Of course the last part was hypothetical, but it could happen, after all they are "democrats". Just when you think the Democrats can not shock you anymore, they find new and creative ways to do so.
Posted on 08/14/2004 6:05:42 PM PDT by Pikamax
August 15, 2004 A Governor's Downfall, in 20 Wrenching Days By DAVID KOCIENIEWSKI
RENTON, Aug. 14 — Gov. James E. McGreevey's breathtaking spiral toward his resignation began with the most mundane of daily events — a simple phone message from an unfamiliar lawyer, one of hundreds of such calls fielded each week at the switchboard of the busy New Jersey State House.
It ended on Thursday with Mr. McGreevey delivering a remarkable six-minute speech that was equal parts confessional, apology and outing, and whose singular, precisely worded bombshell line — "I am a gay American" — was strategically devised with the help of a national gay rights organization the governor had consulted in the last hours of his secret life.
The 20 days between the phone message and the staggering exit line, according to the governor's aides, included a torrent of confidential phone calls and bitter negotiations, a frenetic public schedule that offered no inkling that the governor's political career was imploding, and a series of wrenching discussions about his hidden sexual life with friends, political allies and, with special counselors gathered downstairs in the governor's mansion, his wife.
Mr. McGreevey, distracted and at times distraught as the endgame played out with the former government official with whom he had once had a sexual relationship, nonetheless made an array of public appearances and even managed to project a convincing image as the state's commanding chief executive: he marshaled New Jersey's large-scale effort to thwart a reported terrorist plot to bomb a building in Newark; attended bill signings, news conferences and radio call-in shows; and spoke before a constellation of business leaders, political donors and advocacy groups at the Democratic National Convention in Boston.
As his private crisis deepened, he held those frank talks with his wife, and with his elderly parents, too.
And in the end, as it became clear that allegations were destined to become a public scandal, he led heated, marathon debates among a small circle of advisers, considering whether to brace himself for a sensational political and legal battle or cut his losses by seeking an acceptable way to step down. Just hours before his ultimate announcement that he would resign effective Nov. 15, his aides said, he had briefly concluded that his plan was merely to say he would not seek re-election in 2005.
Throughout, the ordeal clearly taxed and tested, in ways both human and political, the man New Jersey had come to regard as a successfully ambitious but impulsive and sporadically bumbling character. It forced, with a set of excruciating circumstances, Mr. McGreevey to consider the costs of disclosure, and to weigh the risk of trying to keep his identity and inappropriate relationship buried. As he watched his secret life emerge to crush his public one, he was in waters hardly well charted by spin doctors.
To be sure, much is still unknown about the three weeks of crisis management as Mr. McGreevey sought to salvage his hold on office and prepare himself and his family for the shock of a most public outing. The former aide who has accused Mr. McGreevey of sexual harassment, Golan Cipel, has issued only a cryptic statement, saying that the governor had abused the power of his office to coerce him into a sexual relationship. He and his lawyer have hinted at a very dark portrait of the governor, but evidence of that, if any, has not yet been disclosed.
Mr. McGreevey insists that their liaisons constituted a "consensual affair," but he, his aides and his legal team have declined to discuss specifics or describe what corroborating evidence Mr. Cipel's lawyer may have confronted them with.
Still, interviews with Mr. McGreevey's advisers and lawyers provide some details about the crucible the governor passed through during the last three weeks and offer a glimpse of a political end that, for all the management and crafting of words, still hit with the speed and intensity of a storm.
Like Any Other Day
When Mr. McGreevey and his staff arrived at the State House on Friday, July 23, there was little reason to suspect that the day would be any more contentious than usual. Although Mr. McGreevey had been bruised by a succession of corruption investigation involving his fund-raisers, the governor himself had not been accused of any wrongdoing, and he was determined to lift his sagging poll numbers by focusing on politically popular programs involving schools, property tax reduction and the environment.
The two major events on his public schedule that day were a bill signing authorizing $800 million in state aid to communities to protect drinking water sources and a new executive order that tightened the accounting practices of state agencies and authorities.
"I will not tolerate anything less than the highest standards," Mr. McGreevey said in a written announcement. "And anyone who does should not be part of this administration."
By mid-afternoon, however, everything changed.
Allen M. Lowy, a lawyer from New York, left a telephone message with a receptionist, aides said, announcing that he intended to file a sexual harassment lawsuit against Mr. McGreevey. The message was forwarded to Michael DeCotiis, the governor's chief counsel, who alerted James P. Fox, Mr. McGreevey's powerful chief of staff.
Mr. Lowy was an unknown in Trenton, is not licensed to practice law in New Jersey, and Mr. McGreevey's aides said that the tone of his complaint struck them as "somewhat goofy." Nonetheless, the substance of the message caused immediate concern. Mr. Lowy's client, Golan Cipel, had been a political and public relations nightmare for the governor since the administration's earliest days. Shortly after his inauguration in January 2002, Mr. McGreevey appointed Mr. Cipel as his homeland security adviser, and his scant qualification for the job brought a barrage of critical media coverage and persistent — but uncorroborated — rumors that Mr. Cipel and Mr. McGreevey might be involved in an intimate personal relationship.
Mr. DeCotiis conferred with William E. Lawler III, a Washington lawyer who had been representing Mr. McGreevey in the fund-raising investigations.
When the governor's legal team spoke to Mr. Lowy by telephone, they said, their concern was bewilderment and alarm. In a brief conversation, Mr. Lowy reportedly said that he was drafting a lawsuit in which Mr. Cipel would allege that Mr. McGreevey had sexually harassed and assaulted him over the course of his employment with the state and sought to silence him by arranging jobs, with the state and in the private sector.
In his only public comments, a brief public statement on Friday outlining Mr. Cipel's version of events, Mr. Lowy insisted that it was the governor's lawyers who tried to head off the embarrassing disclosures and "silence him" with a financial settlement. But Mr. McGreevey's aides are equally adamant in contending that it was Mr. Lowy who boasted that he could easily win a $50 million judgment with the case and demanded a multimillion settlement to avoid the public humiliation of a lawsuit.
What is indisputable is that by the time the conversation ended late that Friday afternoon, and the two sides prepared to meet in person in New York the following Monday, Mr. McGreevey was suddenly facing a potentially devastating problem.
Mr. McGreevey's advisers dispatched researchers to gather intelligence on Mr. Lowy, who had worked as a patent and entertainment lawyer but had no known experience in criminal law. They did find one tantalizing connection: he lived in the same plush building as Mr. Cipel, on a street off Columbus Circle in Manhattan.
In a moment that would have seemed unimaginable just hours earlier, the aides said, Mr. Fox and the lawyers had to demand candor from Mr. McGreevey on an awkward topic that had long been the subject of innuendo and evasiveness within the administration. Mr. Fox, who is openly gay, pressed Mr. McGreevey for a full and detailed description of his relationship with Mr. Cipel.
For the first time, Mr. McGreevey acknowledged that he and Mr. Cipel had had a sexual relationship for several months, ending in the early spring of 2002.
At the Convention
The next day, aides said, as Mr. McGreevey and hundreds of New Jersey Democratic party leaders, donors and operatives began their pilgrimage to Boston for the national convention, Mr. Fox stressed the importance of keeping matters quiet, strictly adhering to Mr. McGreevey's public schedule and offering no hints that he had suddenly been engulfed by a potential disaster.
"You've got to keep your game face on," Mr. Fox said, according to an aide.
When Mr. Lowy and Mr. McGreevey's lawyers sat down in New York that Monday, it didn't take long for the meeting to turn contentious, according to Mr. McGreevey's aides. At first, Mr. Lowy declined to reveal details about the allegations. Once Mr. Lowy did offer some of his specific claims, Mr. McGreevey's legal team telephoned the governor, who had been traveling among various convention events that morning with his wife, Dina, and their 2-year-old daughter, Jacqueline.
Mr. McGreevey's aides said that in a series of conversations outside various convention events, the governor emphatically denied all of Mr. Cipel's claims that their sexual encounters had been coerced — but it is impossible to evaluate those statements because neither side will reveal precisely what charges were discussed. The meeting ended in less than two hours, but its combative tone, and the suggestion, according to aides, that Mr. McGreevey settle the claim by raising $1 million each from five of his wealthy patrons, left the governor and his aides shaken.
Mr. McGreevey kept up his calm public demeanor throughout the convention — meeting with business leaders and labor organizers, and appearing at a stem cell research forum, a Democratic unity meeting with Senator Jon. S. Corzine and, in a moment of some coincidence, a group of gay rights advocates.
The moment he stepped off the public stage, however, he would ask for updates on the behind-the-scenes discussions between the legal teams. When the convention ended and the governor headed off to spend the weekend in Newport, R.I., with his wife, it was clear, his aides said, that the situation was only deteriorating.
On that Saturday morning, when Mr. McGreevey was called back to Trenton because of the terrorism alert, the frightening news was almost a welcome diversion from the looming conflict. The governor busied himself for days by overseeing the law enforcement response, giving interviews on national newscasts, and touring the targeted building to reassure workers that every precaution had been taken.
As the week dragged on, however, and the terror threat abated, the legal discussions intensified, and their pace and tenor, the aides maintained, made it clear that the dispute was growing more ominous.
Some of Mr. McGreevey's allies said they argued that it would have been reasonable to pay Mr. Cipel a small settlement. He had, after all, endured public embarrassment because of his brief, widely ridiculed employment with the state, and while it was debatable whether the experience had hurt his future job prospects, Mr. McGreevey's advisers would have liked nothing more than to prevent the matter from becoming public.
The vehemence of Mr. Cipel's accusations set Mr. McGreevey's advisers wondering if someone, or something, else might be behind the negotiations. Mr. Cipel had once worked for Charles Kushner, the McGreevey fund-raiser who was recently charged by federal officials with hiring a prostitute to silence a witness in a campaign finance investigation. He had also been friendly with two of Mr. McGreevey's aides who are under investigation for using their positions to inflate the value of a billboard company.
The governor's inner circle, in fact, thought it was possible that Mr. Cipel and Mr. Lowy might be cooperating with federal investigators as part of some sting operation involving Mr. McGreevey. After a second face-to face meeting, the governor's lawyers, according to aides, told Mr. Lowy that Mr. McGreevey would rather resign than be pressured or publicly humiliated by Mr. Cipel.
"They didn't believe he'd actually do it," said one person involved in the negotiations.
The Personal Side
By last weekend, Mr. McGreevey's aides said, the governor's focus began to turn beyond the mere legal and political consequences of his dilemma and was trained on the intensely personal issue of facing up to his sexuality and explaining it to the people around him.
With the threat of the lawsuit being filed at any moment, Mr. McGreevey began widening the circle of advisers. He conferred with Raymond J. Lesniak, a state senator from Union County, and two political strategists, Steve DeMicco and Joel Benenson.
"On my way into the governor's mansion, he stopped me in the garden and, stuttering a bit, said, `I think I'm gay,' " Mr. Lesniak said. "I said, `You think you're gay?' And he said, `I know I'm gay.' Then we stood up and we embraced." Mr. McGreevey also sought counsel from another ranking administration official who is gay and offered advice about the intense emotional turmoil of coming out.
Aides to the governor said that Mr. McGreevey broached part of the unfolding story with his wife on Monday. Then on Wednesday night, Mr. McGreevey took what aides described as "the most devastating" step in that process by walking up the stairs of Drumthwacket, the governor's mansion, and telling his wife that he had betrayed her with another man and was about to go public. His aides said they arranged for counselors and friends to be on hand, but declined to describe how she reacted to the news. Mr. McGreevey then broke the news to his mother and his father, a former Marine drill instructor.
Through much of Wednesday night and early Thursday morning, the governor and his advisers debated how to handle what they expected to be the coming lawsuit. No option was pleasant. The governor could stay and fight the suit, hoping that the public would be forgiving of a man whose confused sexual identity had led him to break his marriage vows. But others worried that the graphic nature of Mr. Cipel's charges would provoke an angry reaction against the governor.
And it was unclear how much political support Mr. McGreevey had among Democrats: even before Mr. Cipel first threatened to sue, Mr. McGreevey's spotty performance and the lingering scandals around his associates had led some party leaders to lobby for Mr. Corzine to get the party nomination for governor next year.
"The political people all said that the public might accept that he was gay and overlook the fact that he had an affair," said one person involved the debate. "But having a lover on the payroll, in a job where they weren't really qualified, whatever their sexual preference, would be devastating."
Mr. McGreevey soon began preparing a speech to make to the public about his life and current circumstances. In doing so, he began conferring with directors at the Human Rights Campaign, a gay advocacy group. The most dramatic line the governor eventually uttered — "I am a gay American" — was developed by the group and was a poll-tested phrase used to reframe the debate about gay causes from one about sexual liberation to one about civil rights.
As of Thursday morning, the speech called for Mr. McGreevey to announce that he would complete his term, which ends in January 2006, but would not seek re-election. As the day progressed, however, Mr. McGreevey's aides said he blanched at the thought of putting his staff, his party and, above all, his family, through the withering public fight that would surely continue until he left office.
After another round of discussions, the word went out at 1 p.m. that Mr. McGreevey would make a major announcement at a 4 p.m. news conference. Even then, the furious discussions continued, his aides said. Party leaders wanted Mr. McGreevey to wait until after Sept. 2 to leave office so that his successor, Senate President Richard Codey, would not have to face a special election this November. The governor said he would stay until Nov. 15 because he could not ask his wife and young daughter to leave the governor's mansion — their home — on any shorter notice.
Then, a few minutes before 4 p.m., came a stunning development. Mr. Lesniak received a call from a lawyer who said he was an intermediary working on behalf of Mr. Cipel and Mr. Lowy and wanted to cut a deal. Mr. Lesniak declined to discuss the matter because it was now under investigation by the F.B.I. But according to several people, the lawyer offered to drop the lawsuit in exchange for a cash settlement and the Governor's agreement to approve permits for Tuoro College, a school in Brooklyn, that was trying to found a medical school in New Jersey.
No deal of any kind was made, although confusion still exists about the school and the alleged proposal. Mr. Kushner, the governor's major fund-raiser, is on the board of the school. Senator Robert Torricelli's consulting firm, too, had been trying to arrange meetings with state officials to discuss the permits.
There was nothing left, then, but for Mr. McGreevey to step up to the podium, surrounded by his wife and parents. When he finished his speech and walked away, to the cheers of his staff members in the room, Mr. McGreevey's aides said that Mr. McGreevey looked more relieved than they had ever seen him. "He didn't just look relieved," Mr. Lesniak said. "He was relieved."
What will happen?
ANSWER: Did anything happen to Berger or Gorelick except that they were rewarded?
Who would have ever thought that the Sopranos have more integrity
in their little finger than the rest of the state of New Jersey?
Similarly, when the Lawinsky affair was exposed, if Bill Clinton had admitted it to the public and pointed out that both parties were over 21 years old, the political damage to him would have been negligible.
It was the lying, purjury, attempts to fix a court case, intimidation of witnesses, and other evidence of corruption that outraged President Clinton's critics.
His defenders intentionally misunderstood the cause of this outrage and for purposes of propaganda attributed it to other, less than honorable causes, e.g. prudery.
Thus, to a considerable degree, they deflected the criticism of his behavior from its true cause to an absurd invention that they created to serve their purposes.
Of course the last part was hypothetical, but it could happen, after all they are "democrats". Just when you think the Democrats can not shock you anymore, they find new and creative ways to do so.
McGay's father was a "Marine drill instructor"? Hah!!
The spin of the Slimes never ceases to amaze me.
Congressman Billybob
Latest column, "Says the Wuss: Ma, He's Touching Me"
If you haven't already joined the anti-CFR effort, please click here.
1. It is not really very sympathetic to McGreevey, which tells me that the NYT and the rest of the Rats are cuttng him loose.
2. Human Rights Campaign was one of the first groups touting his "courage." We now find out that Human Rights was a consultant in ths mess, rendering their opinion useless.
""He didn't just look relieved," Mr. Lesniak said. "He was relieved."
In other words, he peed in his pants.
Mr. Fox, who is openly gay,
How was Mr Fox selected for his job?
It's fun watching these democrat governors getting picked off. Here in California, I got to help governor davis get the heave ho. Now I've got a nice balcony seat with plenty of hot buttered popcorn from which to watch McGreevey take his well-earned nose-dive into the political graveyard. Entertainment at its best.
how do people like this get elected, is McGreevey a lawyer?
1. The NYT would pursue the power equation explanation if this were a conservative and a subordinate. In other words, the "was is consensual or not?" would not be a question at all since a boss has implicit power over a subordinate so it was de facto sexual harrasment and could NOT be consensual since the Marxian perspective would indicate the ruling class ALWAYS abuses those below them.
2. This guy's dad was a marine drill instructor? My own armchair analysis is that his dad was distant and stern with no emotional input. He is a homo because he is searching for the male approval and affirmation he never got at home. Homosexual inclination may or may not be inborne, but the behavior is symptomatic of a void of proper male affection.
"The most dramatic line the governor eventually uttered — "I am a gay American" — was developed by the group and was a poll-tested phrase used to reframe the debate about gay causes from one about sexual liberation to one about civil rights."
They admit they spin, but no one cares.
Not that I agree with McGreevey's behavior towards his parents. I simply think it was a stealth manner of skewering his dad. Almost no one in the media has asked about this. Seems to me one should ask questions about WHY he made his parents stand there with him.
He gave a gay lover the job of Homeland security adviser after 9-11. Put the entire state at risk to employ a foreign gay lover. They were trying to get permits approved to build a school. NJ dems are totally corrupt with builders and developers of all kinds. McGreevy's people immediately thought it might be an FBI sting - because they are as crooked as the day is long. Torricelli, Kushner - all the crooks' names come up. What more do you need to know than that he played with is willie on the issue of terrorist attacks after hundreds from NJ had died? A total corrupt disgrace.
You got to be kidding!! The whole entire sordid, sick and crooked story is about ways to avoid the inevitable outcome for being a bunch of immorals, crooked and sick bastards...
"Mr. Fox, who is openly gay, pressed Mr. McGreevey for a full and detailed description of his relationship with Mr. Cipel." ,...."I am a gay American" — was developed by the group and was a poll-tested phrase used to reframe the debate about gay causes from one about sexual liberation to one about civil rights."
Once again the Democrats spin garbage and filth into CIVIL RIGHTS. The reality is sordid and sickening but under the PC cover, who would dare call it that.
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