Culture of Corruption Scandal Vomits Up More Members Of Congress

A DWT oldie but goodie

Seth Hettena has been more on top of the Mitch Wade corruption case than anyone else and today he revealed who the 5 members of Congress are that Wade ratted out. Last week we speculated that they were the two obvious ones, Virgil Goode (R-VA) and Katherine Harris (R-FL) plus some combination of Jerry Lewis (R-CA), Tom Delay (R-TX), Duncan Hunter (R-CA), Roy Blunt (R-MO), and Elizabeth Dole (R-NC). We were on target with Goode, Harris and Lewis, all of whom should have been rotting in prison cells by now, but the other two were Democrats, Senator Dan Inouye (HI) and Congressman Alan Mollohan (WV).

The Inouye and Lewis connections involve Wade’s former employer, defense contractor Brent Wilkes, who introduced Wade to Cunningham.

During his trial, Wilkes testified that it was a “total misrepresentation” to say he relied on the Congressman Cunningham to do everything for him; Jerry Lewis, along with Rep. John Porter of Ill., were far more important, Wilkes said. (There’s excellent background on Lewis’ lobbying operation here.) The U.S. Attorney’s office in Los Angeles reportedly opened an investigation into Lewis back in 2006.

By contrast, Inouye, the Senate’s third-most senior Democrat, hasn’t yet been linked to an investigation of “corruption similar to Mr. Cunningham.” Wilkes was seeking the veteran Senate  appropriator’s help in lining up military and government contracts for his Honolulu document conversion subsidiary, Akamai Info Tech. Inouye was also one of more than a dozen members of Congress Wilkes unsuccessfully attempted to subpoena for his trial last year.

Mollohan’s ties to Wade are more direct. He received $23,000 in campaign contributions and gifts to a family foundation from Wade’s company, MZM Inc., and another firm that did business with MZM. In October 2002, MZM gave $20,000 to Mollohan’s Summit PAC.

No wonder Inouye was so adamant about defending Alaska's crooked senator, Ted Stevens. Maybe they can be cellies. Let's hope Inouye resigns as chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee this evening-- although I'll happily cover any and all bets on that one.

UNLESS BUSH PARDONS HIM, ANOTHER REPUBLICAN CROOK IS HEADED FOR A DOZEN YEARS IN PRISON-- REMEMBER BRENT WILKES?

Click for a better view of Republicrooks who will eventually wind up in prison

He had a sharp lawyer-- Mark Geragos-- but in the end, GOP crooked contractor, Brent Wilkes, will have to depend on Bush's pardon pen to keep him from spending the next 12 years in prison. He was painted by federal prosecutors as "the mastermind behind the largest congressional bribery scheme in history." No charges have been leveled in the case against most of the Republicans he bribed. I mean they have established he was bribing congressmen. Well... why haven't Jerry Lewis, Denny Hastert, Tom Feeney, Virgil Goode, Katherine Harris, Tom DeLay, Duncan Hunter, John Doolittle, etc, been taken into custody yet? Although both Lewis and Hastert were named as people who accepted bribes during testimony, the prosecution tried to keep this narrowly focused on Duke Cunningham-related crimes.

During Wilkes' trial, prosecutors presented evidence that he showered Cunningham, a Republican congressman from Rancho Santa Fe, with expensive meals, gifts, fancy trips, cash bribes and prostitutes.

In exchange for the gifts and bribes, Cunningham, who then held a seat on a powerful defense committee, used his influence to earmark money in budgets and steer projects that benefited ADCS, Inc., the Poway defense contracting firm that Wilkes owned.

An investigator said in court papers that the federal government lost at least $30 million and as much as $60 million on the contracts that ADCS was involved in.

Cunningham was a small-time hood compared to the real money guys on that committee, especially Lewis and Hunter, each of whom has used political connections to keep from being indicted. Lewis has spent well over a million dollars in legal fees, so far, to have U.S. Attorneys fired and transferred and to keep himself out of court.

Wilkes is 53 and if Bush forgets to pardon him he'll be 65 when he gets out of prison, still a young man compared to John McCain. The Feds had demanded 25 years for him, so he got off relatively lightly. And the probation officials who were called upon to make a sentencing recommendation based on all the facts in the case said he should get 60 years in prison, which would have meant, in effect, life. Judge Burns, indicating Wilkes was a possible flight risk, sent him directly to prison, writing that he's not trustworthy. Ya think?


UPDATE: MEDIA IGNORES THE MEAT OF THE MATTER

The mass media, like today's Washington Post, never really gets into the epidemic of bribery that has been at the heart of the Republican Culture of Corruption in DC for the past decade.

"There can be little doubt that Wilkes was the spider, and Cunningham the fly, in this web of corruption," prosecutors said.

Prosecutors also described Wilkes himself as "a frequent and enthusiastic patron of prostitutes" and said he kept a tape of himself having sex with two prostitutes in his office safe.

"Wilkes coldly and successfully exploited the simplemindedness of one of this country's war heroes, now a tortured shadow of his former self," prosecutors wrote. "Wilkes stands now revealed as a war profiteer, a thug, a bully, a lecherous old man who preyed on his young female staffers and hired prostitutes."

...Wilkes is a Republican Party "Pioneer" who raised more than $100,000 for President Bush's reelection in 2004 and donated-- in concert with his business colleagues -- $656,396 to 64 other Republican lawmakers and the national Republican Party committees in Washington from 1995 through the third quarter of 2005, according to campaign finance records.

Who the hell cares if Wilkes is a lecherous old man and a patron of prostitutes. The Post should be looking into which Republican legislators got their share of the million dollars of more Wilkes funneled into their campaigns-- and pocketbooks-- and what they did for him in return. Cunningham was hardly the only fly Wilkes had trapped. Don't we need to hear more about his relationship with recipients of his generosity like Pat Roberts (R-KS), Jerry Lewis (R-CA, who he testified gave him far more than Cunningham ever did), Joe Knollenberg (R-MI), Duncan Hunter (R-CA), Ken Calvert (R-CA), Peter Hoekstra (R-MI), Darrell Issa (R- CA), Larry Craig (R-ID), Heather Wilson (R-NM), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Joe Baca (D-CA), Brian Bilbray (R-CA), Bill Young (R-FL), and Robin Hayes (R-NC)?

REPUBLICAN CONTRACTOR BRENT WILKES CONVICTED ON ALL 13 COUNTS

The case was so solid and one of the GOP contractors who was bribing Randy "Duke" Cunningham and at least half a dozen other Republican members of Congress was convicted today on all 13 charges. He could wind up in prison for 2 decades but that seems unlikely since he has the goods on so many lawmakers. During the trial, for example, he testified that he got far more out of crooked GOP congressman Jerry Lewis than he ever did out of Cunningham. And he has another trial coming up for bribing CIA Executive Director (procurement maven) Dusty Foggo.

Following the verdict, jury forewoman Tyheshia Smith-Kruck, the only jury member to speak to reporters, said the jury had no doubts about Wilkes' guilt.

“The evidence was enough to convict him of all charges,” she said.

...Wilkes was tried on 13 charges of conspiracy, bribery, money laundering and honest services wire fraud.

Prosecutors contended that from 1997 to 2004 he showered Cunningham with gifts small and large. In all, they alleged, he leveraged $625,000 in cash bribes and tens of thousands more in gifts ranging from meals to computers in exchange for Cunningham's influence in appropriating money and pressuring bureaucrats to award contracts to ADCS Inc., Wilkes' company.

Wilkes forcefully denied bribing Cunningham. He testified that his interactions with the congressman were legitimate and legal, and his activity was simply “business as usual” in the lobbying and appropriations culture in Washington, D.C.

A central part of that culture is the process of earmarks-- where representatives insert money into budgets for programs with no oversight. That was a key component of the trial, with the government alleging Wilkes plied Cunningham to get earmarks into the Pentagon budget and then lean on bureaucrats to steer contracts to his company.

In addition to meals, there were flights in private jets, computers and software purchased for the congressman, and two small jet boats and a dock.

The big-ticket items in the case involved a $100,000 payment Wilkes made to Cunningham in 2000. Prosecutors said it was a bribe. Wilkes, however, maintained he was buying Cunningham's boat, the Kelly C. But the deal was never completed, according to Wilkes, because congressional staffers objected, saying that it was wrong for someone with business before Cunningham to pay him for the boat.

So when does the Jerry Lewis trial start? Denny Hastert? Virgil Goode? Katherine Harris?

TWO OF CUNNINGHAM'S BRIBERS, WILKES AND WADE, EXPERIENCE SOME DISCOMFITURE

Wade & Goode-- If there's a briber isn't there also a bribee?

Yesterday, in two somewhat-- albeit distantly-- related matters, Brent Wilkes and Mitchell Wade, two sleazy, crooked Republican contractors, went through a tough day. Wilkes, who is being tried in San Diego for bribing Cunningham, saw his case go to the jury. "Prosecutor Jason Forge said Wilkes' claims of innocence were preposterous and disputed that there were legitimate explanations for gifts and money given to Cunningham."

Even though the prosecutor was fairly inept when Wilkes took the stand, there is such a preponderance of evidence against him that it is still likely he will be found guilty. Interestingly, at one point he claimed-- something I have said for 2 years-- that he was getting more out of Jerry Lewis (R-CA), a far bigger crook than Cunningham, and ten times as corrupt-- than he was out of the Dukester.

Closing arguments began at 2:45 p.m. Prosecutor Sanjay Bhandari gave a very succinct, calm and, I thought, effective closing argument. He said the case boiled down to a question of whether Wilkes gave Cunningham things of value for influence and then tried to hide it. Wilkes friendship with Cunningham, Bhandari said, was a cultivated one, motivated by an attempt to get something back from the congressman. Every time Wilkes wanted something from Cunningham, a bribe changed hands. Wilkes’ defense was a cover story concocted long ago. For him to be telling the truth, a long list of people have to be lying.

A very animated Mark Geragos told jurors that the only lies they have heard were ones the government had been telling them, based on the testimony of admitted felons like Mitch Wade.

Ah, yes... Mitch Wade. He had a bad day too. Yesterday, as the result of a complaint filed by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, the Federal Election Commission announced the second largest fine in FEC history -- $1,000,000-- has been imposed against Wade and his company MZM for illegally funnelling campaign contributions/bribes to crooked Republicans Virgil Goode (VA) and Katherine Harris (FL).

WILKES' REPUBLICAN CULTURE OF CORRUPTION TRIAL GETTING WILD-- MAY BE KEY TO HASTERT'S EARLY RESIGNATION

Prostitutes, a disloyal nephew, subpoenas refused by bribe-taking members of Congress... Brent Wilkes' trial is a peek inside the way the Republicans ran the United States government for the first 6 years of the Bush Regime. And the mundane details are sickening in as much as they point to untold millions-- perhaps more-- being distributed among GOP fat-cats in return for... a chance to win at poker and a little nooky. In the end Cunningham helped Wilkes get nearly $100 million worth of government contracts for around $700,000 in bribes. What a deal!

Joel Combs, a nephew of Wilkes who worked closely with him at Wilkes' ADCS company in Poway, testified Wednesday morning about another benefit Wilkes gave: He let Cunningham win at poker.

In a morning of testimony that was damaging to Wilkes, Combs revealed that at an expensive trip in Hawaii, Wilkes set up poker games for Cunningham and other people, including Combs. Wilkes gave Combs cash with some instructions.

“He gave me money to lose to Duke,” Combs said.

It was not the first time that happened, Combs said. He said Wilkes would often instruct ADCS employees who played cards with Cunningham to intentionally lose.

...He testified that Wilkes developed a close relationship with Cunningham over the next seven years, and that led to ADCS getting millions in contracts via Cunningham's influence and ability to earmark government funds for certain programs in the defense budget. He would also pressure Pentagon officials to award contracts from those programs to ADCS.

Wilkes often said he could rely on Cunningham. “He explained that Cunningham was basically willing to do anything,” Combs said.

When there were problems with government officials about the work, Combs said Wilkes would often respond that he would “get ahold of Duke” to resolve them. He said Cunningham was “our problem-solver.”

Although Wilkes' attorney tried to get the judge to rule that none of the prostitutes who were supplied to Cunningham and other Republican officials would be permitted, he was overruled and yesterday Donna Rosetta and Tammy McFadden told their tawdry stories.

Donna Rosetta said she was chauffeured to a private villa at the Hapuna Beach Prince Hotel in Kamelua, Hawaii, in August 2003 by an escort service she worked for. Cunningham and Wilkes invited her and a second woman to undress and slide into a hot tub before Cunningham invited her upstairs, Rosetta said.

"They were smoking cigars and talking about some meeting they had earlier," Rosetta said.

She and Cunningham went to a bedroom, and he tipped her $50 to $80, she said.
The other woman, Tammy McFadden, testified that Wilkes and Cunningham appeared to be arguing about who would go upstairs with which woman.

"The one I ended up with was the one who was running the show," said McFadden, referring to Wilkes. She described Cunningham as "the boisterous one" and said he was overbearing.
Earlier in the day, Wilkes' nephew and employee Joel Combs testified that he found the escort service in the phone book on a $20,000 trip to Hawaii that also included catered meals and a diving trip captured on a video that was played for jurors.

Combs told jurors his uncle paid thousands of dollars for golf trips, private jet flights, Super Bowl box seats and boat navigation systems for Cunningham. In return, Combs testified, Wilkes had virtually unlimited access to the lawmaker.

Combs, the nephew, also testified that Wilkes also "communicated with" other sleazy politicians known to be hungry for bribes like Jerry Lewis (R-CA), Duncan Hunter (R-CA), Roy Blunt (R-MO), and, of course, Tom DeLay (R-TX) and Denny Hastert (R-IL). He testified today-- just as Hastert let it be known he would be resigning from Congress-- that Wilkes had paid "to fly Cunningham and former House Speaker Dennis Hastert from a golf outing in Palm Springs to San Diego for a reception and then back to Washington on private jets." The media isn't making the connection to the testimony and Hastert's sudden decision to resign. CNN, for example, reported an aide saying "I think he is just done with being a member of Congress." I am anxiously awaiting for CNN to report Hastert's favorite cookie recipes.


UPDATE: BEST WAY TO FOLLOW THE TRIAL

Author Seth Hettena, whose book, Feasting on the Spoils-- The Life and Times of Randy Cunningham, History's Most Corrupt Congressman, certainly qualifies him to live blog the Brent Wilkes trial. It's a must, especially for everyone who's waiting impatiently for Wilkes to cop a plea and trade Jerry Lewis, Duncan Hunter and Denny Hastert in for a lighter sentence.

WHEN IS A BRIBE TO A CONGRESSMAN NOT A BRIBE? AND HOW MANY YEARS IN PRISON SHOULD BE ATTACHED?

Republicans would like the trial and attendant media reports over and done with ASAP-- so that by the time voters go to the polls in November, 2008 the memory of all the corruption and bribes to Randy Duke Cunningham and as many as a dozen other Republican Congressman will have faded or, at least, been muddied by the GOP propaganda machine. One of the bribers, Republican rainmaker and defense contractor Brent Wilkes, went on trial yesterday in San Diego.

The prosecutor got the show on the road with a statement describing how Cunningham bullied the Pentagon into paying for Wilkes' contracting firm's shoddy work-- millions of dollars worth of wasteful, useless work the Pentagon had no interest in.

Appropriately, Wilkes has hired a showboat attorney with a reputation as one of the worst buckets of slime in the legal profession-- and that is saying a lot-- Mark Geragos. According to today's San Diego Union-Tribune Geragos claimed that none of the bribes Cunningham has admitted taking came from his client. “There was never any bribery,” he told the court.

Geragos did not tell jurors that in February, Cunningham told a different story to federal agents interviewing him in prison. There, Cunningham admitted that he accepted cash, gifts and trips in return for securing government contracts for Wilkes' company, ADCS Inc.

Cunningham has been in the downtown San Diego federal jail since July while cooperating with prosecutors. The Rancho Santa Fe Republican, who was elected to Congress in 1990, was sentenced to an eight-year federal prison term in 2006 after pleading guilty to conspiracy and tax evasion charges.

Geragos said he would show that what Wilkes did was not illegal. It's how business gets done in the nation's capital, he said.

Geragos certainly has a point there-- or at least half a point, It very much is how business gets done in the nation's capitol. But that doesn't make it "not bribery." Cunningham was one of scores of congressmen who were accepting "gifts" from business interests looking to profit from government contracts. Cunningham was far from the worst. Everyday names-- to Congress-watchers-- like Tom DeLay, Duncan Hunter (yeah, that one on TV yesterday with Giuliani, Romney, Frederick of Hollywood, McCain and the rest of the pathetic pygmies™), Jerry Lewis, John Doolittle, Virgil Goode, Ric Keller, Tom Feeney, were taking millions of dollars from contractors in return for special treatment. Were they "bribes?" Geragos hopes to confuse the jury and sow doubt with legalistic definitions.

Teri Figueroa is covering the trial for the North County Times and paints a sordid picture of how "fiscally conservative" Republicans handle taxpayer dollars. "The trial," she write, "promises to pull back the curtain on Capitol Hill lobbying and offer a primer on how individual members of Congress set aside federal money for pet projects." Each and every one of the crooked politicians subpoenaed to testify has refused, claiming congressional privilege. One of them, Idaho's Larry Wide Stance Craig, has gone back on his promise to resign-- on unrelated morals charges-- in order to avoid the subpoena.

"Federal prosecutors say Wilkes plied the Escondido-based Republican congressman with $700,000 in cash and gifts to secure more than $80 million in government contracts-- taxpayer funds-- for his now-defunct defense firm ADCS Inc."
Geragos told that jury, rather incredulously, that "Every single one of these transactions they're alleging is a bribe has an innocent explanation they don't want you to hear."

I have a feeling that in the next few weeks we'll all be hearing lots and lots of explanations, though not of the innocent kind.

HOOKERS MAKE CULTURE OF CORRUPTION FIGURE WILKES LOOK BAD?

Hookers and pimps cannot be mentioned in relation to Republicans?

Is there anyone in America who doesn't already know that the only elected Republicans who don't chase call girls are the Republicans who chase young boys? Half a dozen Republicans have already admitted that they availed themselves of the pimping services of Republican "contractor" and rainmaker Brent Wilkes, whose trial starts in San Diego on Wednesday. But Wilkes is demanding that the judge not allow anyone to mention the pimping he did for Cunningham and a wide array of other Republicans who he was bribing and who made his company fabulously wealthy with taxpayer money in return for the illicit poontang and the endless pocket-lining.

Wilkes' slickster shyster, Mark Geragos (famous for his antics in defending other celebrity miscreants like Michael Jackson, Scott Peterson, and Gary Condit), has made the completely daft argument that by even mentioning Wilkes' procurement of hookers for Randy "Duke" Cunningham and a dozen other lowlife Republican congressmen, the jury would get a "negative prejudiced view of Mr. Wilkes' moral character."

Maybe more relevant would be a bevy of character witnesses who Geragos does plan to parade before the jury to attest to what a good and decent stand up guy Wilkes is. I'm sure he goes to church too.

Among the Republicans most nervous about their own criminal activities being exposed are Cunningham "business partners" Jerry Lewis, Duncan Hunter, Darrell Issa and John Doolittle, to name only the California crooks who have been subpoenaed in this case-- all of whom are refusing to testify. Interestingly, another major bribe taker, Idaho Senator and toilet cruiser Larry Craig, is likely delaying his resignation from the Senate in order to avoid having to comply with the subpoena with which he was served in this case.

IT'S SEPTEMBER 30-- LARRY CRAIG RESIGNATION DAY! BUT THEN THERE'S THAT VERY INCONVENIENT BRENT WILKES CORRUPTION TRIAL SUBPOENA

Or maybe not. I know if they had fingers all the salmon in America would be crossing them and wishing he'd just resign already and leave them alone. Environmentalists and fishermen, on the other hand, do have fingers to cross-- and they've been fighting the arch anti-environmentalist for decades. "Craig, who was removed from leadership posts on the Senate Appropriations and Energy committees after a sex scandal, is known as one the most powerful voices in Congress on behalf of the timber and power industries. Environmentalists have fought him for years on issues from endangered salmon to public land grazing."

While Harry Reid (D-NV) and Maria Cantwell (D-WA) are trying to undo some of the ecological damage done by Craig, at the behest of his campaign contributors and the Bush Regime, the Minneapolis-St Paul airport is frantic about the public toilet situation as the day of the Republican National Convention approaches. According to today's NY Times "Dividers intended to make soliciting sex much more difficult will be added to stalls in two men’s rooms at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport."

They figure if they bring the dividers down to two or three inches from the floor, randy Republicans won't be able to annoy innocent patrons with their footsie games and their abominable hand signals.

Anyway, Craig's attorney, Stan Brand, apparently a shameless publicity hound, was on Tweety's cable show Friday and he pretty much said the Senate is stuck with Craig until his term expires-- so much for the self-imposed September 30 deadline-- and if other Republican closet queens (like, say Mitch McConnell, who neatly fits into both categories) don't like it, they can just go suck on a... lemon.

MATTHEWS: Let me ask you about the Ethics Committee. That‘s especially for you working within the Congress on ethics matters.

Can you win his case in the Ethics Committee, if it comes to that? I know that no senator‘s been expelled by the Senate. I-- I think you have to go back almost to the Civil War, when they expelled people for joining and taking an oath to the Confederacy.

BRAND: Right.

MATTHEWS: What is the case? Would they...

BRAND: Well, again...

MATTHEWS: What‘s the worst the Senate could do to a senator...

BRAND: Again...

MATTHEWS: ... if he says, I‘m staying?

BRAND: Yes. Again, I mean, I-- you know, I-- they‘re-- it‘s inconceivable to me that the United States Senate will open the door to bringing cases against senators for misdemeanor, misdemeanors that have nothing to do with the performance of official duties.

I know they say they have the right to discipline people for bringing discredit on the Senate. That‘s a vague standard. That‘s well beyond where we are in 2007. I can‘t imagine that 99 other senators want to be judged by that standard. [Especially not the ones Craig has some interesting information on.]

MATTHEWS: Yes, you wonder about all the traffic violations and other kinds of problems that they would be facing.

Anyway, thank you.

Stan Brand, is your sense that the senator may well be able to hang on until the end of his term?

BRAND: I-- I think that‘s conceivable, especially if he gets some type of relief in Minnesota. But I don‘t think it depends on that.

Funny that Tweety never asked the lawyer if maybe Senator Craig won't resign because he fears that subpoena in the Brent Wilkes corruption trial that he would have to comply with if he wasn't a U.S. Senator.

CALIFORNIA IS #1-- IN TERMS OF CORRUPT REPUBLICANS STILL NOT IN PRISON

The Culture of Corruption fostered by the Republican Party's national leadership as an integral and systemic part of their dominance over American politics. And it is far from dead just because of the banishment from Washington of major progenitors Tom DeLay, Bill Frist and Rick Santorum. This morning CREW-- Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington-- released a well-documented new report, Beyond DeLay: The 22 Most Corrupt Members of Congress (and two to watch).
This is the third such report CREW has released on the "egregious, unethical and possibly illegal activities of the most tainted members of Congress."

The "two to watch" are David Diapers Vitter (R-LA) and Larry Craig (R-ID) and there are 4 other senators on the list of the two dozen slimiest members of Congress, Pete "Sneaky Pete" Domenici (R-NM), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), and Ted Stevens (R-AK). The rest are a gaggle of House members, 4 Democrats and 14 Republicans.

Although Alaska has the distinction of being the only state with 100% of it's congressional delegation on the list, it is California that has the most unethical and corrupt members. California congressmen currently under investigation include crime kingpin Jerry Lewis, about-to-be-indicted John Doolittle, and 3 southern California crooks: Duncan Hunter, Ken Calvert, and Gary Miller.

The full list of the crookedest of the crooked is at the CREW page. Meanwhile many of the most corrupt members of the House have been subpoenaed to testify at the trial of Brent Wilkes, one of the Republican contractors/rainmakers who has been charged with over 30 counts of bribery, fraud, etc in connection with the Duke Cunningham (R-CA) case. The spillover is most likely to result in prison terms for Denny Hastert (R-IL), Jerry Lewis (R-CA), and Duncan Hunter (R-CA), although other corrupt congressmen being dragged into this also include Roy Blunt (R-MO), Jerry Weller (R-IL), Darrell Issa (R-CA), John Doolittle (R-CA)-- I mean what list of crooks would be complete without the Doolittle name on it?-- Peter Hoekstra (R-MI), Joe Knollenberg (R-MI), and a few Democrats who have also been beneficiaries of the military-industrial complex's generosity (John Murtha, Ike Skelton, Silvestre Reyes, and Norm Dicks).

All of the lawmakers said they do not intend to comply with the subpoenas.

The subpoenas from U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California were read on the House floor late Monday in accordance with House rules requiring lawmakers to inform the House speaker if they've been subpoenaed.

All the lawmakers said in notifications to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that after consulting with House attorneys they had decided not to comply with the subpoenas.

RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT IS MORE ATTRACTIVE TO DUNCAN HUNTER THAN JOINING HIS PAL DUKE CUNNINGHAM IN PRISON (WHERE HE BELONGS)

Today Duncan Hunter, an extreme right wing congressman from the suburbs and desert east of San Diego, made it official: he's running for president (of the United States... of America). One of the triumvirate-- along with Jerry Lewis and Randy "Duke" Cunningham-- of the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee that was a major pillar of Tom DeLay's Republican Culture of Corruption, Hunter is under investigation (as is Lewis; Cunningham already having been convicted and sentenced to prison) for a wide array of corruption charges.

When Fox "News" and the Washington Post first announced he was setting up an exploratory committee, neither could avoid mentioning Hunter's close relationship with Cunningham, nor the fact that "Hunter has accepted $46,000 in campaign donations from the same contractors at the center of the Cunningham scandal, Brent Wilkes and Mitchell Wade." That's the tip of the iceberg and it is suspected that Hunter, like Cunningham, accepted millions of dollars in bribes from Republican defense contractors over the years. In fact, most knowledgeable sources looking into the case, agree that both Jerry Lewis and Duncan Hunter dwarfed Cunningham in terms of bribes taken in. After all, each was infinitely more powerful and more able to make good on the desires of the vast array of bribers who were always so generous with them.

Yesterday the New York Times did a pre-announcement introduction of Hunter to its readers, the vast majority of whom are assumed to have never heard of Hunter (unlike DWT readers who should be well aware of Hunter's nefarious dealings, there being 72 mentions of Hunter (none laudatory) on the internal search engine and 804 if you search "duncan hunter," "downwithtyranny" on Google. The Times led with a regurgitation of the crap in the press release-- "Hunter will make his announcement at the Marriott Renaissance Park hotel in the South Carolina city of Spartanburg... The breakfast event is titled 'America: The Strength of Freedom,' which also is Hunter’s campaign slogan." Then it goes on to talk about what a hawk he is, how he hates immigration and women's right to choice and how he won't have an easy time fundraising because no one knows who the hell he is. And... and nothing. Not a word from the paper of record about corruption, bribes, Brent Wilkes, Tony Snesko, Mitchell Wade, Randy "Duke" Cunningham, Carol Lam or anything else that might give Americans a clue that the man asking for their support may well wind up in prison before the first primary votes are cast.

Today the press is tip-toeing around connecting Hunter with the Culture of Corruption. USA Today was far more blunt in 2005:

Brent Wilkes, the founder of defense contractor ADCS Inc., gave more than $840,000 in contributions to 32 House members or candidates, campaign-finance records show. He flew Republican lawmakers on his private jet and hired lobbyists with close ties to those lawmakers.

Wilkes' charitable foundation, which aids sick children and military families, honored congressmen at black-tie banquets and donated to their favorite causes. Wilkes was also a "Pioneer" for President Bush's 2004 re-election campaign, meaning he raised at least $100,000.

With help from two committee chairmen, ADCS got more than $90 million in government contracts since its founding in 1995, helping propel Wilkes from an obscure businessman to a millionaire prominent in Republican circles.

Since 1994, Wilkes and ADCS gave $40,700 in campaign contributions to Rep. Duncan Hunter, a San Diego Republican who now chairs the House Armed Services Committee. Hunter has acknowledged that he joined with Cunningham in 1999 to contact Pentagon officials who reversed a decision and gave ADCS one of its first big contracts, for nearly $10 million. Hunter's spokesman, Joe Kasper, said the congressman was unavailable for comment Tuesday.

Another California Republican, Appropriations Committee Chairman Jerry Lewis, led panels that ordered the Pentagon to continue programs that aided ADCS when Pentagon officials wanted to cut them. Lewis got $71,253 from Wilkes and his employees in donations since 1993. Wilkes gave Lewis donations and met him at various events, Lewis spokesman Jim Specht said, but "he never talked with him about a defense project."

Before becoming the Appropriations chairman this year, Lewis led the subcommittee that oversees defense spending. In the late 1990s, that panel directed the Pentagon to continue converting paper documents to computer records, the work that ADCS does. Pentagon officials had tried to end the program's funding.

Wilkes' ties to Hunter and Cunningham go beyond campaign contributions. In 2003, the businessman's foundation hosted a "Salute to Heroes" gala to give Hunter an award, just as it did for Cunningham a year earlier. The Wilkes Foundation gave $1,000 in 2003 to a charity run by two of Hunter's staffers, records show.

Bloggers have also been on Hunter's trail for a long time and the consensus is that he's every bit as much of a crook as Cunningham. Taylor Marsh has done a great job on her own blog and at Firedoglake, especially when it came to shining a light on Hunter's shady connections with Republican swiftboat operations, at least one of which was surreptitiously run out of his office. And the Pogo Blog has kept track of Hunter's wheelings and dealings with other criminal elements like war profiteers and bribers Titan.

In recent years, Titan has also continued to enjoy a generous flow of Pentagon money--in part thanks to Duncan Hunter and the "queen of earmarks" Letitia White. Between 2003 and 2005, Titan retained White to look after its interests as the FY 04, 05, and 06 armed services and intelligence authorization and appropriations bills were crafted. (Titan has also been a top contributor to White's former boss Rep. Jerry Lewis.)

Included in some bills, for example, are earmarks beyond what the Pentagon requested for two Navy projects, the experimental Sea Fighter LCS(X) craft and the Affordable Weapons System (AWS). Both projects have been championed by Hunter, and are contracted by Titan.

Both projects, however, have not been met with universal acclaim within the Navy. Though the AWS--touted as a cheap, off-the-shelf alternative to the Tactical Tomahawk--has consistently been praised in House Armed Services Committee reports, a Navy report recently submitted to Congress was less sanguine about the project that Hunter has earmarked $27 million for in the latest House Defense Authorization bill. An excerpt from the Navy communique as reported in a May 29, 2006, Inside the Navy story:

Originally the [Affordable Weapon System] provided much promise, however, it has experienced many technical difficulties resulting in zero successful test flights. Numerous non-Navy initiated engineering changes have significantly increased the cost of the missile. While AWS continues to receive Congressional funding, there are a number of other missile concepts that may provide similar solutions...at a reduced cost.

In case of the Sea Fighter LCS(X) craft, $25.7 million was earmarked in the latest defense authorization bill. Yet the LCS(X), according to the National Journal's Megan Scully, who also took a look at Hunter's Titan ties today:

...does not have a place in the Navy's ambitious 313-ship plan, which [Congressional Budget Office] already views as potentially unaffordable. And the vessel has spent two of the last four months dry-docked for major repairs to its propulsion and other systems.

"For a ship that's brand new, it has a lot of problems," said one Navy official.

Titan was acquired last year by L3 Communications, which is currently the second top corporate donor to both Hunter and Lewis.

Raw Story has also done extensive investigative reporting on Hunter's nefarious activities.

Congressman Duncan Hunter (R-CA), Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, has come under fire from constituents for accepting nearly a quarter million dollars in campaign contributions from missile defense contractors over the past five years. Hunter has also drawn criticism for accepting $46,000 from un-indicted co-conspirators implicated in bribing Hunter’s friend and San Diego colleague, Randy "Duke" Cunningham, who resigned from Congress after pleading guilty.

But Hunter’s ties to the defense industry go even deeper.

The Republican Congressman shares ownership in a Virginia cabin with Pete Geren-- who served as Acting Secretary of the U.S. Air Force from August through early November, RAW STORY has learned. Hunter’s disclosure forms filed with the FEC indicate he built the cabin in 1996 along with Geren and a third partner, Al Tierney....

Hunter, who has held office for 25 years, has come under fire for other questionable defense deals. A Dec. 8 editorial titled "Legal Looting" in the conservative San Diego Union-Tribune criticized Hunter for helping defense contractors ADCS and AUDRE obtain $190 million in Pentagon contracts for "automated data conversion" projects. A 1994 General Accounting Office report noted that the Pentagon didn't want this "help," as it already had the tools for such work, the editorial noted.

But the Union-Tribune observed, "Cunningham, Hunter and their House allies didn’t care. AUDRE and ADCS were generous with contributions-- and ADCS executive Brent Wilkes was allegedly bribing Cunningham. No matter who griped, lawmakers could always add 'earmarks' for pet projects to bills and get their way. This led to such absurdities as a $9.7 million contract for ADCS to digitize historical documents from the Panama Canal Zone that the Pentagon considered insignificant."

It never ceases to amaze me how the mainstream media neglects to mention "little" things like this when they can dwell on completely fabricated nonsense about Obama going to a madrassah or about Hillary being "deserted" by Hollywood.