Winners and Losers (GOP is loser) by Howard Finemen

[papau]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10708129/site/newsweek/

Winners and Losers
A guide to those whose careers will crash—and those who might benefit—because of Jack Abramoff’s saga of greed.

By Howard Fineman
Newsweek

Jan. 4, 2006 - Forget the black hat. Everybody in Washington is obsessed with Jack Abramoff’s gangsterlike attire as he came out of the federal courthouse. But the thing that jumps out at me is the figure $20,194,000. If I read the fed’s plea-agreement papers correctly, that’s the amount of cold cash that the Republican lobbyist siphoned from Indian tribes and stashed in his secret accounts.<snip>

Well, Abramoff jumped the table—and the result will be the biggest influence-peddling scandal to hit Washington in recent times: the Scandal of the Poisoned BlackBerrys, which sent and received e-mails that now will make a gripping saga of greed in action.

And just who are the political losers and winners? There are more of the former than the latter.

LOSERS
Members of Congress: Lawmakers fingered by the Feds in Abramoff probe, or who received campaign contributions through the networking of Abramoff, and who are facing re-election this November. Voters tend to like, or at least tolerate, their local congressman and assume that they aren’t part of the corrupt world of Washington—until the member’s name surfaces in a context like this one.

The Republican Party: The semi-conventional wisdom here is as follows—some Democrats are likely to be stained by ties to Jack Abramoff; polls show that the public has a plague-on-both-your-houses attitude toward wrongdoing in Washington; therefore, the GOP won’t be hurt in November. I don’t buy it. Republicans are the incumbent party in the Congress. They are led by a less-than-popular president in the traditionally weak sixth year of his presidency. <snip>

[MADem]

1. I think Jackie A was wearing ballistic gear, myself

Even the hat looked like it had a lining of of a cousin of kevlar....and the windows on that town car looked like ballistic glass, too...

[leftupnorth]

2. you know

that thought crossed my mind, too.

this guy really fancies himself a gangster, but he's probably smart to wear body armor and use an armored car, i wonder if the Feds want him to do that, or he's doing it on his own.

[MADem]

4. For all we know, he is in a pretrial version of witness protection

He has beans to spill, and they need him alive.

[corky44]

3. I noticed that to. Big fat coat. Same look in Florida. GOP thought:

Where is jack Ruby when you need him...