The chances of soon-to-be former Senator Larry Craig overturning his conviction are slim to none, unless the ruling judge is a closet Democrat who is really enjoying this. Craig's decision to plead guilty was not coerced in the 15 minutes he had between the time he was arrested and his court hearing -- he had more than eight weeks to review his options, including hiring an attorney to represent him and choosing to fight the charges. He chose not to -- and chose to plead guilty. In fact, Craig seemed quite happy with his guilty plea, until the story became public. The judge hearing the Senator's attempt to throw out his plea said he will rule on this sometime next week, so Craig has decided not to resign on Sunday, as he had 'promised':

After arguments were heard in court today in Minneapolis, in which lawyers for Senator Larry Craig sought to undo his guilty plea in the airport restroom case, Mr. Craig issued a brief statement that was posted on his Senate Web site: "Today was a major step in the legal effort to clear my name. The court has not issued a ruling on my motion to withdraw my guilty plea. For now, I will continue my work in the United States Senate for Idaho." Mr. Craig, a longtime Republican senator from Idaho, had earlier announced that he would resign his Senate seat on Sept. 30 - just four days from now. But he also later emphasized, through aides and a bizarrely misrouted voicemail that became public, that he was only announcing his "intention" to resign. And that he wanted to fight to reverse the misdemeanor conviction.

I don't know if Craig has any other recourse, such as taking this to a higher court, if the judge rules against him. If the Senator does, I'm sure he'll take advantage of that and try to stay in office until those are heard as well.

There is only one certainty in this whole affair. Every day this is prolonged, Larry Craig is becoming a bigger and bigger national laughingstock.

The continuing saga of Norman Hsu is showing more and more the dark underbelly of political fundraising. It keeps getting worse for the Democrats as a whole and Hillary in particular:

A Laguna Beach investment firm filed a lawsuit against Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu on Friday, claiming he defrauded investors out of at least $23 million and required them to donate to Democratic candidates.

According to the lawsuit filed by Briar Wood Investments, Hsu persuaded the company's operator to do business with him by taking him to star-studded Democratic Party events. There, the 56-year-old Hong Kong native was praised by New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, California Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown and others, the lawsuit said.

As a condition of doing business with the fundraiser, Hsu directed investors to make contributions to certain Democratic candidates, the lawsuit said. The investors turned over tens of thousands of dollars, including $30,000 worth of checks to Clinton's campaign on a single day.

Read that again, Hillary knew who he was and probably invited him to events. He used that access to persuade investors to give him money which he duly defrauded them of and also coerced them to donate to Hillary's campaign. One would think that $30,000 in one day would make the campaign take notice. $23-million will definitely make the country take notice.

This is getting very interesting. There were two more articles today about some questionable fund-raising practices by Democrats, specifically Hillary Clinton. The first is from the Wall Street Journal, Donors Stir 'Bundling' Questions:

BRISTOW, Va. -- When Hillary Rodham Clinton held an intimate fund-raising event at her Washington home in late March, Pamela Layton donated $4,600, the maximum allowed by law, to Mrs. Clinton's presidential campaign. But the 37-year-old Ms. Layton says she and her husband were reimbursed by her husband's boss for the donations. "It wasn't personal money. It was all corporate money," Mrs. Layton said outside her home here. "I don't even like Hillary. I'm a Republican."

Read it all. It gives a good summary of the practice known as "bundling". The second article is from this morning's Washington Post, Past Clouds Candidates' Donor Lists, which starts off with this gem:

A list of the donors who have "bundled" large sums from dozens of individuals to give to Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign includes several figures who were involved in the 1990s Democratic Party fundraising scandal that tarnished her husband's record. Among them is an Oklahoma oilman who testified in the mid-1990s that the firm he worked for, owned by Democratic fundraisers, sought to curry favor with Bill Clinton's administration by providing payments and a golf club membership to a Cabinet secretary's son.

To give the appearance of fairness, the Washington Post does note that one of Mitt Romney's national finance co-chair was indicted. That man, Alan Fabian, immediately resigned and his contributions were returned, which the Post doesn't tell you.

Looks like campaign finance abuses are once again going to be a big story during this election cycle.

Republican Senator John Cornyn offered a Sense of the Senate Resolution this afternoon, requiring a three fifths majority, decrying the personal attacks that we've witnessed over the past two weeks on General Petraeus and his troops' integrity. As General Petraeus was confirmed to his position as head of Multinational Forces in Iraq unanimously by this same august body, one would assume that this resolution would also be unanimous, or close to it. Especially when you read the entire text:

To express the sense of the Senate that General David H. Petraeus, Commanding General, Multi-National Force-Iraq, deserves the full support of the Senate and strongly condemn personal attacks on the honor and integrity of General Petraeus and all members of the United States Armed Forces.

That's it. No hidden language, nobody specifically mentioned. Just 47 words. A good time for the Senate to unite in a bipartisan way in support for the commanding General currently in combat in Iraq. It passed, 72 to 25, with three Not Voting. The "Nays" consisted of 24 Democrats and 1 Independent. The 3 "Not Voting" were all Democrats.

NAYs ---25 Akaka (D-HI) Bingaman (D-NM) Boxer (D-CA) Brown (D-OH) Byrd (D-WV) Clinton (D-NY) Dodd (D-CT) Durbin (D-IL) Feingold (D-WI) Harkin (D-IA) Inouye (D-HI) Kennedy (D-MA) Kerry (D-MA) Lautenberg (D-NJ) Levin (D-MI) Menendez (D-NJ) Murray (D-WA) Reed (D-RI) Reid (D-NV) Rockefeller (D-WV) Sanders (I-VT) Schumer (D-NY) Stabenow (D-MI) Whitehouse (D-RI) Wyden (D-OR)

Not Voting - 3 Biden (D-DE) Cantwell (D-WA) Obama (D-IL)

Ah, true profiles in courage. Well, at least the troops know who their friends are - who has their back up on the Hill. And al Qaida knows who their friends are, as well.

You have no idea how hard it is for me to call ex-Marine John Murtha that. I respect anyone who has served...at least until the point that they take off the uniform and demean our troops like Rep. Murtha and Sen. John Kerry did.

John Murtha said shortly after several Marines were charged with murder in Haditha Iraq that they killed "in cold blood" when the hadn't even gone to trial. Most of the charges were dropped including the most serious charges and the Marines have effectively been cleared. So why hasn't Murtha apologized for his comments and why didn't the media question why a sitting congressman would first portray our troops as murderers than not apologize when it became clear they would not? That was a rhetorical question.

I guess if you can't get the old media to do the job, it falls to new media bloggers to ask the corrupt congressman the pertinent questions:

It seems that at that exact moment Murtha would like to have redeployed himself to Okinawa. Murtha loathes those who he once belonged to and he should be ashamed of himself. Unfortunately shame is not something Murtha knows anything about.

Congressman John Murtha is an absolute disgrace and he is exulted by the Democrats. He accused our troops of committing a vile act and when they are proven innocent, he runs away. Ladies and gents, enjoy your new Congress, the Most. Ethical. Congress, Ever.

The day after the demonstrably Democratic CREW lists him as one of the most corrupt members of Congress, Roll Call is reporting (Mr. Murtha's Money) that all of the recipients of Democrat Representative Jack Murtha's earmarks in this year's Defense Authorization bill donated money to the Representative. Not some of them, not most of them - but all of them. Pay to play, perhaps?

Every private entity that Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) favored with an earmark in this year's defense bill recently has given political money to the lawmaker, according to an analysis of House Appropriations and federal elections records by Roll Call and Taxpayers for Common Sense. PACs and employees of those 26 groups together have contributed $413,250 to Murtha since the beginning of 2005. He collected nearly a quarter of the sum--$100,750--in the two weeks leading up to March 16, the original deadline for lawmakers to file their earmark requests.

Murtha's brazenness is pretty remarkable. Check out this somewhat dated (earlier this year) summary over at the website for the Taxpayers for Common Sense, which includes links to Excel files with updated information on donations to Murtha. Even Murtha's hometown newspaper, The Tribune-Democrat of Jonestown PA, is publishing some pretty extensive articles on Murtha's questionable dealings. And the paper is reporting that former Democratic Senator Max Cleland has resigned from one of Murtha's charities:

Cleland acknowledged his change of heart came during an investigation by the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call. The paper was looking into PAID's limited achievements and close ties to Murtha, local defense contractors and others benefiting from congressional earmarks. "I don't really know much about it," Cleland said. "Once I learned more about the organization, I just decided it was not for me. And I really don't have time to do that." Roll Call found that PAID received Murtha-backed government contracts as recently as 2003 and works with other companies Murtha has funded.

Eventually the national media will get around to investigating Murtha with the same zeal that they investigate Republicans with, right?

The only quibble I have in response to David's post "The Baddest Apples" is his description of CREW as non-partisan. It's a very partisan outlet, funded by George Soros and the Democracy Alliance. CREW, along with the DCCC, was instrumental in keeping the Mark Foley scandal quiet until it could do the most political damage to the Republicans' election hopes in 2006. And it's manned by Democrat ex-Hill staffers. They occasionally attack Democrats to either keep up the appearance of non-partisanship, or when the Democrat acts so egregiously that it's impossible to save him, as is the case with Rep. William Jefferson.

Having said that, I agree with their interpretation of every one of those Republicans on the list, with the possible exception of David Vitter (who is a hypocrite, but not corrupt - and I don't think he's been arrested for anything, nor pled guilty). Like I've said for the past year, the GOP still has alot more cleaning out to do. I would prefer that the party do it before the electorate does, but so be it.

The nonpartisan nonprofit organization Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has just released its list of the most rotten to the core politicians in congress. Titled, "Beyond Delay: The 22 Most Corrupt Members of Congress (and two to watch)" the list is full of old favorites and a few new surprises.

Members of the Senate:
Pete Domenici (R-NM)
Mitch McConnel (R-KY)
Lisa Murkowski (R-AK)
Ted Stevens (R-AK)

Members of the House:
Ken Calvert (R-CA)
John T. Doolittle (R-CA)
Tom Feeney (R-FL)
Doc Hastings (R-WA)
Duncan Hunter (R-CA)
William Jefferson (D-LA)
Jerry Lewis (R-CA)
Gary Miller (R-CA)
Alan Mollohan (D-WV)
Timothy Murphy (R-PA)
John Murtha (D-PA)
Steve Pearce (R-NM)
Rick Renzi (R-AZ)
Harold Rogers (R-KY)
David Scott (D-GA)
Don Young (R-AK)
Jerry Weller (R-IL)
Heather Wilson (R-LA)

Dishonorable Mention:
Larry Craig (R-ID)
David Vitter (R-LA)

If you want to know the ins-and-outs of what makes you eligible for the list, you can have a look-see here.
Pretty much what you'd expect. Graft, graft and more graft.

Abraham Lincoln has a big memorial statue and Sen. Larry Craig gets... a bathroom stall. Well, Abraham Lincoln was a president, so it is understandable.

Yes, the infamous Minneapolis bathroom stall has now become a tourist attraction of sorts. According to the AP, travelers from all over the world who pass through the airport ask to be directed to the infamous stall where the notorious "hand signal" that led to Craig's disturbing the peace misdemeanor conviction occurred. The conviction also led to a lot of embarrassment for the Republicans and cast more dark clouds over the Senate as a whole as it reaffirmed in many people's eyes the negative stereotype of elected officials being self absorbed elitists. Of course, this is not of many elected officials – or even Craig for that matter – but for many, perception is reality.

While the entire Craig episode has been reduced to a comedic vehicle for pundits, the truth of the matter is that with the nation at war, a looming mortgage crisis, climate change, etc, the public needs (and demands) strong and solid leadership. The emergence of the "Craig bathroom attraction" highlights what has become endemic to the woes of the very unpopular Congress and its foibles as public disapproval grows.

For many years, unacceptable sexual activity has been the norm in Washington, D.C. That all changed with the impeachment of Bill Clinton. Closets were opened and improper activity was quickly punished. The accused was immediately shunned. The concept of fair trial was gone. The opposing party attacked to gain an advantage. The member party, secured the rope and hung the accused without a trial.

As a Catholic, I saw this happen in my church. For years, priests who abused children were allowed to continue to serve in the community. They were promoted and allowed to harm more children. Then, the crap hit the fan. Things changed. Some might say for the better. However, under the new plan, innocent priests who were accused were immediately punished and removed from their job. They lost a career and financial support. Some of these priests have been proven to be innocent. However, nobody seems to care as long as the problem is resolved. However, shouldn't we care about the innocent priest who served the community and was unjustly accused?

Senator Larry Craig was not guilty of a crime. He should keep his seat. The press, the Democrats and the Republicans must start thinking about the individual. Our country was built of the concept of a fair trial. It is nice to see that the Washington Post has come out to say that Craig did not commit a crime. Instead, he pleaded guilty with the promise his actions would be kept secret. They were not.

Hillary Clinton just doesn't get it, and never will. There was an article a few days ago in Newsweek by Michael Hirsch (Battle for the Best and Brightest) that contains an interesting factoid, included almost as a throwaway line:

The more experienced Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, has relied largely on her husband and a triumvirate of senior officials from his presidency-former secretary of state Madeleine Albright, former U.N. ambassador Richard Holbrooke and former national-security adviser Sandy Berger (who tries to keep a low profile after pleading guilty in 2005 to misdemeanor charges of taking classified material without authorization).

Sandy Berger stole top secret documents from the National Archives immediately preceding former President Clinton's testimony before the 9/11 Commission. He admitted to stealing and destroying those documents, and part of his plea agreement was that he would take a lie detector test and be questioned as to the veracity of his claim that no other documents other than the ones he admitted taking were disposed of or altered. Berger, a lawyer, has since refused to take that test, and resigned from the bar to avoid being questioned under oath during a disbarment proceeding.

At the time that Berger's misdeeds were discovered by National Archives staff, no federal police agency (ie the FBI) was called in. The only person called, in fact, was Bill Clinton's lawyer Bruce Lindsey. When a criminal act is discovered, one normally calls the police first, not one who could be seen as the lawyer for the accused. BeldarBlog has a good rundown on the entire case, with many links, for those who need a refresher. Captain Ed also has a good post up on this subject.

When this case first broke (and was still just an allegation of a criminal act), Berger was a top adviser to John Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign. He immediately quit, to avoid embarrassing the candidate. Years later, after pleading guilty, Hillary taps him to be one of her top advisers. Excellent judgment, Hill...

No, it's not 1996 again. It's 2007, and the Clintons find themselves in another fund-raising scandal, this time with a boy named Hsu (sorry...). Here's Hillary's original statement when the nation found out that Norman Hsu (her longtime friend and donor) was under the spotlight for funneling donations to Hillary and other Democrats using straw donors:

"Norman Hsu is a longtime and generous supporter of the Democratic Party and its candidates, including Sen. Clinton," Howard Wolfson, a spokesman for the campaign, said Tuesday. "During Mr. Hsu's many years of active participation in the political process, there has been no question about his integrity or his commitment to playing by the rules, and we have absolutely no reason to call his contributions into question or to return them."

A statement like that from any of the Clintons is like the kiss of death. Of course we then immediately found out that Norman Hsu was a wanted felon, so Hillary (professing to be shocked) decided to give the money her campaign got directly from Hsu to charity. Following up on that story, it came out that Hsu was also responsible for bundling about $850,000 of donations to Hill's campaign. That's a real problem - according to the original story in the Wall Street Journal, some of those Hillary donors don't really have the means to donate the extravagant sums of money they did to Democratic candidates - so much so that the Feds have opened an investigation into this.

That's all odd enough, but as with all Clinton stories, it does manage to get stranger. Hsu turned himself in to authorities in California, and posts $2 million of his own money in bail. He then skips town, forfeiting the funds, and is found on a train after apparently attempting to commit suicide. Meanwhile, we find out that Hsu's also responsible for a missing $40 million - given to him recently in an investment scheme. The question now is how much of the $850,000 bundled by Hsu and given to Hillary's campaign is embezzled funds?

Most people, at this point, would just give up and return all of the funds to Hsu's donors, and make the list of donors available to both the public and the authorities. But that's not Hillary's style. She's decided to hide the names of the bundled donors, and will re-accept the donated funds in question as long as the donors sign an affidavit signifying that the money is theirs. Thus guaranteeing more legs for this story.

Ah, Hillary. I knew I could count on you...

Rudy Giuliani, former New York City mayor and current presidential aspirant, may have unwittingly given Larry Craig a vote of confidence for staying in the Senate.

Responding to a question about his private life during last week's GOP debate, Giuliani said, "I certainly haven't lived a perfect life. I am not running as the perfect candidate for president of the United States. I'm running as a human being who has been very successful as a leader and had definable results in a situation in which people thought it was impossible to accomplish these things."

If we delete the presidential reference and substitute one for the Senate, could not the substance of that statement apply to Craig? If so, Giuliani has given grist for hungry rivals. For his words contrast with what was said earlier in the debate.

"We should be bolder about standing up for family," Kansas' Sen. Sam Brownback said. "Family's important for us, and it's important for America ."

"When our guys have problems like this, they leave," Rep. Duncan Hunter of Texas said. "They leave the Senate or they leave the House. When the Democrats have problems like this, they often make them chairmen of their respective committees."

The "family values" opening is available for any Republican ruthless enough to use it. Paging Mitt Romney...

You'd figure that a fund-raising scandal in a major presidential campaign that results in one arrest and possible attempted suicide of a runaway felon, the return of almost a million dollars, and the pledge that all fund-raisers for that candidate will have to undergo a criminal background search would be the subject of front page articles around the nation, if not the world. You'd be wrong.

I have to congratulate the New York Times for at least covering it, however. Not on the front page in print or on the web - but on page A14. Hey, at least the story, Clinton Sees Fear Realized in Trouble With Donor, made the first section.

Of all the possible vulnerabilities facing Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign, Mrs. Clinton has long believed that the one of the biggest was money, friends and advisers say. Some sort of fund-raising scandal that would echo the Clinton-era controversies of the 1990s and make her appear greedy or ethically challenged.

As a result, Mrs. Clinton told aides this year to vet major donors carefully and help her avoid situations in which she might appear to be trading access for big money, advisers said. Also to be avoided, the senator said, were fund-raising tactics that might conjure up the Clinton White House coffees and the ties to relatively unknown donors offering large sums, like the Asian businessmen who sent checks to the Democratic National Committee.

This is a huge story, and will get bigger if the mainstream media chooses to investigate it. You won't see much comment from Hillary's Democratic opponents, since tainted donations have been spread among them all.

Funny thing is that if this was any Republican presidential candidate, let alone the leading one, there'd be multi-edition front page investigative stories ongoing at the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times. With at least one Pulitzer, guaranteed.

The mystery of where Norman Hsu got his money turns out to have a really simple answer: He stole it. The WSJ broke this story but it's behind a subscription wall, so I'm linking to Fox:

The newspaper reports that a company run by Norman Hsu, who donated nearly $2 million to Democratic candidates since 2004 - including presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Clinton - recently received $40 million from a Madison Avenue investment fund run by Joel Rosenman, one of the creators of the fabled Woodstock rock festival in 1969.

Now, that $40 million is missing, Rosenman reportedly told investors this week.

This raises a new wrinkle for Hillary Clinton and her Democratic cohorts. Up to now they've been grudgingly returning the money by paying it to some unspecified charity. Now that the money turns out to be stolen, will they return the money to its rightful owners?

And how would one determine the rightful owner? Who gets paid first? This is going to be a first-class, grade-A mess. One question that just occurred to me is whether the Justice Department has the ability and willingness to freeze the funds wherever they may be. Then things would get really interesting.