That's what happened, and so far the White House hasn't confirmed or denied the story. The closest to it they've come is to claim that "nothing improper took place." In other words, the defendant is pleading not guilty.
And make no mistake, if it happened, it's a crime. I draw your attention to 18 U.S.C. 600:
http://law.onecle.com/uscode/18/600.html
Whoever, directly or indirectly, promises any employment, position, compensation, contract, appointment, or other benefit, provided for or made possible in whole or in part by any Act of Congress, or any special consideration in obtaining any such benefit, to any person as consideration, favor, or reward for any political activity or for the support of or opposition to any candidate or any political party in connection with any general or special election to any political office, or in connection with any primary election or political convention or caucus held to select candidates for any political office, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.
Clearly, as you can see, it would be a crime.
IF the White House did indeed make such an offer, and IF the President knew and approved of the offer, then this is an impeachable offense. Abuse of power is a crime at any level of government, and all the more so at the highest level.
I said IF, though, and we have to determine what really happened. Sestak says it happened, but is refusing to offer details. The White House is saying that "nothing improper happened" and hasn't elaborated. It looks to me like we are going to need a special prosecutor to get to the bottom of this thing. But the AG's office has already refused to investigate. No surprise, there, as it is controlled directly by the President's office.
Do we want a President, of whichever party, who is willing and more than willing to break the law in order to achieve political advantage for his own party? I don't... do you?
Since we've learned today that Joe's brother did the talking for him in this....and Bill Clinton did the talking for Rahm and Obama in this...pretty much all the air is out of this ballon.
ReplyDeleteWhat'd Joe get to arrange his part? He needs around $20 million to run a 4-star campaign. I'm guessing the Democratic National Committee has arranged donors to meet up with his team.
What'd Billy C get for his part? Hillary owes millions on her campaign debt. So they arranged for several donors to step forward over the coming months and finish up that problem.
Face it....you can't prosecute two guys outside of the White House and Joe. All's well that ends well.
Oh, and that Rahm guy...he will never get involved in state elections ever again...this cost the Democratic National Committee probably over $20 million to clean up this mess.
Ripley, I don't agree with your assessment that the new information "let's the air out of the balloon." The offer was made from Rham Emmanuel... indirectly. But the statute says indirectly still counts as an illegal act. See my 4 pm post for more details on my logic.
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