Free Republic

In a filing in the federal corruption trial of former Detroit City Councilwoman Monica Conyers, U.S. Attorneys argued that the defendant cannot retract her guilty plea or ask for an appeal because she waived her right to appeal when she pleaded guilty. The Detroit News reports: In a filing with the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, Assistant U.S. Attorney Patricia Gaedeke said Conyers waived her appeal rights in a plea agreement she signed last June. “The defendant received the sentence she bargained for in the plea agreement,” Gaedeke said in the court filing. “The defendant therefore has no right...

Democrats in Congress are pushing for a new law that would allow nearly 4 million people currently banned from voting to cast their ballot, and most of those millions, studies show, will vote Democrat. And where will these new voters come from? From the ranks of convicted felons. Last week, a House subcommittee heard testimony on H.R. 3335, the "Democracy Restoration Act." The bill seeks to override state laws, which vary in how they restrict when convicted felons released from prison can vote. The bill, sponsored by Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., and sponsored in the Senate by Sen. Russell Feingold,...

A reporter asked House Judiciary Committee Chairman, John Conyers, where in the constitution is the government given power to mandate that the people purchase health insurance. He answered “under several clauses…the good and welfare clause…and, uh..a couple others.” Ohhh, now it all makes sense! Here I thought the government mandating any individual to engage in commerce was unconstitutional. Come to find out that power is given to congress in the “good and welfare” clause of the constitution. Thanks for clearing that up john. Now, where exactly is this “good and welfare clause?” It must be just after the “right to...

Democrats in Congress are pushing for a new law that would allow nearly four million people currently banned from voting to cast their ballot, and most of those millions, studies show, will vote Democrat. And where will these new voters come from? From the ranks of convicted felons. Last week, a House subcommittee heard testimony on H.R. 3335, the "Democracy Restoration Act." The bill seeks to override state laws , which vary in how they restrict when convicted felons released from prison can vote. The bill, sponsored by Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., and sponsored in the Senate by Sen. Russell...

(CNSNews.com) -- House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) said the “good and welfare clause” gives Congress the authority to require individuals to buy health insurance as mandated in the health care bill. However, there is no “good and welfare clause” in the U.S. Constitution. During an interview Capitol Hill Friday, CNSNews.com asked Rep. Conyers, “The individual mandate in the bill requires individuals to purchase health insurance. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has said that never before in the history of the United States has the federal government required any one to purchase any good or service. What part...

Another funny thing happened in what House Speaker Nancy Pelosi promised would be "the most ethical Congress in history." Monica Conyers, the wife of House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, pleaded guilty last year to a federal charge of conspiracy to commit bribery that prompted her to resign from the Detroit City Council last year. This month, she was sentenced to 37 months in prison. One could argue that his wife's felony conviction should not reflect on Conyers' chairmanship of the committee that has jurisdiction over federal courts, in that U.S. Attorney Terrence Berg announced that the evidence in the...

When it comes to qualifying for a court-appointed lawyer, it doesn't necessarily matter to whom you're married. That's what Monica Conyers, wife of Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), demonstrated this week when a federal judge declared her indigent and assigned her a tax-funded public defender to appeal a three-year prison sentence for bribery conspiracy. Monica Conyers, a former Detroit City Council member, pleaded guilty this past June to accepting cash bribes in exchange for her vote on a $1.2 billion sewage sludge contract with a Houston company. Now she wants to undo that deal, but says she can't afford a...

DETROIT — Former Detroit councilwoman Monica Conyers is relying on a court-appointed lawyer to pursue an appeal of her prison sentence for corruption. That means the public will pick up the tab, even though Conyers' husband John is a Michigan congressman who's paid $174,000 a year. Monica Conyers signed an affidavit declaring she can't afford a lawyer. Steve Fishman, the attorney who negotiated her guilty plea, says she has no money. An appeal of her 37-month prison sentence has been assigned to Douglas Mullkoff of Ann Arbor. Conyers was sentenced last week for a bribery conspiracy. The grounds for an...

An ugly page in Michigan politics came to an end this afternoon when a federal judge sentenced former Detroit City Councilwoman Monica Conyers to 37 months in prison for her role in a city bribery scandal. Conyers, the wife of House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, did not go quietly as she attempted to rescind her guilty plea at the last moment and claimed to have taped conversations that would exonerate her. Accounts of the courtroom scene paint a bizarre picture of a woman oscillating between desperation and hubris as she was sentenced in the very same building where her husband...

Kawame's Mommy and a Top Aid have been served Subpoena's. It happened March 1st, she told Pelosi and it is just breaking now

DETROIT (AP) - A federal judge has denied ex-Detroit councilwoman Monica Conyers' request to withdraw her guilty plea in a corruption case and sentenced her to three years and one month in prison. As guards cleared the courtroom Wednesday, Conyers yelled that she planned to appeal. Conyers suggested that she was the victim of "badgering" last summer when she acknowledged a conspiracy to take bribes for her support of a Houston company seeking a sludge contract. U.S. District Judge Avern Cohn says her plea deal was voluntary. Conyers is the wife of Democratic U.S. Rep. John Conyers. She quit the...

Excerpt: Monica Conyers has just been sentenced to 37 months in prison. She also received 2 years of supervised probation. Just before sentencing, Conyers screamed "If they have their tapes, I have my tapes too. I taped Rayford, I taped Riddle. You'll be fair to me or I want to withdraw my plea." She also yelled, "What about my children? They did nothing to cause this. All I did was try to help someone I fired."

DETROIT (AP) -- The most prominent person caught in an corruption investigation in Detroit is returning to court to be sentenced in a bribery scheme involving a city sludge contract. Ex-councilwoman Monica Conyers pleaded guilty last summer to conspiracy and admitted taking cash in exchange for supporting a Houston company, Synagro Technologies. The contract passed by one vote in 2007.

From yesterday, Thursday, February 25, 2010:Intel bill pulled over controversial added interrogation provision "A controversial bill that would have levied criminal punishments on intelligence officers for harsh interrogations was pulled Thursday evening [Feb 25, 2010] . House Republicans charged Democrats with trying to sneak a provision into the intelligence authorization bill that would establish criminal punishment for CIA agents and other intelligence officials who engage in “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment” during interrogations."... Intelligence committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes (D-Texas) added the language, originally offered by Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), to his manager’s amendment, which makes several changes to the bill...

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) will hold a hearing Friday to examine a report that allowed two Bush administration officials to escape any formal punishment regarding their role in drafting the legal justification for the harsh interrogations of detainees. Jay Bybee and John Yoo, two former high-level Bush administration officials who drafted the legal basis for the Bush administration’s treatment of overseas terror suspects, escaped any formal punishment in a long-awaited Justice Department report released Friday evening. Leahy also called on federal appeals court judge Bybee to step down from the lifetime appointment over his role in the...

Rep. John Conyers and pal filmmaker Michael Moore. Conyers is closely allied with CAIR. An Islamic group and one of its top contacts within the U.S. Congress are in the midst of a plot to neutralize FBI counterterrorism efforts. And they've found a willing collaborator in Attorney General Eric Holder. The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) applauded the news that the Attorney General Eric Holder and his Justice Department Civil Rights Division will review the shooting death of a Detroit imam, Luqman Ameen Abdullah, by FBI agents on October 28 in Dearborn. House Judiciary Chairman Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) announced...

Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) has called on Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to demote the official coordinating Haiti relief efforts for not having enough minority staffers. The House Judiciary Committee Chairman sent a letter to Clinton on Thursday after Rajiv Shah, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, showed up at a meeting with the 42-member Congressional Black Caucus without any African American staffers in tow.

October 28, 2009 Note: The following text is a quote: Eleven Members/Associates of Ummah Charged with Federal Violations One Subject Fatally Shot During Arrest United States Attorney Terrence Berg, Eastern District of Michigan, Andrew G. Arena, Special Agent in Charge (SAC), Federal Bureau of Investigation, (FBI), Detroit, Michigan, and Police Chief Warren Evans, Detroit Police Department (DPD), Detroit, Michigan announced a federal complaint was unsealed today charging Luqman Ameen Abdullah, a.k.a.Christopher Thomas, and 10 others with conspiracy to commit several federal crimes, including theft from interstate shipments, mail fraud to obtain the proceeds of arson, illegal possession and sale of...

DETROIT (WXYZ) - Michigan Congressman John Conyers has asked the civil rights division of the US Justice Department to investigate the death of Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah. Both the Dearborn Police Department and the FBI are currently investigating the case. It expanded out of an FBI investigation into the fencing of stolen merchandise. The October raids were conducted as part of that investigation. Agents opened fire on Abdullah after they say he killed an FBI dog and shot at federal officials from a warehouse.

Keith Ellison, widely hailed as America's first Muslim congressman, could more accurately be described as CAIR and Hamas' man in Congress. Congressman Ellison has been a regular presence at CAIR fundraisers and at pro-Hamas rallies in the United States. As a former member of Farrakhan's Nation of Islam , Ellison has enough anti-semitic and Islamist credentials to satisfy anyone, and had expressed openly anti-semitic beliefs in the past. Since Ellison got his start with CAIR , his attempt to provide support for Hamas is completely unsurprising. Both Hamas and CAIR are projects of the Muslim Brotherhood, which also helped...

WASHINGTON — A Washington watchdog has filed a complaint against Louisiana Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu, suggesting she may have traded her influence on a specific earmark for $30,000 in campaign contributions. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington on Tuesday demanded the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. district courts in Louisiana and Texas investigate whether Landrieu, who is in her second term, broke federal law back in 2001 by including a $2 million earmark in the District of Columbia appropriations bill for a company whose lobbyists had thrown her a fundraiser just days earlier. That event, held four days...

It would be funny were it not so pathetic. No, I take that back. It is hilarious, knee-slapping, laugh-out-loud funny, and I have been laughing about it since I found out about it. Fellow examiner, Jim Kouri, (Law Enforcement Examiner) alerted me to the fact that Media Matters, the leftwing, Soros-funded, media lapdog, er watchdog, had taken me and others to task over reportage on universal voter registration. The issue was John Fund's naming of Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA) as pushing universal voter registration legislation along with point man, Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY). Fund said this in a recorded panel...

A Congressional Research Service report commissioned by the House Judiciary Committee says ACORN hasn't violated any federal regulations the past five years. The report, released by Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers's, D-Mich., staff Tuesday evening, also reports that the undercover filmmakers that allegedly caught employees of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now breaking the law may have violated state law in their filming operation.

My last post dealt with Barack Obama's Marxist personal physician of more than 20 years, Quentin Young and his decades long campaign to socialize US healthcare. Young and his comrades in Physicians for a National Health Plan and Healthcare Now! have driven the US healthcare debate for years. Now they have a friend in the Oval Office and both Houses of Congress controlled by the Democrats. Soon the Senate may pass a Healthcare Bill-but whatever form it takes, the drive to fully socialized, government controlled "single payer" healthcare will only accelerate.

When I heard this on the radio on the drive home the first thing I thought was, I’ll bet they’re democrats (socialist) and huge Obama supporters. Walter Kendall Myers, 72, aided by his wife Gwendolyn Myers, 71, used his Top Secret security clearance to pass on classified information to the Cuban government and at one point met with Cuban leader Fidel Castro, according to court documents. The two were charged with conspiracy to act as illegal agents of the Cuban government and to communicate classified information to Cuba, the Justice Department said. They were also charged with wire fraud and...

Detroit (WWJ) -- A Detroit federal judge has sentenced a Detroit businesman and corruption figure to the maximum five years in jail for conspiracy to commit bribery. Rayford Jackson arranged the bribes for now-former city councilwoman Monica Conyers

The most senior African American in Congress offered some unsolicited advice Monday to President Barack Obama on how to get his signature health care bill through a balky Senate: knock their heads together. "The president could take a few pages from Lyndon Johnson's book...and start knocking heads together," said Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

Advice For Obama: Knock Heads On Health Care He 'could take a few pages from Lyndon Johnson's book,' says Rep. Conyers WASHINGTON - The most senior African-American in Congress offered some unsolicited advice Monday to President Barack Obama on how to get his signature health care bill through a balky Senate: knock their heads together. "The president could take a few pages from Lyndon Johnson's book ... and start knocking heads together," said Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Conyers, who spoke to reporters in Detroit, first came to Congress in 1965, the year Medicare and...

While the Lions left long ago, it appears former employees have continued to sack the Pontiac Silverdome..(snip)..Kissick told the Press former employees have taken home leather couches, television sets, granite counter tops and more. He's under investigation too, he said, because he's reported such thefts in recent years. “They took tools, equipment furnishing, everything they could get their hands on. Then they went into the super suites and began dismantling them. Security called me and I told them I wasn’t there anymore and that they needed to call downtown.”

(CNSNews.com) – House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) said the Obama administration should not donate any of the nation’s H1N1 vaccine supply to foreign countries--as it originally planned to do--before there is enough vaccine to cover those Americans most at-risk from H1N1 flu. Conyers was asked by CNSNews.com outside the Capitol on Thursday whether the Obama administration should go ahead with its plans to donate some of the U.S. vaccine supply to foreign countries before the U.S. had enough vaccine to cover the 150 million Americans who are most at risk from the H1N1 virus. Conyers said, “The answer is...

WASHINGTON -- Mr. Conyers intends to focus this hearing specifically on brain injuries -- and on their ramifications in college and high school football as well.

Muslim-American interns who have served in Congress should be respected, and not subject to questions about their patriotism, House Judciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) said Thursday. Responding to allegations from Republican lawmakers that the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) sought to plant Muslim "spies" in the Capitol, Conyers issued a scathing statement on his colleagues' accusations. "It shouldn't need to be said in 2009, and after the historic election of our first African-American president, but let me remind all my colleagues that patriotic Americans of all races, religions, and beliefs have the right - and the responsibility - to...

WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)--Two top House Democrats requested Tuesday that the Congressional Research Service conduct an analysis into whether recent legislation to strip federal funds from community-organizing group Acorn is unconstitutional. House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., and House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., ...

Two powerful Democratic committee chairmen on Tuesday came to the defense of the embattled community group ACORN, sending a clear signal that not all Democrats are content to let Republicans destroy the organization. House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) and House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) have formally requested the Congressional Research Service provide a “clear and objective analysis” of the “charges and countercharges” that have recently been levied against the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. The House and Senate last week overwhelmingly voted to strip federal funding from ACORN. The group has been the subject of...

U.S. Reps, John Conyers (D-Detroit) and Barney Frank (D-Mass.) on Tuesday wrote a letter to the Congressional Research Service requesting an investigation of ACORN, the anti-poverty group whose employees in Baltimore recently were caught on hidden camera offering questionable advice to conservative activists posing as a prostitute and pimp. In the letter, Conyers and Frank ask the nonpartisan research group to look into ACORN's alleged misbehavior, including funding violations and alleged voter registration irregularities. But they also question whether Congress' swift move to cut the group's funding was unconstitutional. Specifically, Conyers and Frank ask whether the funding cuts qualify as...

King gives Conyers an acorn, literally By Jordan Fabian - 09/16/09 10:43 AM ET Well, this is certainly one way to start a conversation. Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) handed House Judiciary Committee chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) an actual acorn, hoping to discuss the embattled community activist group of the same name. King tweeted Wednesday: Just presented an acorn to chairman j conyers-who-with a smile and a handshake agreed to meet tomorrow to talk about an acorn investigation The Republican, who also sits on the Judiciary panel, has frequently called for investigations into ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now)...

Oversight: As the Senate votes to de-fund Acorn, add pimping, tax evasion and human trafficking to voter fraud paid for with taxpayer dollars and you have an organized criminal enterprise. It's time to investigate.After Acorn workers were caught on tape in three cities allegedly abetting what they believed was a fraudulent-mortgage and sex-trafficking scheme, the Senate has voted overwhelmingly to strip the group of funding in the Transportation/Housing and Urban Development appropriations bill. The amendment, offered by Nebraska Republican Sen. Mike Johanns, passed by an 83-to-7 margin and marked the third time this year that Republicans have tried to block...

When President Obama addresses Congress and the nation tonight, he should pledge to do three things. First, he should announce that he will discard the 1,018-page health bill drafted in the House of Representatives and replace it with a 20-page bill in plain English. Twenty pages should be sufficient. The framers of the US Constitution established an entire federal government in 18 pages. One reason for the rancor over the current health bill is that few people, including members of Congress, know what it says. When those who have read it point to its dangerous provisions, the bill's defenders offer...

'After I read the story, we’ll have an even gooder conversation, the 44-year veteran Congressman said..........'

"...The artists deserve it, ...With things the way they are today, everybody needs every little penny they can get." ...Radio personalities such as Tom Joyner, whose "Tom Joyner Morning Show" is owned by Radio One Inc., a black-owned conglomerate, oppose the bill, generating support from their vast listening audiences.... There is also a division within the civil rights community. The NAACP recently passed a resolution supporting the bill, while activists Al Sharpton, whose radio show is syndicated by Radio One, and Jesse Jackson, whose show is syndicated by a subsidiary of Clear Channel Corp., oppose it... The bill's sponsor, Rep....

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) could face a tough reelection race in 2010, according to a new, independent poll released this weekend. 40 percent of Conyers's constituents said he deserved reelection, according to a poll conducted earlier this month by the Lansing, Mich.-based Deno Noor Polling, in conjunction with the Rossman Group and Perricone Group. 44 percent of Detroiters represented by Conyers said they would prefer to elect someone else. 15 percent were unsure or didn't know. The 80-year-old Conyers has served in Congress since 1965, making him one of the longest-serving members of Congress still in office....

If freedom of the press is only for those who own the presses, then what freedom is there in the mainstream media for stories that damage liberals? Important stories have legs in the mainstream media, but others -- those which take a small political matter and inflate it to affect a politician’s fate -- can have manufactured “legs” if an advantage can be had. Remember the offhand “macaca” comment made by former Virginia Sen. George Allen? Blame the “former” tag partly on the wall-to-wall coverage of Allen’s verbal slip in outlets like The Washington Post, which seemed to run a...

The dismissal of New Mexico U.S. Attorney David C. Iglesias in December 2006 followed extensive communication among lawyers and political aides in the White House who hashed over complaints about his work on public corruption cases against Democrats, according to newly released e-mails and transcripts of closed-door House testimony by former Bush counsel Harriet Miers and political chief Karl Rove. House Judiciary Chairman John M. Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) Tuesday characterized the role of Bush White House figures in the firing episode as improper and inappropriate. "Under the Bush regime, honest and well-performing US Attorneys were fired for petty patronage, political...

Detroit police are investigating the disappearance of thousands of dollars of city property that went missing from the office of former Detroit City Councilwoman Monica Conyers, wife of Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich). Monica Conyers has not been charged with any wrongdoing, but City Council President Kenneth Cockrel Jr. filed a formal request on Friday asking the police department to look into the whereabouts of missing electronic equipment, including laptop computers, digital cameras and printers, worth roughly $21,000. The items disappeared when Conyers resigned her council seat on July 6 after pleading guilty to a federal bribery charge. She is awaiting...

Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) said that he is a supporter of Sarah Palin's apparent leadership of the Republican Party. "As a supporter of Sarah Palin for taking over the Republican Party, I’m one of her great advocates," said Conyers. "I mean, what an attractive, young, neoconservative reactionary! Wow! There’s never been one like her." “She attracts crowds. She’s going to write a book,” he said. “She’s so busy she can’t – she doesn’t have enough time to govern Alaska. ‘Hey, let’s get ready for the big one when we go back in and take on Obama.’ I want to encourage...

Cockrel goes to cops on Conyers; City equipment from her office is still MIA

The nation's senior Black congressman fears Barack Obama is in danger of becoming a one-term president. Obama's health care proposal is “crap,” says Detroit's John Conyers, and Obama loses whether it passes or fails. Conyers: “There is no one more disappointed than I am in Barack Obama.” A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford “Progressive congresspersons may wind up voting against Obama on health care.” Congressman John Conyers says Barack Obama’s stance on health care has been wrong, and it’s going to cost the president “big time.” It might even cost Obama his second term in the White House....

“I love these members, they get up and say, ‘Read the bill.’ What good is reading the bill if it’s a thousand pages and you don’t have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?” - U.S Representative John Conyers (D-MI, 14th District) I have to admit I have a soft spot in my heart for John Conyers, who in a now-famous video performance declared his hatred for reading, reading of bills proposed for consideration in the House and pretty much anything having to do with performing his job in the first...

Here are the news stories and opinion articles conservatives dugg today! Check out the list and hold the MSM accountable to ALL the facts! http://diggsandburies.blogspot.com/

$21K in supplies said missing from Conyers' office DETROIT - The president of the Detroit City Council says more than $21,000 in city-owned office supplies and computers are missing from the office formerly occupied by convicted felon Monica Conyers. (...) Cockrel is demanding the items be returned. Conyers' attorney, Steve Fishman, says Conyers didn't take any equipment or authorize anyone to do so. Someone should check John Conyers' office to see if they show up....That's how crooks operate. They go to pawn shops to sell the goods or to a "fence" to sell the stolen goods.