"Duke" Cunningham case: the Repubs MUST have all been convinced that

the thousand year Reich was really in session, and they couldn't be touched. Whether they arrived at that conclusion independently by watching shrub run roughshod over the media and the country these last 5 years, or whether they had to be reassured by Cheney, Delay, and shrub to "go ahead, take the money, it's okay" is what's curious to me.

At least in DeLay's case, and even Abramoff to some degree, there is a clumsy, ham handed effort to shuffle money through a layer or two to hide things, however transparent.

It couldn't have been more obvious in the "Duke"'s case if Mitchell Wade had walked into his office in Congress with giant sacks full of silver dollars and dumped them onto his desk.

Dude bought "Duke"'s house at inflated value (about .7 mil higher than market) and then quickly turned it around at loss for true market value, purchased a boat which he NAMED "Duke-stir" and allowed "Duke" to live on essentially rent free, and apparently made the 500K down payment on "Duke"'s 2.5 mil Rancho Santa Fe home, among other favors.

But I guess Wade got pretty good value for all that grease considering his company was nowheresville prior to Duke's patronage. Everybodys' back scratched, palm greased except the constituents.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/politics/cunningham/20051128-1149-bn28duke6.html

I saw some troll on this board talking about how "Duke" had been essentially acquitted of everything. Unfortunately can't remember the name, but how now, eh?

got the message that they could loot the place without any repercussions. The message I think came from the very top, in an unspoken way.

The Bush Administration has been stealing hand over fist, and their audicity has been astounding.