Commerce, Treasury funds helped boost GOP campaigns

From McClatchy via the Arizona Republic courtesy of AlterNet:

Top Commerce and Treasury department officials appeared with Republican candidates and doled out millions in federal money in battleground congressional districts and states after receiving White House political briefings detailing GOP election strategy.

Political appointees in the Treasury Department received at least 10 political briefings from July 2001 to August 2006, officials familiar with the meetings said. Their counterparts at the Commerce Department received at least four briefings - all in the election years of 2002, 2004 and 2006.

The House Oversight Committee is investigating whether the White House's political briefings to at least 15 agencies, including to the Justice Department, the General Services Administration and the State Department, violated a ban on the use of government resources for campaign activities.

Under the Hatch Act, Cabinet members are permitted to attend political briefings and appear with members of Congress. But Cabinet members and other political appointees aren't permitted to spend taxpayer money with the aim of benefiting candidates.

And

The briefings are part of the legacy of White House political adviser Karl Rove, who announced this week that he is stepping down at the end of the month to spend more time with his family.

More here.

So maybe this is why Rove got the hell out of Dodge.

This just has to be illegal. I mean, come on. The motherfuckers were using tax dollars for Republican campaigns. That's fucking outrageous. It's all so true to form, too. This is the kind of bullshit that took down GOP Lizard King Tom DeLay: play as close to the edge of the legal line as possible, and then cross over when you think nobody's looking. I'm sure that the White House will soon issue some kind of bullshit statement of rationale, some stupid-ass "explanation" of why it's all okay. The FOX guys will go into hysterics supporting the statement, and the idiots on Capitol Hill and the rest of the corporate media, while not necessarily agreeing with the rationale, will take it seriously.

I'm really sick of this shit. Bush and his people break law after law and nothing happens, no accountability, zip, zilch, never. This is so goddamned pathetic. The Democrats in Congress just sit there doing nothing, allowing Cheney to have his "unitary executive" branch, handing over king-like powers to whoever succeeds him--that is, if they don't declare martial law, rendering succession moot.

I don't know who I hate more, Democrats or Republicans. They're both destroying the republic.

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