NY Post Composite.
Posted on 07/26/2008 5:55:50 AM PDT by neverdem
Three senior aides to a former governor, Eliot Spitzer, and a former state police superintendent violated state ethics laws by plotting against a former Republican majority leader of the Senate, Joseph Bruno, the state's top ethics body has concluded.
More than a year after the Spitzer administration was hit with allegations that it improperly used the state police to dig up travel records that could prove damaging to the former Senate leader, the State Commission on Public Integrity handed down the first formal charges related to the scandal.
It did not find evidence linking Mr. Spitzer to the scandal.
The commission, seven of whose 13 members were appointed by Mr. Spitzer, accused the former governor's communications director, chief of staff, and a senior homeland security aide, as well as a former head of the police, of creating records and monitoring Mr. Bruno's travel "on a real time basis" in an effort to catch him misusing state aircraft privileges.
Its report was a year in the making and was delayed by what the commission described as "numerous improper obstacles" placed in front of it by the Spitzer administration, which turned over key documents to the body only after the commission threatened it with a court order.
Mr. Spitzer's communications director, Darren Dopp, and the superintendent, Preston Felton, who has since retired, were each fined $10,000, while the other two aides, the chief of staff, Richard Baum, and a police liaison, William Howard, settled by agreeing to the charges but not paying any penalty.
Mr. Dopp, who has accused the ethics panel of making him a scapegoat and has maintained that he had followed proper procedure, is contesting the charges, which may lead to a public hearing before an administrative judge.
"The commission's investigation was compromised from the beginning and after a..."
(Excerpt) Read more at nysun.com ...
But it does not always do this. Sometimes the law defends plunder and participates in it. Thus the beneficiaries are spared the shame, danger, and scruple which their acts would otherwise involve. Sometimes the law places the whole apparatus of judges, police, prisons, and gendarmes at the service of the plunderers, and treats the victim — when he defends himself — as a criminal. In short, there is a legal plunder, and it is of this, no doubt, that Mr. de Montalembert speaks.
This legal plunder may be only an isolated stain among the legislative measures of the people. If so, it is best to wipe it out with a minimum of speeches and denunciations — and in spite of the uproar of the vested interests.
from...
http://bastiat.org/en/the_law.html#SECTION_G1807
(thanks for the link, raygun)
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ROTFL
Naturally!
The rug get’s thrown over the truth in Gnu Yak once again. Total BS.
Now, for the rest of the analogy ~ his stalwart lieutenants must pay the ultimate price for having tied their fortunes to his tail.
(There's more to it, e.g. the head of the former regime's daughters get sold into sexual slavery, his wives and sons are slaughtered like animals, his wealth is plundered, and so forth, I don't think we quite do those things so I'll end it at the point where his main supporters are punished.)
(Still, those old Ottomans had some genuinely correct ideas for how to deal with regime toadies didn't they)
Thanks for the ping!
Suuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrrrrrrre it didnt.
"Such misconduct erodes public confidence in the integrity and independence of the state police," stated the commission, the majority of which were appointed by Spitzer
Now there is an objective conclusion. NOT!
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