Ethics Trial Expected for California Congresswoman

[Chris_]

WASHINGTON — Representative Maxine Waters, Democrat of California, will face charges of misusing her office and is expected to contest the claims in a House trial, the second powerful House Democrat to opt for such a public airing in recent days, Congressional officials said Friday.

A House ethics subcommittee has charged Ms. Waters, 71, a 10-term congresswoman, in a case involving communications that she had with the top executive of a bank that her husband owned stock in while it was applying for a federal bailout in 2008, two House officials said.

Charges are expected to be announced next week, several Congressional officials said, speaking only on the condition of anonymity because the proceedings remained confidential. Details of the specific accusations of wrongdoing were not available Friday evening.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/31/us/politics/31waters.html?partner=rss&emc=rss


I don't even know why I'm bothering to put this in Breaking News.  She saw the deal her friend Charlie got and wants in on it, and she'll probably get it.

Bunch of thieves and liars.

[Wretched Excess]

nice play on koock-spinach and maxine

[Zathras]

Wonder if the rule of threes applies here?

[littlelamb]

Wonder if the rule of threes applies here?

Then who is going to be next?

[Lacarnut]

Then who is going to be next?

We can only hope that it's the Magic Negro.

[Godot showed up]

Waters came under scrutiny after former Treasury Department officials said she helped arrange a meeting between regulators and executives at Boston-based OneUnited Bank without mentioning her husband's financial ties to the institution.

Her husband, Sidney Williams, held at least $250,000 in the bank's stock and previously had served on its board. Waters' spokesman has said Williams was no longer on the board when the meeting was arranged.

Waters has said the National Bankers Association, a trade group, requested the meeting. She defended her role in assisting minority-owned banks in the midst of the nation's financial meltdown and dismissed suggestions she used her influence to steer government aid to the bank.

"I am confident that as the investigation moves forward the panel will discover that there are no facts to support allegations that I have acted improperly," Waters said in a prior statement.

The committee unanimously voted to establish an investigative subcommittee to gather evidence and determine whether Waters violated standards of conduct.

Waters, like Rangel, could settle her case by arranging a plea bargain with the ethics committee. So far she has decided instead to fight.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100731/ap_on_go_co/us_waters_ethics

[Lacarnut]

We can expect racism charges to come out of the mouths of these two birds.

[Godot showed up]

The practice of setting prices administratively, with little regard for actual production costs or user values, introduced multiple possibilities for corruption. Each branch of the economy had its own ministry, and corrupt officials could easily turn political power into personal gain: cheating and bribery were commonplace. Members of the nomenklatura protected one another and there were no investigative reporters or vigilant prosecutors to restrain or expose them. The regime tolerated the "second" or underground economy," partly because some Party officials profited from it, partly because it smoothed over the shortages and rigidities of the official "first" economy. "By the late Brezhnev years, lagging salaries and poor supplies of things that could be bought with them conspired with secrecy and favoritism in the bureaucratic hierarchy to produce a national epidemic of economic crime and corruption.... For the elite, it was an easy step from the secret enjoyment of legal privileges (apartments, cars, special shops and hospitals) to the illegal enjoyment of secret privileges. For all but the most naive or ascetic among the officialdom, self-seeking supplanted both doctrinal loyalty and personal morality"

http://media.ucsc.edu/classes/thompson/history30c/23_stagnation.html

I just couldn't help thinking of courruption under Brezhnev. Personally, I think Obama has about as much personality and charm as Brezhnev, too. He's nearly as dull and plodding, in my opinion.

[Tucker]

Ain't never gonna happen. She's bela pelosi's bud.

[Mike220]

Then who is going to be next?

Shelia Jackson Lee please.

[DumbAss Tanker]

Nothing's gonna happen to her.  She is a Black Dem and it's an isolated incident (She may be crooked as Hell otherwise, but they only are bringing out the one thing).  Rangel is a different deal, he has been such a thief for so long they don't have any plausible excuse to overlook it.

[Karin]

I am sick and tired of laws applying differently to different people.  This is America, it shouldn't happen here.  I'm reading an article in Am Spec called "The Ruling Class."  I can only read it in pieces, as I sit there and get angrier and angrier reading about the hubris and smug arrogance of these 

[Hawkwarrior2]

Maxine waters is an incompetent idiot! She is the exact example of what happens when african-americans elect a canidate just because of the color of their skin. I'm not saying all black politicans are bad but, you know it happens. I call for all black americans to look deeper at canidates than just their race.

[Chris_]

Maxine Waters and Al Franken are what happens when people with room-temperature IQ's vote for politicians that represent "their best interest".

[Chris_]

[youtube=425,350]HZegTfr5HRg[/youtube]
"The American people do not appreciate double standards."

[Godot showed up]

Well, well, well--the plot thickens:

http://www.thefoxnation.com/barney-frank/2010/08/03/barney-frank-dragged-maxine-waters-ethics-case

Barney Frank Dragged Into to Maxine Waters Ethics Case
U.S. Rep. Barney Frank said yesterday he has “no regrets” about his role in helping a troubled Boston bank qualify for a $12 million federal bailout now at the center of ethics charges against California Rep. Maxine Waters.

Explosive Treasury Emails Put Barney Frank in the Ethics Hot Seat

When Barney Frank was asked about intervening on behalf of a home state bank for Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) funds, the Massachusetts Democrat admitted he spoke to a “federal regulator” but according to the Wall Street Journal, “he didn’t remember which federal regulator he spoke with.”

According to explosive new Treasury Department emails uncovered by Judicial Watch, it appears this nameless bureaucrat is none other than then-Treasury Secretary Henry “Hank” Paulson!

These documents, which we obtained in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit, indicate that Frank personally called former Secretary Paulson regarding a TARP cash infusion for the Boston-based OneUnited Bank. And it worked. On November 25, 2008, following Frank’s intervention, the Treasury Department awarded $12,063,000 in bailout funds to OneUnited, which is located in Frank’s district.

http://www.judicialwatch.org/weeklyupdate/2010/13-barney-franks-ethics-mess


Check out the emails on judicialwatch's page.

[debk]

Shelia Jackson Lee please.

How did she ever get elected?

I probably haven't seen her more than 10 times on tv, if that....however, what I have seen, I don't like.

I looked up her and her website quite a while back after seeing her nastiness on tv...I think she was interviewed on either O'Reilly or Hannity...and after seeing her, and reading about her, I couldn't understand her getting elected in TX.

[Mike220]

How did she ever get elected?

I probably haven't seen her more than 10 times on tv, if that....however, what I have seen, I don't like.

I looked up her and her website quite a while back after seeing her nastiness on tv...I think she was interviewed on either O'Reilly or Hannity...and after seeing her, and reading about her, I couldn't understand her getting elected in TX.

Her district is gerrymandered from hell.

In her district, there's only been one R elected since 1919. If I move to H-town after I finish my surg tech program, I will definitely make sure to live outside her district.

[debk]

Her district is gerrymandered from hell.

In her district, there's only been one R elected since 1919. If I move to H-town after I finish my surg tech program, I will definitely make sure to live outside her district.

I know this will sound like an ugly racist question...but did they carve that section out based on race and socio-economics?

It's a very "odd" shaped district.

[Mike220]

I know this will sound like an ugly racist question...but did they carve that section out based on race and socio-economics?

It's a very "odd" shaped district.

Demo info from wiki:    36.9% White, 40.4% Black, 3.4% Asian, 35.6% Hispanic, 0.4% Native American, 0.5% other. Average annual income of slightly more than $32,000.

Make of it what you will.

Cook has it at Dem +24. Second highest in the state behind Eddie Bernice Johnson's 30th district.

[ColonialMarine0431]

Her district is gerrymandered from hell.

I can match that. Florida's 3rd Congressional District. It starts in a predominately black section of Jacksonville and runs almost half-way down the state. Even the rep from district, Corrine Brown, blatently admits it was Gerrymandered to include a majority of black people. Fortunately we have a ballot initiative for Novemeber to do away with blatant racism.

[Chris_]

NC-12 isn't much better.


http://watt.house.gov/

[Mike220]

NC-12 isn't much better.

http://watt.house.gov/

Heh, in my American Govt class last year, that was the textbook example used to display gerrymandering.

[debk]

Ours is Jimmy Duncan(TN-R), Tn's Second District.




Population (2000) 632,143
Median income $36,796
Ethnicity 90.7% White, 6.3% Black, 1.0% Asian, 1.3% Hispanic, 0.3% Native American, 0.1% other

[Chris_]

Facing Ethics Charges, Rep. Waters Points Finger at Bush Administration

Embattled Rep. Maxine Waters on Friday blamed the Bush administration for her ethics problems -- saying she had to intervene with the Treasury Department on behalf of minority-owned banks  seeking federal bailout funds -- including one tied to her husband -- because the Treasury Department wouldn't schedule its own appointments.

The California Democrat said in a Capitol Hill news conference -- an event rarely held during a congressional recess -- that she reached out to then-Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson in late 2008 when his department failed to respond to the National Bank Association's request for a meeting.

"The question at this point should not be why I called Secretary Paulson, but why I had to," she said. "The question at this point should be why a trade association representing over 100 minority banks could not get a meeting at the height of the crisis."

But the House ethics committee, which is investigating Waters for allegedly improperly using her position for personal gain, says in its report of charges that when the meeting was held, the officers of only one bank came -- OneUnited.

Fox News

It's always someone else's fault...