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Rangel Charged
Topic Started: Jul 22 2010, 04:34 PM (623 Views)
cks
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The House ethics committee that has been investigating Charlie ("I didn't know") Rangel has decided that there is substance to the allegation of ethics violations. He will be charged and a trial will be held though exactly which violations he will charged with were not listed. (I saw this on the Fox News site).
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Mason
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Parts unknown
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The Hell you say!

I think Nancy promised resolution of the Rangel case about 18 months ago.

Why do I expect hijinks?

.
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RighteousThug
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The investigation of Rangel has focused on:

•His use of official stationery to raise money for the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at City College of New York.

•Whether he had the Ways and Means Committee consider legislation that would benefit donors to the Rangel Center at the same time the congressman solicited donations or pledges.

•Preservation of a tax shelter for an oil drilling company, Nabors Industries, which has a chief executive who donated money to the center while Rangel's committee considered the loophole legislation.

•Use of four rent-controlled apartment units in New York City, when the city's rent stabilization program is supposed to apply to one's primary residence. This raises the question of how all the units could be primary residences. One was a campaign office, raising the separate question of whether the rent break was an improper gift.

•Whether Rangel, as required, publicly reported information on the financing and rental of his ownership interest in a unit within the Punta Cana Yacht Club in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. Rangel also had to pay back taxes on the rental income.

•Whether he intentionally failed to report — when required — hundreds of thousands of dollars or more in assets. The amended disclosure reports added a credit union IRA, mutual fund accounts and stock.
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RighteousThug
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The charges above are separate from the Dominican Republic travel that led to his stepping down as Ways & Means chair.

Kwame Kilpatrick learned a lot from ol' Charlie.
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kbp

Mason
Jul 22 2010, 05:14 PM
.
The Hell you say!

I think Nancy promised resolution of the Rangel case about 18 months ago.

Why do I expect hijinks?

.
They have to address the fact he faces charges during the election, while somehow delaying "hijinks" until AFTER that election, if at all possible.
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longstop
longstop
Rep. Charles Rangel needs to keep running for office to pay off mounting legal debt
BY James Gordon Meek
DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2010/07/24/2010-07-24_meters_running_rep_must_too.html


WASHINGTON - Charles Rangel's legal bills are piling up as high as the campaign cash he's raking in to pay for his ethics defense.

That leaves the Harlem Democrat with no choice but to run for, and win, a 21st term in the House to keep raising campaign money to pay legal fees - which top $1.7 million, records show.

"It's perverse - he's got to keep doing it," said Solomon Wisenberg, a former independent counsel who probed ex-President Bill Clinton's sex scandal.

If Rangel wins reelection he can continue dialing for dollars to pay D.C.'s primo law firms.

If he loses or resigns, the House probe would end but he might have to dig into his own pockets to pay his legal debts.

Rangel's decision to fight the charges has meant big fees from power firms like Zuckerman Spaeder, where partner Leslie Kiernan will make the case before the House Ethics Committee.

The panel meets next week to weigh the legendary lawmaker's reported tax lapses, undisclosed income and improper perks.

In the first quarter of the year, he paid Zuckerman $142,000, leaving his campaign war chest with a modest $516,000.

Most of the money he has raised the past two years has gone to lawyers in the ethics scandal - which is not believed to have blown up into a criminal probe.

"Rangel can be thankful the Ethics Committee case is all there is," Wisenberg said.



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chatham
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Rangles troubles just follow what his predisecsor went through. Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Powell got reelected even though he had issues.
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wingedwheel
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Not Pictured Above
chatham
Jul 24 2010, 03:57 PM
Rangles troubles just follow what his predisecsor went through. Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Powell got reelected even though he had issues.
Someone on FOX mentioned Powell's son is now running for the seat Rangel holds.
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Baldo
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A Crooked Politican from New York’s Fifteenth Congressional District that will relect him. I have as much respect for the voters of that District as I do for Rangel.

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Rusty Dog
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wingedwheel
Jul 24 2010, 04:23 PM
chatham
Jul 24 2010, 03:57 PM
Rangles troubles just follow what his predisecsor went through. Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Powell got reelected even though he had issues.
Someone on FOX mentioned Powell's son is now running for the seat Rangel holds.
It's Adam Clayton Powell's GRANDSON who's running against Rangel.
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wingedwheel
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Rusty Dog
Jul 24 2010, 06:28 PM
It's Adam Clayton Powell's GRANDSON who's running against Rangel.
That makes more sense age wise. Wasn't really paying much attention when I heard it.
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cks
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Daniel Henninger had a great column in this morning's WSJ regarding Rangel. Hopefully a tech savvy liestopper will pull it up and post it so all can read. I think it says much as to why it is corruption is rife in DC with little done to those who see fit to engage in such behavior.
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kbp

The Great Guy Theory of History
Charlie Rangel forgot that America's voters want more than a great guy.

By DANIEL HENNINGER

We consider today the sad case of Charlie Rangel, the beloved 20-term Congressman from New York City.

You've probably heard of the Great Man Theory of History. The Charlie Rangel story can be explained by the Great Guy Theory of History.

Men have a shorthand way of sorting through the torrents of human behavior. They'll say someone is a "great guy."

Like in: "Have you ever met Charlie? Great guy."

That's it. Two words. "Great guy." You're in the club. Vouched for. Cleared for take off.

Politics seems to attract great guys, and there's been no greater guy than Charlie Rangel. Until recently, you could have filled Madison Square Garden with famous and connected people who'd vouch for Charlie Rangel.

One reason long-serving politicians pile up great-guy points wherever they go is so no one will ever think of throwing them over. But now it looks as if Charlie Rangel is going over the side, and this is causing anguish among his many friends.

Someone once said that there are no genuine friends in politics. Deep and complex relationships maybe, but friendship? Don't go looking for it.

Sounding like a don in "The Godfather," President Obama told CBS last week: "He is somebody who is at the end of his career, 80 years old. I'm sure that what he wants is to be able to end his career with dignity, and my hope is that happens."

The biggest problem is the punishment. It used to be the political club would give a Charlie Rangel a great-guy's pass; the House would issue a letter of reproval or maybe a reprimand. There was a time when it was unthinkable that the House would censure or expel a Charlie Rangel for these infractions.

We are not in that time.

Mr. Rangel says he's innocent, presumably of any crime. Maybe so, but this is a cruel moment. Congress's approval rating sits at 22%. If we had no-confidence votes in the U.S., that would be it.

Until recently, people inside the Beltway had a hard time figuring out why the tea parties exist. They exist because disgust is still a basic human emotion.

The House ethics panel's document, "In the Matter of Charles B. Rangel," available on the committee's website, is a 41-page summary of why people are disgusted with Congress and Washington. And Albany, Sacramento, Trenton and Springfield.

Nancy Pelosi keeps talking about how she was going to "drain the swamp." This is unfair to swamps. Like politics, a swamp is a complex ecosystem. It may smell at times, but the smell has a biological purpose. Politicians aren't meadowlarks and butterflies. Everyone knows that. They slither and coil and provide crude balance to the ecosystem. If we "drained the swamp," everything would die.

But here's Charlie Rangel's problem. Here's how Congress's approval fell to 22% and why the voters have decided it's time to abandon the swamp.

There are 535 members of Congress and thousands more in state legislatures. When citizens vote one of their own into these offices, they transmit to these individuals significant power and status. People who before the election were no more special than anyone else suddenly are called Congressman this or Senator that. But the deal is that you are supposed to try to do some good in return for the gift of power and status.

An infinitesimal number of these politicians do enough significant good to deserve a statue, much less their name on a building or highway. Politicians who think they are owed immortality—such as a Rangel Center—are mistaken.

The committee document on Mr. Rangel is an unpleasant read. Press accounts can't do justice to the cumulative impact of paragraph after paragraph describing a political life disconnected from the original, basic bargain.

A public trial would be ruinous for Mr. Rangel. Conventional wisdom holds it would be ruinous as well for other Democrats. But I think a trial would damage incumbents in both parties. There's nothing uniquely "Democratic" about the Rangel story told here.

Congress just passed a financial regulation bill and people wonder how it can be 2000 pages long. The Rangel saga suggests why. The reason it's 2000 pages long has less to do with the need for regulation and a lot to do with the needs of Washington. Every financial player in America will have to contribute money, one way or another, to Washington's great guys—to their campaigns, their legacy projects, to the former members of the congressional family who will lobby and lubricate the bill's incomprehensible details.

That's the deal in Washington now. But that's not the deal as understood by most American voters. American politics is about to go through one of its periodic purifications. Decent, competent members of Congress will get swept away. Charlie Rangel, a 20-termer and a great guy, will go down in ignominy.

In the old days, guys who were lucky or smart left office or died before the sheriff arrived. This year the voters have the Capitol surrounded. In January we're going to get the 112th Congress and a chance for better than what we've had. Let's get on with it.

Write to henninger@wsj.com
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cks
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Thanks kbp for posting the Henninger column.
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Kerri P.
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http://www.wral.com/news/political/story/8122741/
Top Dems to rally around Rangel at NY fundraiser
Posted: 3:31 p.m. today
Updated: 57 minutes ago

NEW YORK — Rep. Charles Rangel forged ahead with plans for a fundraising gala on Wednesday night with Democratic luminaries including the governor, presumptive governor and both the state’s U.S. senators on the guest list — not bad for a congressman steeping in a tempest of ethics charges.

The event, tied to his 80th birthday, has emerged as a test of political loyalty to Rangel, the dean of the state’s congressional delegation. It came a just day after he delivered an impassioned speech on the House floor insisting he would not resign despite the 13 charges pending against him.

Despite Rangel’s troubles, the fundraiser had sold out, with at least 800 people expected to crowd the ballroom at the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan, Rangel spokesman Bob Liff said. Many people planned to come because they felt Rangel had been poorly treated by the press and the political establishment, he said.

Snip....
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