Democratic "culture of corruption"...again.

It's not just Democratic congressman William Jefferson with $70,000 of bribe money in his freezer any more. Here is a list of all the campaign contributions raised by the "in custody" criminal, Mr. Hsu, to all of your favorite Democratic politicians:

Hsu fundraising





Suitably Flip

Ummm, yeah. A guy with a 15 year old bench warrant raised a lot of money. Oh snap.

Hey, now. Get a hundred Norman Hsu's together and it might equal one Jack Abramoff. Do that a hundred times and it would equal the K Street Project.

Can't you see? Democrats are only ten thousand times less corrupt than Republicans. Why, that's practically the same in pan-galactic nmubers.

The guy was a donor, not a practicing politician, right? That seems to be a point the Wall Street Journal glossed over.

I guess there is sort of a point to this: candidates should do criminal background checks on their fundraisers to look for outstanding warrants(?). Of course, that doesn't happen often, but I suppose an extra precaution would be a good thing.

But I'm not seeing how this fits the larger "culture of corruption" title. They guy raised money for them; they accepted it. Turns out the guy is wanted for something 16 years ago. Unless they knew about it, hid him when the police came over, and participated in a running gun battle with police to keep him out of jail somewhere along the line, or exchanged the money for an "I will pardon you" guarantee, I'm not sure where the corruption is. Maybe you can explain this to me; I always thought that corruption was to make impure through dishonest practices. I don't see where any of those politicians are being dishonest, since they did not know, and if they had known, likely would not have accepted the money.

I have to second the "where's the corruption" question. I can see how its bad form for a candidate to knowingly take money from a wanted criminal and it does look like Hsu may have contributed illegally. But I don't see any evidence, even circumstantial evidence, that would indicate that any of the candidates took this money in some sort of quid pro quo arrangement or suspected that the money was raised illegally (if in fact it was illegal). Is taking donations from a wanted man even illegal?

People have already started to compare this to the Abramoff crimes and I don't see the equivalence.

BUTBUTBUT he donated to a DEMOCRAT! That's enough to make it equivalent to He Who Shall Not Be Named, right?

Non Sequiturs"R"Us.

Huh.