One Committee's Three Hours of Inquiry, in Surreal Time (Abramoff Hearing)

[Pirate Smile]

I know, it is Dana Milbank but it is a good description of the Hearing today. He is going after Abramoff, Delay and Company. Just read it.

"Yesterday's Senate hearing into superlobbyist Jack Abramoff's alleged defrauding of Indian tribes had something for everyone. There was the yoga instructor who took the Fifth. There was the lifeguard selected to run a think tank from a beach house at Rehoboth. And there was Exhibit 31, an e-mail from Abramoff to a rabbi friend.

"I hate to ask you for your help with something so silly but I've been nominated for membership in the Cosmos Club, which is a very distinguished club in Washington, DC, comprised of Nobel Prize winners, etc.," Abramoff wrote. "Problem for me is that most prospective members have received awards and I have received none. I was wondering if you thought it possible that I could put that I have received an award from Toward Tradition with a sufficiently academic title, perhaps something like Scholar of Talmudic Studies?"

There were titters in the audience as Sen. Byron L. Dorgan (D-N.D.) read aloud the e-mail, then outright laughter as he continued reading: "Indeed, it would be even better if it were possible that I received these in years past, if you know what I mean."

-snip-
There were also the ghosts in the room: Republican activists Ralph Reed and Grover Norquist (who appeared often in Abramoff's correspondence but who weren't the focus of yesterday's inquiry) and House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), a friend of Abramoff's referred to elliptically as an unnamed "member of Congress."

Much more at the link
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/22/AR2005062202100_2.html

edit to add - here is the "official" (non-snarky) Washington Post story on this fiasco.

Panel Says Abramoff Laundered Tribal Funds
McCain Cites Possible Fraud by Lobbyist

By Susan Schmidt and James V. Grimaldi
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, June 23, 2005; Page A01

Lobbyist Jack Abramoff used money from a Mississippi tribal client to set up bogus Christian anti-gambling groups and to fund pet projects including gear for a "sniper school" in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, according to documents released yesterday by Senate investigators.

The revelations came in e-mails and testimony made public yesterday by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee at its third hearing on the activities of Abramoff and Michael Scanlon, a public relations executive and former spokesman for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.).

Abramoff, who is also at the center of a corruption investigation by the Justice Department, laundered tribal money by directing the Indians to donate to tax-exempt groups that the lobbyist later used for his own purposes, the Senate committee said. One project involved Abramoff's effort to arrange for military equipment, including night-vision goggles and a "jeep," for the sniper training conducted by a high school friend.

Aaron Stetter, a former Scanlon employee, testified that Scanlon and Abramoff sought to whip up opposition to casinos proposed by rival tribes by setting up bogus Christian phone banks. He said callers would identify themselves as members of groups such as the Christian Research Network or Global Christian Outreach Network and urge voters to contact their representatives.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/22/AR2005062200921.html