Defending New Jersey politicians

From the Warning Signs of Alan Caruba at Facts-not-Fantasy

Know the Warning Signs from Alan Caruba at Facts-not-Fantasy

I’d be surprised to learn that anyone in the Obama and Holder Department of Justice even knows how to spell “justice.”

On the same day it announced an indictment of New Jersey Senator Robert Menendez (D) for allegedly taking bribes and engaging in various forms of corruption, it also announced that it would not pursue a criminal contempt of Congress resolution against Lois Lerner, the member of the Internal Revenue Service at the center of the effort to deny conservative groups the right to be certified for non-profit tax status.

Without such status, the group’s ability to raise funds and pursue their issues and agenda was significantly impacted. If you were a liberal group, however, you sailed right through. That’s that way the Obama administration has functioned in all aspects of governance since it began in 2009.

In what is now becoming a standard way of avoiding an investigation, last June the IRS announced that it had “lost” two years’ worth of Lerner’s emails in a 2011 computer crash. An IRS inspector general, however, unearthed the backup tapes believed to contain them. Lerner would not speak to lawmakers, but she has reportedly cooperated with the FBI.

In an April 1 Politico.com article, “Don’t Blame Menendez, Blame New Jersey” Jeff Smith and Brian Murphy would have you believe that New Jersey is a steaming heap of political corruption that has no equal. When was the last time a New Jersey senator was found guilty of bribery? 1981. Thirty-four years ago. An entire generation has been born and grown up in the Garden State since then.

I am born, bred, and live in New Jersey. Illinois has ex-Governors in jail and no New Jersey Governor ever shared that distinction.

Our current one, Chris Christie, came to statewide attention when, as the U.S. Attorney for New Jersey, he put a number of our politicians in jail for corruption in addition to a slew of convictions for sexual slavery, arms trafficking, and racketeering by gangs, along with other federal crimes.

He was a very good lawyer and had also been politically ambitious, rising through the ranks, campaigning for Bush 41 and 43, the latter who appointed him to the State Attorney post. In a very Democratic state, he would handily defeat Joe Corzine in 2009 to become Governor because Corzine was as incompetent then as Obama is today.

The rap on New Jersey is that politicians and those who donate a chunk of money to support their election are somehow different or special in some way. I doubt there is a political reporter or blogger in any other state that could not regale you with a history of their crooked politicians and appointees that would not equal or exceed ours.

Meet Senator Robert Menendez (D)

Now, let’s get to the heart of the charges against Sen. Menendez. More to the point, when the charges were announced. In early March he gave a speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Menendez made no secret of his displeasure that the Obama administration was negotiating with Iran.

“When it comes to defending the U.S.-Israel relationship,” he told the group, “I am not intimidated by anyone—not Israel’s political enemies and not by my political friends when I feel they’re wrong.” He said that as long has he had an ounce of fight in him, “Iran will never have a pathway to a (nuclear) weapon.”

And Menendez had also made it clear that he opposed the normalizing of a diplomatic relationship with Cuba. “The deal achieved nothing for Americans.”

When the DOJ indictment was announced, the state’s largest daily newspaper virtually pronounced him guilty. “The litany of travel arranged by U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez’s good friend, Salomon Melgen, reads like the operation of a small airline.” It salivated over the 68-page indictment and the favors alleged between him and “his wealthy benefactor” that included “more than $1 million to various political campaigns connected to the senator.” No question about it, Melgen was Menendez’s friend and supporter. That is, however, not against the law.

I doubt there is a member of the U.S. Senate that does not have such wealthy supporters, nor any that have not accepted an invitation to vacation as their guest. Did Menendez reply by using the influence of his office to facilitate visas or the approval of deals by which Melgen would benefit? In one cited case that influence did not have any effect on the outcome, but simply stated this is part of the job. It is the quid pro quo of politics and always has been.

The Department of Justice indictment came at the same time the Obama administration had squandered 18 months in useless, senseless negotiations with Iran to arrive at an agreement that would ultimately permit Iran to produce nuclear bombs. No other nation wants that. Iran had never ceased to tell the world it intended to “wipe Israel off the map”, nor cease to call America the “Great Satan.”

The level of hubris from the President to the Secretary of State to those engaged in the negotiations is beyond measurement. It blinds them to the obvious.

The White House clearly could not permit a prominent Democratic senator to tell the Israelis and the world what a bunch of jackasses they were. They feared losing control of the rest of the Democratic senators and thus Menendez is being subjected to a long, costly indictment as a lesson to the others.

The indictment suggests a pattern of corruption based solely on the relationship between Menendez and Melgem, both longtime friends. If Menendez broke the law the DOJ should have been able to come up with comparable charges involving others for whom he intervened. If I was a gambling man, I would bet that Sen. Menendez beats the charges.

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Unlawful scheme to raise legislators' pay

An unlawful scheme to raise legislators' pay from the files of Jeff Jacoby at the Boston Globe

In the long-running saga of Beacon Hill pay raises,
underhanded maneuvering has been the norm.

'The louder he talked of his honor," wrote Ralph Waldo Emerson in 1860, "the faster we counted our spoons."

As a resident of Massachusetts, Emerson knew better than to take at face value anything public officials say about their own rectitude. That was a prudent attitude a century and a half ago. It's just as prudent now.

So when Beacon Hill created a high-powered "advisory commission" to evaluate the salaries paid to top elected officers and lawmakers, only a naïf could have doubted it would come back with anything but a recommendation for hefty pay raises all around — and pitch that recommendation as a matter of fairness, honor, and good government.

Huge increases in what are already among the highest salaries paid to legislative leaders and statewide officials in America, concluded the commission in a report released Monday, is the best way to attract "publicly spirited and honest individuals" to state government. More lavish paychecks will "ensure that there is not a temptation to betray the public trust."

Quick, count the spoons.

News stories have focused on the commission's call for hiking the governor's total compensation by nearly $100,000 a year, and boosting the six-figure salary of the House speaker and Senate president by more than 70 percent. Since governor-elect Charlie Baker says he would "probably veto" any such legislation, the Legislature may try to get the pay hikes passed before Baker takes office in January.

But the biggest affront in this plan is the element that has drawn the least attention: the commission's unlawful scheme to engineer a raise for rank-and-file legislators.

Three years later the Legislature returned to the trough, attaching a 50 percent raise for its members to a judicial pay measure, which couldn't be blocked by referendum. In 1987, another ploy:

A sizable (and retroactive) legislative salary increase was passed with an "emergency preamble," which made it effective immediately — and immune to repeal until it was nearly two years old. In 1994, Governor William Weld — days after claiming that still another pay hike was "not something we're considering" — colluded with legislative leaders to pass a bill enlarging the salaries of House and Senate members by a stunning 55 percent.

Time and again, Beacon Hill politicos have justified such avarice by lamenting that they had no better option — that there is never an acceptable way for elected officials to give themselves a raise.

But then they devised one: They would put a cost-of-living adjustment for legislative salaries right into the state constitution, and forswear forever the right to vote on their own pay. In 1988, Massachusetts voters were invited to approve a proposed constitutional amendment that would, once and for all, put the issue to rest.

"A Yes vote would prohibit state legislators from changing their base pay," explained the official voter guide, "and instead would adjust that pay according to changes in median household income."

Voters agreed. The amendment passed handily. Massachusetts lawmakers looked forward complacently to receiving automatic biennial raises as a constitutional right, forever. And sure enough, their salaries went up by a few percentage points every two years, in keeping with the amendment's explicit formula adjusting legislative pay in tandem with median household income.

Until median household income stopped going up in the wake of the Great Recession.

In the wake of the Great Recession, median household income in Massachusetts
declined slightly. That meant legislators' salaries were slightly reduced — though they
remain among the most highly paid state lawmakers in the country.

In 2011, legislative base pay was trimmed by 0.5 percent. In 2013 it dropped by another 1.8 percent. After a decade of scoring regular raises without having to do anything to justify them — hey, it's in the constitution! — the Legislature was suddenly confronted with the reality that salaries can go down, too.

But that's not a reality every lawmaker is prepared to accept. And — surprise, surprise! — their "advisory commission" says they shouldn't have to. The panel recommends a new method of calculating changes in Massachusetts state income, one that relies on statewide income data "in the aggregate, not the median." That may sound boringly technical, but the bottom line is crystal-clear: The commission's recommended method would have raised legislators' pay in 2011 and 2013.

But aggregate income isn't what the constitution specifies. The amendment drafted by the Legislature — and approved by the voters in a landslide — made "median income" the touchstone. It forbids lawmakers from voting for anything else. Beacon Hill, for once, has been hoist with its own petard.

Assuming, that is, that in Massachusetts, the constitution rules. Does it?

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