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| Three not-good government suckers playing ball with the Dark Side undid 2012's referendum eliminating run-offs. |
FEDS-1, VOTE FARMERS- 0
The government was able to convince a jury of Frank Raia's guilt on the testimony of a shady cast of characters with cooperation agreements. And those cooperating witnesses will testify again as needed. They-- plus new witnesses the Feds may turn-- will have more to say, perhaps about Hoboken candidates whom they 'helped' elect and who knew how they were 'helped' via the 'Old Guard' voter bribery scheme.
In fact, yesterday's guilty verdict is sure to turbo-charge the D.O.J.'s investigation and prosecution of Hoboken vote-by-mail fraud.
Had Raia won, the opposite would be true. A deflated U.S. Attorney would have little incentive to continue in Hoboken if a jury could not convict our juiciest, lowest-hanging piece of fruit. The F.B.I. investigation would also lose steam without leverage to scare subjects and witnesses into cooperating. Hence, yesterday's guilty verdict was critical to the vitality of the D.O.J.'s voter fraud prosecution. Full steam ahead.
And now that the government has slammed the lid on the Raia case, where next?
CONSPIRACY IS A CONTINUING CRIME
Frank was indicted on one count of conspiracy to violate the federal Travel Act and conspiracy which is a continuing crime. As a continuing crime, this prosecution has unlimited growth potential in Hoboken. Why?
Because the federal conspiracy statute simply requires that a person have knowledge that the crime was being committed, whether or not he/she directly benefited from it. For example, if Candidate A knew that vote-by-mails were being harvested for him and voters were being paid, even though Candidate A never touched a fraudulent ballot, he is as guilty as the individuals who were actively engaged in the commission of the crime.
How many Candidate A's are there in Hoboken? My guess is six, that are within the 5-year statute of limitations.
Now that Raia has been convicted, more folks have good reason to come forward and cooperate before the Feds wake them up at 5AM, and put them in a big black SUV. We know of some who are cooperating but did not appear to testify at the Raia trial- Lizaida Camis, for example. Who else?The government is not tipping their hand. Matt Calicchio's testimony disclosed that he had secretly taped Anthony Romano, Perry Belfiore, Eduardo Gonzalez and Frank Raia. What did they say? Ask Frank's defense. They were given the tapes.
Well, GA has a reasonable basis to believe that the investigation has reached Hoboken's 2017 election cycle. Oh yeah. Based on reliable sources. Plus a 'tell' that by someone is cooperating; GA read between the lines of a message sent to me by that someone. Not sayin' who.
REACTION ON THE STREET
A GA reader who appears somehow connected to persons in this drama sent me this, redactions by me.
Word that I am getting is that people are sleeping with one eye open on both Romano and Defusco side from 2017. Please have [redacted] stay from [redacted] or he will end up being a negative to the campaign. Perry is signing like Calicchio and Holmes at a buffet LOL. [redacted] is very worried that Calicchio and Holmes already sold him out won't even take their calls anymore. Hearing church lady did alot of yapping about [redacted's] momma. [Redacted] is very very worried about if they look into 2015. If I hear anything else I'll let ya know.
"Calicchio and Holmes at a buffet." Well, you do know the Golden Rule of federal plea deals, right?
First come, first served.
First come, first served.
(1) For 50 years, the cornerstone of the republican party was fending off communism and anything that smelt like it.
ReplyDeleteThen one day… they decided Russian meddling in our elections wasn't that important. Or at least not as important as something else. Though the something else was never named. MAGA or whatever.
For the last decade, vote buying was the bloody shirt to reform. An instant call to moral indignation that united reform despite its composition of liberals, libertarians and conservatives. And nothing was more of a red flag than untraceable pac money seeking to influence voters.
Then one day… vote buying wasn’t that important. Or at least it was ok if the right people did it. And no one asked about untraceable money oozing into town if it supported the right side of an issue. (See above right.)
Forget about the slippery slope. The slipping is done already.
The governing coalition of Fisher, Giattino, Cunningham + Ramos and Defusco depends upon vote-buying. It does not matter if 3 of them don’t do it. The coalition exists because 2 of them do.
That’s why they don’t ask about it, don’t pursue it, don’t consider any legislative action to curb it in the future.
Beyond sputtering the usual platitudes, they won't do any soul-searching about the "team" they have foisted on the city. The same way they didn’t ask about out-of-town money (see above right…). Because secretive pacs that spread money around are always pro-democracy, right...? And after all, it’s not like vote-buying and election-meddling are important matters of public concern like, say, a nixle with a political subtext or a Lime accident.
Utter sell outs, the lot of them. Just sitting around and hoping Raia's vote-buying operation can be successfully if totally incongruously palmed off as something that Frank dreamed up by himself and did by himself and never involved anyone in their coalition. Thus if anyone in the coalition did happen to show up repeatedly with an outsized bounty of VBMs, why they could be trusted so long as they weren't working with Frank. Fairy tales for the children among you. Lap it up, children.
Trump wants you to trust what he says about Putin over what US Intelligence says about Putin. Lap it up.
Fisher, Giattino, Cunningham + Ramos and Defusco want you to believe what they say (and just as importantly don’t say) about their governing majority over what your common sense is screaming to you. Lap it up.
How about no. No. Fuck no. Exactly why or how 3/5s of the governing majority came to believe they had more in common with the other 2/5s than they had with Doyle and Jabbour is at best interesting but not relevant. They made their bed. They own the lies and fairy tales that come with it.
They advocate vote-buying - implicitly. They are complicit in its continued success. Period.
Call me a glass half-empty fish if you will. But I am not seeing this week’s events as some kind of “triumph” for reform. Rather it is a shocking defeat. To witness this cowering, feckless “good government” majority finally confess that winning by any means is more important than the principles that animated reform through the darkest days up to the present moment. To finally admit that Occhipinti’s 575 paid “workers” generating 1200 votes was only a problem because we didn’t want Occhipinti to win. But it’s ok if we do it.
(2) Bullshit.
ReplyDeleteThe thing to do now is to make them sign up for it. Don’t let them play is game of waiting until it blows over with this “it was all Frank” fairy tale and its how-stupid-are-we-supposed-to-be qualifier “it was all Frank except when he worked for us.”
Draft a resolution. Likely a doomed resolution. But do it anyway. What guidelines do candidates agree to abide by with respect to “campaign workers” and voting. Give them something to formally reject instead of this cowardly performance of we are witnessing now. We already know what one of them believes about “legislating character.” At least he won’t have to come up with a new statement when he rejects the resolution. But make the rest of them admit what they have become. That will simplify matters in November.
It all comes back to what we want from politicians: to win for our 'side' whatever that means (unfortunately it comes to an affiliation akin to being a die-hard sports fan), or that they work for us - all (or at least most) of the voters. It's a national issue that greatly undermines our democracy. I was happy when Reform lit a fire under Hoboken's people, but with the current split, I do feel it has confused the lines for people who don't follow the Hoboken scene too closely.
ReplyDelete