Not professing to be a legal expert, but since we all know that the profession is populated by criminals and madmen, I'm going to resort to common sense before looking deeper into this story gives me a migraine. Not that I've ever had one, but ambulance chasers can task me.
Old Newt himself is saying that the FBI sting operation... that added substantial evidence to the premise that all black officials in La. are incompetent scoundrels who'd sell their own mother to the highest bidder...was the wrong thing to do:
"Former House speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), in an e-mail to colleagues with the subject line "on the edge of a constitutional confrontation," called the Saturday night raid "the most blatant violation of the Constitutional Separation of Powers in my lifetime." He urged President Bush to discipline or fire "whoever exhibited this extraordinary violation."
Many legal experts and defense lawyers agreed with Gingrich. Charles Tiefer, a University of Baltimore law professor who served as solicitor and deputy general counsel of the House for 11 years, called the raid "an intimidating tactic that has never before been used against the legislative branch."
"The Framers, who were familiar with King George III's disdain for their colonial legislatures, would turn over in their graves," Tiefer said.
Washington defense lawyer Stanley M. Brand, a former general counsel for the House who has represented numerous lawmakers accused of wrongdoing, also questioned the government's strategy.
"This is really an over-the-top move, and it could create some real blow-back problems for them in the courts," he said.
But Viet D. Dinh, a former assistant attorney general in the Bush administration who is now a Georgetown University law professor, said that "the raid on his offices itself does not define a constitutional issue."
The constitutional privilege for lawmakers does not "expand to insulate everything that goes on in a congressional office, especially if there's allegations of abuse of process or bribery," Dinh said. ". . . The fine line is whether or not it relates to a legislative process or not, not whether they've raided his office."
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It would appear that the FBI broke a few eggs to make one hell of an omelet, and if there was THAT much evidence pointing to this man's participation in a criminal act, then I'm all for the Feds dragging dragging his ass out of the building and into an awaiting paddy wagon if need be. To my way of thinking, hiding behind a badge of office and getting away with bloody murder...think Teddy K...is precisely WHY we don't cotton much to royalty, because it places someone above the common citizen for all the wrong reasons. As long as the paperwork was in order, then fry the sucker.
And yes, the liberal rags are doing all they can to make it appear that both sides of the aisle are aghast, not at the fact that this cretin took tremendous bribes, but at the FBI's overzealous attack on poor Representative Jefferson.
Does this surprise anyone?
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