Yesterday we asked what prominence the Democrat and Chronicle would give the story about the withdrawal of the felony charge against County GOP Executive Director Moore.
We had the answer today: front page.
Not the top headline, but given the substance of the story and the competing news, we'd call it fair reporting.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Credit Where It's Due
Next Political Indictment Any Day
Watch for it, maybe even today. We're within a day or two of the next political indictment. We don't think any later.
As we've explained before, it fits the Democratic campaign plan.
Moreover, it's now necessary, in order to push from the news cycle yesterday's embarrassment to the District Attorney's office, of having to drop the felony charge against Andrew Moore because the charge was never warranted in the first place.
Let the games continue!
Disciplinary Rule 3.8
From the New York Rules of Professional Conduct for attorneys, adopted in April 2009:
Disciplinary Rule 3.8:
Special Responsibilities of Prosecutors
and Other Government Lawyers
(a) A prosecutor or other government lawyer shall not institute, cause to be instituted or maintain a criminal charge when the prosecutor or other government lawyer knows or it is obvious that the charge is not supported by probable cause.
Assistant District Attorney William Gargan, who presented the felony charge dropped yesterday by DA Green, should take note.
Monday, October 19, 2009
Just Wondering
When Monroe County GOP Executive Director Andrew Moore was indicted in September, the print edition of the Democrat and Chronicle carried the story as its top headline, front page and above the fold. The lead story.
We'll be waiting to see on what page, and where, tomorrow's edition carries the news of the District Attorney dropping the felony charge against Moore.
DISTRICT ATTORNEY WITHDRAWS FELONY CHARGE AGAINST ANDREW MOORE
District Attorney Michael Green this morning withdrew his felony charge against Monroe County Republican Executive Director Andrew Moore.
"[F]rom the outset, the substance of the felony charge appeared in question," the Democrat and Chronicle observed in its story on this morning's development.
Of course it did. Because, as we've pointed out on numerous occasions, all Moore did was to write a mailing piece for a political campaign. For that, he was arrested for violating a law that requires offering or giving a reward to a public official, who then engages in misconduct.
To date, the DA's office has never said what the alleged reward was. It has not responded with a "bill of particulars" on any of its charges against Moore. A "bill of particulars" is a statement by the prosecutor describing what the accused person actually did to break the law.
Now we know why. As the DA himself admitted to reporters this morning, after reviewing the evidence presented to the grand jury, he concluded that there isn't evidence to support the charge. (Just what we've been saying for the past five weeks.) No wonder Moore's indictment was described by a professor of criminal law as "funny," except for the person going through it.
This is a major embarrassment for the Monroe County District Attorney's office, as it is whenever a prosecutor's office presents an indictment to a grand jury, only to have to withdraw it later for lack of substance. We give credit to Mr. Green for correcting this matter after his recent review of the charge, which was brought to the Grand Jury by Assistant DA William Gargan. But, as reporters asked Green this morning: Why wasn't a charge this serious reviewed before presenting it to the Grand Jury? Channel 10 has video of Green's defensive and less-than-convincing response.
Today's action seems more characteristic of the Mike Green to whom we looked up and admired, until his office fraudulently indicted Mr. Moore in an action reeking of politics.
Nevertheless, Green still has not withdrawn the three misdemeanor charges against Moore. If Assistant DA Gargan misrepresented the felony charge to the Grand Jury, that taints the entire Grand Jury presentation The misdemeanor charges require proving coercion and showing that Moore acted as an accomplice to Robutrad ringleader Robert Morone, when Morone allegedly pressured a county employee into signing a letter to be used in a political campaign. Yet all Moore did was to write a campaign letter -- an act no more criminal than going out for a cup of coffee.
Mike Green holds an office distinguished by predecessors such as Howard Relin and Don Chesworth. Today Green began to redeem it, and himself, from an unworthy act. We may now be witnessing a struggle between Green's conscience and the demands of Joe Morelle to deliver Democratic victories next month through abusive prosecutions.
Listen to your conscience, Mr. Green. Fire your rogue prosecutor William Gargan, whose overreaching in the Moore matter has damaged your reputation and credibility. Vindicate your reputation by dropping the remaining misdemeanor charges against Andrew Moore. You'll sleep better, and you'll be able to look in the mirror without wincing.
Credit to Green for not doing this on a Friday, when the story would be buried because of the weekend. Credit to him for reversing the action of Assistant DA Gargan, who should have known better. Gargan has now set himself up for unethical conduct claims, for presenting to a Grand Jury a charge lacking "probable cause."
Friday, October 16, 2009
Confirmed
We told you last Sunday, and today comes confirmation straight from the Assemblyman's office. Rumors to the contrary notwithstanding, Joe Errigo definitely is running for re-election next year.
Our next prediction about to come true? The one about a new political indictment from the Monroe County District Attorney's office for the Democratic election campaign.
New Contributor
We welcome our newest contributor, Lucy's dad, Steve Zodiac. Steve came on board to write restaurant reviews, but we see he couldn't resist the bite of the political bug his first time out. Great work, Steve. Like your video.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Hope They Believe It
First entry on Mustard Street! I signed on to review restaurants and bars. But I caught Bob Smith's WXXI show today. I like Bob's show. Today he talked about the citizen protests against the Obama/congressional health care restructuring. Bob said something like, "We know who planned them, orchestrated them and paid for them." Bob has swallowed whole the mainstream media myth on the protesters, that they aren't ordinary citizens. Maybe he's just trying to promote it.
If Bob is an example of mainstream media mindset, I hope he really has swallowed it whole, and really believes it. It shows how disconnected from citizens the media is. If they are so disconnected, they are less able to affect events. Nothing like this since Reagan was elected. The press and the bi-coastal elites were totally shocked. They never saw the conservative tidal wave coming. Because, like now, they are completely out-of-touch.
A White House Shaky in its Convictions?
The White House's attacks on Fox News recall an observation by Democrat, feminist and Obama supporter Camille Paglia:
What is this morbid obsession that liberals have with Fox? It's as if Democrats, pampered and spoiled by so many decades of the mainstream media trumpeting the liberal agenda, are so shaky in their convictions that they cannot risk an encounter with opposing views. Democrats have ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, the New York Times, Newsweek, Time and 98 percent of American humanities professors to do their bidding. But no, that's not enough -- every spark of dissent has to be extinguished with buckets of bile.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Throwing Away an Election
It's becoming clearer that Monroe County Republicans don't know how to run an effective campaign this year. They're using the same playbook as they have in past years for their county legislature candidates. Because of the election indictments, it requires more than that.
Local elections like town races and county legislature seats are a ground game. Get your candidate to campaign door-to-door and support her or him with appropriate mailings.
The indictments now make this an air war as well. By which we mean a larger thematic issue that's used by one side. Democrats are doing this with the Robutrad indictments. In response, county Republicans so far have been totally passive. They have ample material for such a campaign against the Democrats, to augment the individual races. But so far, nothing.
They have the money to do it, but apparently not the smarts and definitely not the guts.
Weakness never wins. If you're weak because you can't help it, that's one thing. If you're weak because you choose to be, you shouldn't be governing, or running political campaigns.
This has been a disturbing trend on the Republican side for the past couple of years (both pre- and post-Minarik), and we'll have a more detailed analysis in an upcoming post.
Let the Sun Shine In
Since this is the kind of story the Democrat and Chronicle suppresses when it involves a Democratic candidate (and promotes when the candidate's a Republican), we provide this link to today's post by Cincinnatus of Monroe Rising.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Connecting the Dots
The local Democratic election effort has moved from party headquarters to the District Attorney's office. As we await a fresh indictment this week or maybe next, it's time to connect the dots.
We've relied on a former downstate prosecutor for help in understanding the legal side of what's going on with the political indictments of the last month. She's made us aware that the Democratic campaign plan for county elections, currently being executed by District Attorney Mike Green, involves more than just the charges against individuals we've seen and will see in the next week or two.
Taken together, the indictments so far and the indictment to come form a legally significant pattern: one person in Republican headquarters, one in the Republican County administration, the one to come in Republican fundraising. Each allegedly related to "Robutrad."
Our ex-prosecutor friend says this pattern is not mere happenstance. It's by design.
Understanding it explains why DA Green had to go so very far out on a limb in bringing an indictment against GOP Executive Director Andrew Moore. That's the indictment in which the conduct alleged doesn't even fit the conduct requrement of the law under which Moore was charged. (The statute requires coercion and direct quid pro quo payback in some form. All Moore did was write a letter as a campaign piece.)
Creating this pattern is necessary, however, as a legal requirement for the next big step in the Democratic effort to take over the County Legislature. Next week, or the week after, will come the charge that purports to tie it all together.
Green will charge the whole Republican organization with conspiracy and racketeering, under state racketeering laws. Or alternatively, he will have established the basis for federal authorities to bring charges under the racketeering law known as "RICO," the "Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act."
Racketeering laws like these can be invoked where a prosecutor can allege "conspiracy," which is to say, two or more engaged in allegedly criminal activity that's somehow related. That can amount to a "pattern of racketeering" that forms the basis for the charge. That's why Green had to create a pattern touching the three major bases: party, administration and fundraising.
And if the authorities don't bring a criminal racketeering charge, someone working with the Democratic organization can bring a civil charge under the federal RICO law.
This next step will permit the Democratic campaign to tar with the brush of "racketeering" the entire Monroe County Republican organization, and by implication, all Republicans running for all offices.
Look for that word to appear in Democratic campaign advertising in the final weeks of the current campaign. And look for the "racketeering" charge, either criminal or civil, a week or so after the next individual indictment.
