Tag: scandal

House Speaker Jase Bolger personally appealed Monday to Ingham County Circuit Court judges to reject a request to empanel a one-judge grand jury to investigate a foiled election-rigging scheme in a Kent County legislative district.

Senate Democratic Leader Gretchen Whitmer and state party chairman Mark Brewer petitioned the court last week to launch its own probe into Bolger and state Rep. Roy Schmidt's attempt earlier this year to plant a fake Democrat in the 76th District and allow Schmidt to become a Republican with a patsy opponent.

Kent County Prosecutor Bill Forsyth determined in July that no crime was committed after Schmidt's faux opponent, a 22-year-old friend of his son and nephew, dropped out of the race days after filing in May. But Democrats have called Forsyth's investigation into question after the Republican prosecutor acknowledged cancelling warrants to search Bolger's phone records and Schmidt's phone and email records.

A Michigan State Police detective said he had probable cause that Bolger and Schmidt may have caused subornation of perjury by knowingly procuring Matthew Mojzak to commit perjury by falsely claiming to be a 76th District resident for at least 30 days prior to the May 15 filing date.

Rest here

Who is it this time?

In 1998 or 1999, my employer decided it would jump on the latest politically correct bandwagon.  One possibly driven by the penchant of the chief executive of the United states to drive a hummer, or get one, or umm something.  The Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa & Chippewa Indians, like every other larger corporate entity across the country felt they would take no chances on the burgeoning lawsuit activities related to male-female relationships in the workplace.

Harassment classes commenced.

Every one of the employees were paid and mandated to attend a seminar on how to handle our relations with other employees.  The hyper sensitive era was loaded by media and plaintiff attorney exploitation of casual discourse, sideways glances, and failures to hire unqualified and otherwise trouble prone employees.  All under the banner of harassment, lechery and abuse.

That would be about the same time this event would have happened:

"During Herman Cain's tenure as the head of the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s, at least two female employees complained to colleagues and senior association officials about inappropriate behavior by Cain, ultimately leaving their jobs at the trade group, multiple sources confirm to POLITICO  ...  In one case, POLITICO has seen documentation describing the allegations and showing that the restaurant association formally resolved the matter. Both women received separation packages that were in the five-figure range."

The women left the employ, and settled for what couldn't have been much more than the cost of hiring attorneys, and filing the complaint.  All in a time where many were cashing in on the newest fad of the day, an abuse of harassment policy for personal gain.

While the news cycle titillates over this new and wonderful discovery in the past life of the current polling leader, I wonder how far they will go when it is found out that the cases were settled as a matter of cost balance.  How low will the opponents of this man of character delve to create a wedge between solid conservatives and his as yet growing candidacy? As this particular set of accusations is discovered to have no substance, what next will be the cheap shot on a real conservative?

OCDP Chair Mike McGuiness Steps down.. The Ivory Tower has him citing personal ambitions as the reason.

"Because of a new professional opportunity, effective tonight, I'm resigning my position as chair of the Oakland County Democratic Party," McGuinness said in a statement.

It gets better..  All this time tossing his best pet under the bus, he claimed he knew nothing of the Bauer involvement in the fake Tea Party.

McGuinness, who also is a candidate for the Oakland County Board of Commissioners, has said that he had no knowledge of Bauer's actions. But records obtained by the Free Press through the Freedom of Information Act show that the two are registered to vote from the same address in Waterford.

On the plus side, yesterday saw some decisive action from City Council President (and former Mayor) Ken Cockrel.  After Mrs. Conyers submitted her official resignation he went ahead and began sweeping away the last vestiges of the Democrat's crooked operation, firing Sunceria Garrett, the aunt whom she'd recently given a fat city contract and declining to renew the contracts of four other Conyers staffers.  The Detroit News:

Cockrel said his decision to terminate Garrett wasn't based on her relationship to Conyers, but hinged on cutting the budget.

"Frankly it was an unnecessary position," Cockrel said. "This was not a vacant position. It was filled."

Say what you will about Cockrel, the man has shown a willingness to make some tough personnel decisions (though I suspect these were relatively easy). Before leaving the Mayor's office Cockrel set in motion a budget savings plan that included hundreds of layoffs and reductions in pay for even more of the cities thousands of taxpayer funded bureaucrats.  

Detroit, you'll remember, is currently running a budget deficit in the hundreds of millions of dollars while recent gargantuan layoffs in the auto industry have further crippled the tax base (and city "income" projections) for the upcoming fiscal year.  

Alas, the monster financial storm engulfing the city doesn't seem to worry new mayor Dave Bing.  

Read on...

The Ivory Tower reports this morning that Sam Riddle, a Detroit Democrat and well known political consultant is coming clean about additional dirty deeds, some directly involving Congressman John Conyers (D-Detroit):

Riddle said Conyers even helped draft a letter sent by her husband, Congressman John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., to help a man with whom she had financial ties...

In that deal, Riddle said, Monica Conyers arranged for Riddle to get a $20,000 contract with Greektown entrepreneur Dimitrios (Jim) Papas in about 2007. Riddle said Papas hired him for crisis consulting and political advising -- but he was never asked to do any work. She then demanded $10,000 of that money as a "finder's fee," Riddle said.

At some point after Papas paid him, Riddle said, John Conyers sent a letter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in support of a controversial hazardous waste injection well in Romulus that one of Papas' companies was seeking to operate.

Papas, you'll remember, is the same "gentleman" who paid Senator Debbie Stabenow's (D-Michigan) husband Tom Athens to work illegally as a lobbyist backing the same toxic waste dumping project.  The sort of dumping project that Stabenow had explicitly campaigned against, before realizing it represented an opportunity for her family to make serious illegal bank.

Not a bad collection Papas had there.  A United States Senator, a United States Congressman and the top dog on the Detroit City Council, all either directly on the payroll or accepting cash through one paper-thin degree of separation.  

Meanwhile, Senator Stabenow and Congressman Conyers refuse to answer questions about the lifestyle they've enjoyed thanks to Papas generous "giving" or the Congressional favors that cash has purchased.

But while Stabenow has managed to skate thus far on the dirty dealings that happened under her roof, Conyers may not be quite as lucky.  The Ivory Tower reminds readers:

Ethics rules prohibit House members from contacting federal agencies on matters in which they have a personal financial interest. It is unclear whether John Conyers knew of any financial connection between his wife and Papas.

Point A... arguing that a 21 term Congressman could somehow not know about the "professional relationship" between his wife and the specific company for which he went to bat is inane.  The man would almost literally have to be senile.  Point B... if you're going to make that argument then we've got a whole separate set of issues to deal with.

Either way, ethics rules are ethics rules and John Conyers clearly violated them.  

Another Detroit Democrat embroiled in a federal ethics probe?  That's JUST what the Motor City needed.  Maybe Monica isn't the only Conyers who should be considering resignation this morning.

The penultimate sentence in one of my recent posts was "Never underestimate the creativity of a plaintiff's lawyer and a desperate debtor." As if on cue, enter the City of Detroit's former mayor and leading debtor, Kwame Kilpatrick, and his attorney, Florida's well-known Willie Gary. [If you've been preoccupied during the last several years, there's a timeline of Kilpatrick's scandals here.]

On March 10, in a Mississippi circuit court, Gary and Kilpatrick sued SkyTel, reportedly for the nice round sum of $100 million, for allegedly violating the federal Electronic Stored Communications Act. The gist of the lawsuit, which can be viewed here, is that by releasing text messages between Kilpatrick and others, principally his former chief of staff, Christine Beatty, SkyTel invaded Kilpatrick's privacy and violated federal law.

Read more below the fold.