"Paul, there's only one way to deal with a blackmailer."
Posted on 05/29/2015 8:37:15 PM PDT by bjcoop
Did Denny Hastert, former speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, really think he could get away with it?
He must have. He kept paying and paying, until the FBI came knocking, asking about all that cash he was withdrawing from his bank accounts.
And you know the rest.
Whether you consider it hush money to cover up sexual misconduct when he was a teacher and coach, or an attempt to right what he considered to be the wrongs of his past, there's one thing we do know:
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
Same question needs to be put to a lot of people in DC and IL.
Exactly, no one gets a leadership position unless they are compromised.
This is not about Hastert, this is a message to Boehner, McConnell, Pelosi, Schumer, and anyone else in a leadership position. The powers that be want the Trans Pacific Partnership trade agreement passed, they better get it passed, or they are next.
LOL! Hastert forgot that he reverted to the status of a mere peasant after leaving CONgress, and was required to account for his use of The King's Money to The Proper Authoritays.
Be a Democrat next time, Dennis...
They only appear innocuous from the outside.
Hastert was a Party Whip before becoming Speaker.
The Whip’s job is to make deals, twist arms and count votes for the Speaker.
The Whips also enforce party discipline when necessary.
Whips are the Speaker’s Field Marshals. You get to that position by following the orders of the Speaker and by taking the deal offered to you and by getting things done when asked.
These are the people that make things happen on the floor of the House.
What does BO have on Chief Justice Roberts?
Obviously Holder gave him everything the FBI had.
And what did Hitlery glean fron the FBI files she had?
Hastert was not charged with any real crime. He is charged with accessing his own money in the form of cash withdrawal. Then, of course, he is charged with lieing to the FBI because he probably did not correctly answer some question.
I don’t know why or who he was paying off. But the person who was extorting money from him was not charged with anything.
So, just think about what happened here, Hastert uses his legally earned money in cash form and is being charged as a criminal. He talked to the FBI and they did not like his answers so he is being charged with a crime of lieing rather than revealing what he was doing with the money. WTH business is it of the government to know how I use my money? Extortion may be a crime but I never knew that paying it was. Anyone who ever talks to the FBI is a fool. We have Hastert now and Martha Stewart a few years ago.
Note to politicians: Revise the rules so that you too don't get Hasterted in the future.
Well, he did have a choice. Fight or flee. He fled, I don’t blame him, he’d probably have lost the fight, it’s hard to win when “your” own side stick knives in your back. But we’ll never win as long as men like Fitzgerald flee. We need Elliot Ness types here. Reformers who will shirk away when the hammer starts to come down do us no good.
As for Rauner, a great many here believed he was pure scum, I believed he MIGHT be pure scum. I voted for him anyway without reservation because we had not a damn thing to lose. I had some hope he wouldn’t be that bad, after all the unions did go all out to try and nominate the ostensibly more conservative (socially anyway) Dillard as the Republican nominee over him. Dillard the Obama quasi-endorser. They didn’t do that for no reason.
I don’t view the combine as a “you’re in or out” thing. It’s a continuum. There are decent people who “go along” some of the time out of fear or convenience. Rauner is not a conservative and he is an ally of Rahm (who unfortunately is “right-wing” for Chicago, I live here and had to vote for him over the commie Mexican idiot) and his damn wife is full fledged democrat. But....
So far, I see him trying to do good things, at least he appears to be doing so. It’s early in his tenure. He doesn’t appear to be Madigan’s bitch boy. Unfortunately Madigan has 60% of both Houses so his veto pen is worth dirt if the rats hold their ranks.
As for Hastert, someone on this thread said “we all heard the rumors”. That he was a pederast? I never heard any such thing until now, most people seem to be shocked, Hastert is not Mark Foley, it was an open secret HE was a brokeback rump ranger who pinged every gaydar from Key West to DC.
Ordinarily, I’d be near enraged at someone fleeing like that, but you and I have no idea what kind of pressure he was under from what are extraordinarily powerful criminal interests (the mob with the force of the government behind them). IL is extra-ordinarily corrupt. It has been for a very long time. I would think it not unusual if Fitzgerald was being threatened in private: “You have a nice family there, Senator. I’m sure you wouldn’t want anything to happen to it, now would you ?”
I believe he no longer resides in Illinois, and I can certainly understand that.
Curious you bring up Eliot Ness. But what you don’t know is that Ness was one of many people involved in bringing down Capone and organized crime and his authority came down from the President and the FBI Director. Ness, unlike the stories, was never a one-man army. I guarantee you during his tenure in office, Dubya would’ve been closer to Hastert and that gang rather than Fitzgerald. I didn’t see him speaking out on how important it was to Illinois to keep him. Contrast that with the maneuvers pulled to make sure sleazy RINO Lindsey Graham was renominated in 2008 and Tom Ravenel sandbagged over charges that were previously kept quiet (so long as he stayed in lesser office).
As for Rauner, I expect he has his own personal agenda, he may be taking the tack of wanting to run the outfit himself (at least the “R” wing of it). Even if he appears to want to reform certain governmental operations does not make him a “reformer” as we term it. Corrupt or not, they’ve still got to deal with managing the state.
Indeed. Bush’s DOJ was a disgrace in many ways.
They shouldn’t have covered up Ravenel’s coke snorting, indicting him only when it appeared he might challenge Graham. Much like in finding cancerous growths, drug fiends and perverts in the GOP ranks need to cut out, as soon as they are found. If he had been found out by the democrats before his 2006 reelection as State Treasurer, we may have lost the office.
Here’s the amusing thing. If Hastert had walked into the bank and said he was withdrawing $500,000 in cash in ten days....the bank has only two obligations...(1) provide the cash in that time period and (2) ask the usage of the money (as required by federal law).
Hastert gives the bank a bogus answer. They turn around and alert the FBI. The FBI comes and all he has to do is answer “blackmail” money and they offer help but if he refuses....it’s on him from that point on.
Hastert then gives a bogus answer to the FBI. They follow him on the next pick-up and watch him as he pays off the idiot blackmailer. Now, they know the whole story. But with a false statement, Hastert is guilty of something and could face a fine (probably no jail-time). If he’d only told the truth....nothing would have happened.
As for the dimwit blackmail guy? Well....the court will establish how much was paid to the guy, and the IRS will get involved. They will ask the guy to come down and make a statement....he’ll respond: “I got no cash”. So they will bring him into court and charge him.
The dimwit will be in so much trouble....that just hiring a $70-an-hour tax lawyer won’t work. You are in the major leagues of tax trouble....so figure $1,000-a-day lawyer with various fees attached. By the time that IRS gets finished....with taxes, fines, and lawyer cost....half of whatever this idiot generated will be gone.
It’s pretty pathetic - on both sides of the aisle there.
Think back on all the sexual hijinks over the last couple of decades. Heck, Hastert was supposed to be the breath of fresh air after Newt’s embarrassing resignation. Now it turns out that the old High School Wresting Coach meme stands a little truer.
Democrat, RINO - it doesn’t make a difference. They seem to have a higher proclivity for some kind of sexual taboo AND they all seem to be able to amass great wealth off just a $174K/year salary. I wish I was that good with my money.
Maybe we should think about a couple of things to do. Maybe make them eunuchs and open up a savings plan for them and pay their bills, etc. but not allow them (or their spouses) to have any other accounts, instruments, bonds - whatever. Heck, house em in a barracks and bus them to/from work. No barracks phone privileges....they are there to serve us, not stay there forever.
As a group, they’re disgusting, IMO.
Hastert does several years in the Stripey Hole.
Hastert only has one serious crime....false statement to FBI. For that....he’ll get a hefty fine at best.
Now, you might ask....how he came to have all these millions for the blackmail loot? Yes....that might be curious to ask how he got rich.
He's charged with structuring as well. =>
______________________________________________________________________
The Justice Department has charged former House Speaker Dennis Hastert with lying to FBI agents and trying to hide financial transactions intended to keep prior misconduct secret, prosecutors alleged.
-snip-
If convicted on both counts, he faces as many as 10 years in prison and a $500,000 fine.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/dennis-hastert-us-house-speaker-indicted-feds/story?id=31376076
"Paul, there's only one way to deal with a blackmailer."
Now, you might ask....how he came to have all these millions for the blackmail loot? Yes....that might be curious to ask how he got rich.
Crooked deals of buying up interstate exit farmland before the highway was built. See Harry Reid for references on insider real estate thievery. Hastert should be disgraced in more than one way.
I think it’s been pinned.......
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