a fraction of the value. He was censured in 1873 for "seeking to secure congressional attention to the affairs of a corporation in which he was interested, and whose interest directly depended upon the legislation of Congress, by inducing members of Congress to invest in the stocks of said corporation." He died soon afterwards and 10 years later the Massachusetts legislature passed a resolution posthumously exonerating him. His son was elected governor of the state in 1887. The Crédit Mobilier scandal was bipartisan and James Brooks (D-NY) was censured for attempted bribery but refused to resign and died in office in 1873. Like Ames, he was never tried for his role in one of the biggest financial-political scandals in American history.

More recently, congressmen have been disciplined for more colorful reasons. Los Angeles Democrat Charles Wilson, a Mormon-turned-Moonie, was censured in 1980 for taking bribes from Sun Myung Moon and Tongsun Park in the Koreagate scandal, which involved bribing as many as 30 congressmen for helping keep American troops in Korea. Only one of the 30, Richard Hanna (D-CA) was tried, convicted and sentenced to prison. Wilson's constituents defeated him in the next primary that same year.

Since the 1980s, the action has been sexual misconduct (Daniel Crane, Gerry Studds, and Mark Foley are names that come right to mind, none of whom went to prison) and financial shenanigans and self-enrichment, including Newt Gingrich. This year a crooked congressman from New Jersey, Rob Andrews (D), and a drug pushing right wing freak from Florida, Trey Radel ®, were encouraged to retire from Congress in return for no prison time. Currently Staten Island Mafia figure Michael "Mikey Suits: Grimm, is working out a similar deal for himself.

At the end of last month we looked at Bill Curry's assertion that the Democratic Party under centrists Clinton and Obama has lost it's soul. He documents the Democratic Party leaders' transition away from representing working families' interests for the sake of their Big Business contributors' interests. And, like virtually all multimillionaires and billionaires, those interests are criminal interests and their top priorities including staying out of prison. For a share of the spoils the Republican wing of the Democratic Party has been more than happy to join forces with the Republicans to make sure business elites have gotten "special consideration" when it comes to their criminality. Laws are changed to accommodate their needs and discretion on prosecution has kept criminal elements from gangster Sheldon Adelson to banksters Lloyd Blankfein, Robert Ruben, John Mack, Vikram Pandit, Jamie Dimon, Brian Moynihan, Tim Geithner.



Shenna Bellows is running against Establishment conservative Susan Collins for the Maine Senate seat Collins has been holding onto too long. I'm running for Senate," she told us today, "because too many powerful people have taken advantage of working class voters for too long and gotten away with it. Too big to fail and too big to jail are corrupt philosophies that dominate our politics today because of a broken finance system. We need working class representation in Washington to give the power back where it belongs-- not with big banks, well-connected elites and political lifers, but with families, students, teachers, nurses, carpenters and retirees who paid into the system all their lives. The best medicine, and the best way to prevent any more abuses, is to elect a more progressive Congress that has its priorities in order."

The other progressive candidate who is key to the Democrats holding the Senate in November is Rick Weiland who's running for the open South Dakota seat. His whole campaign is predicated on giving working families a fair shake. This is an issue right up his alley:

One of the basic tenets of democracy is that the citizens should never have to question whose side their government is on. Unfortunately, that guiding principle has come under massive assault by Big Money over the last several decades. And, even more unfortunately, it’s more true today than it ever has been. The “recovery” we’ve been told about by politicians from both parties over the last five years has largely been confined to the wealthiest citizens. The small towns I travel to in rural South Dakota haven’t experienced anything close to what the folks on Wall Street have enjoyed. If our country continues this theft of opportunity for people who want to work their way into or remain in the middle class, the impacts will be dramatic. We need a Senate that will stand up, fight, and hold Big Money accountable. Simply put, it’s the single most important issue facing our country today.