Oregon blogger sees connection in Siegelman story and Klamath fish dieoff!

[Joanne98]

He might have a point!

http://www.blueoregon.com/2008/02/the-alabama-gov.html

The Alabama Governor that Karl Rove sent to prison, and why it should matter to Oregonians.
Kari Chisholm
We've never covered Alabama politics here at BlueOregon before, but tonight I heard one of the most chilling stories I've heard in a long time. And it sheds some light on what happened in the Klamath River basin in Oregon in 2002.

On 60 Minutes, Scott Pelley reported on the indictment and conviction of Alabama Governor Don Siegelman. According to their reporting, Governor Siegelman - a Democrat - was targeted by Karl Rove and the Bush Administration's Justice Department because he was a Democrat in Alabama that couldn't be beat.

One of my silly little pastimes is assembling lists of potential presidential candidates 8 and 12 years out. A popular and articulate Democratic governor of Alabama? You bet. Siegelman was on my list.

So, what was he convicted of? Bribery. But the charge is so outrageous and the prosecution so politically motivated, says 60 Minutes, that 52 former state attorneys general across the country - of both parties - have asked Congress to investigate the Bush Administration's actions.

What was the "bribery" in this case? According to a Siegelman aide, who himself went to prison for extortion, Siegelman accepted a $250,000 campaign contribution to a ballot measure he was sponsoring - and in exchange put the donor on an important state board. As 60 Minutes notes, that's an astonishingly loose definition of "bribery". More than that, the story was too "vivid" to be true -- the check was cut days after the star witness said it had been. And the prosecution never turned over the interview notes that would have undermined the witness, as required by discovery rules.

The prosecutor? Leura Canary, a Bush-appointed US Attorney for Alabama, whose husband Bill Canary is a leading GOP political consultant in Alabama - and a "close associate" of Karl Rove.

Grant Woods, a former GOP Attorney General of Arizona who is among those asking Congress to investigate, told 60 Minutes:

"I haven't seen a case with this many red flags on it that pointed towards a real injustice being done. ... I personally believe that what happened here is that they targeted Don Siegelman because they could not beat him fair and square. This was a Republican state and he was the one Democrat they could never get rid of."
Outrageous.

This Alabama story puts a whole new light on the allegations that Karl Rove and Dick Cheney intervened to overrule Interior scientists and force water to be diverted from the Klamath River. That move helped Gordon Smith win his 2002 re-election campaign - though it caused tens of thousands of fish to die, and costing Oregon's fisheries industry over $60 million.

Here's to hoping that Oregon's media takes a fresh look at the 2002 Klamath fish-kill disaster - and investigates what role Gordon Smith, Karl Rove, and Dick Cheney played. Any benefit of the doubt these people ever had is long gone - and it's simply pathetic that the major reporting to date has been by out-of-state media.

http://www.blueoregon.com/2008/02/the-alabama-gov.html

[Pastiche423]

1. Back in 2002

I knew something fishy (pun intented) was up when * campaigned for gordo (Senator Gordon Smith) in Portland. Who can forget the pepper sprayed baby at the protest in front of the Hilton?

We need more coverage in all Oregonian papers, NOW. Gordo is up for re-election in November.


Drifting on the Klamath
A Register-Guard Editorial
Published: Tuesday, August 14, 2007

The problem with Sen. Gordon Smith's defense of the Bush administration's 2002 decision to divert Klamath Lake water for irrigation isn't that the Oregon Republican is wobbly on the facts. It's that he's willing to bend and selectively omit the facts to justify ideologically driven political positions.

In an interview last week with The Register-Guard editorial board, Smith insisted there is no evidence that a massive fish kill on the Klamath River that same year was caused by the administration's decision to release water to farmers. Smith also defended the role that Vice President Dick Cheney played in intervening with federal officials to resume flows to farmers in the Klamath Basin.

The issue of the Klamath diversion arose because the House Natural Resources Committee is investigating Cheney's role in Klamath water management decisions that many believe led to the deaths five years ago of 75,000 fish in the Klamath Basin. Three dozen House Democrats from Oregon and California requested the hearings after The Washington Post reported details of Cheney's extensive intervention, which was intended, in part, to win votes for Smith's re-election. Smith had been pushing the administration to help get water for farmers whose crops were threatened by the shut-off amid drought conditions.

Read more: http://www.stopgordonsmith.com/2007/08/the_register-gu.html

[otherlander]

2. K&R

[otherlander]

3. 11 rec's and only 2 kicks?

:kick: