Get ready to stretch your imaginations, but not beyond the bounds of the plausible. Just what was going on in 2004 that had Rove at the vortex AND has connections to the Department of Justice firings?
A scandalicious love-of-money-and-power quadrilateral polygon that bears the stamps of stolen elections, money laudering, influence peddling, and good old-fashioned bribery involving people you love to hate. Some (Jack Abramoff, Brent Wilkes, and Kyle Foggo) have to be left out, otherwise this diary would be a saga a la Thomas Mann's Buddenbrooks, The Decline of a Family.
It all begins when. . .
. . .Katherine Harris certifies the stolen election in FL in 2000. White House asks, "How to show her some love?" Turd Blossom to the President, Karl Rove, answers, "Ask her to continue to serve Jeb! until 2002 when we'll get you elected to the US House. And re-elected in 2004 -- just don't upset our plans for Mel vis a vis the US senate. And then we'll make you a US Senator in 2006, delivering FL totally to the Republicans!"
Need money? How about some illegal campaign contributions? From Mitchell Wade, the former head of the now "defunct"MZM, Inc. MZM, Inc. -- $32K freshly laundered money. Step up to the plate, Lt. General James C. King, president and CEO of Athena Innovative Solutions, Inc. (the successor company to MZM Inc.) and probably his wife.
MZM maintained a facility near Harris' district. Wade thought that Harris had the ability to request appropriations funding that would benefit MZM and that Harris would be an advocate for MZM and its existing facilities. Wade plea agreement.
And. . .
On March 23, 2004, then-MZM CEO King and possibly his wife made $8,000 in campaign contributions to Harris. This is the same day that Mitchell Wade confessed in his plea agreement that he had laundered campaign contributions to Harris through MZM employees.
MZM, Inc., started by Wade, was a high-tech national security firm that
"provides intelligence gathering, technology and homeland security analysis and consulting for both international and domestic governments and private-sector clients. The firm also provides consulting on political and public message strategies. Its government clients include Congress, the White House, the Defense Department, the U.S. intelligence community, the Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force. . .
. . .
In Nov. 2003, Wade, a major defense contractor contributor to Randall "Duke" Cunningham to the tune of $17K over 2000-2004, bought Cunningham's home for $1.7M. He turned around and sold it in Oct. 2004 at a $700K loss.
During that span, home prices in San Diego County rose an average of nearly 25 percent.
"Meanwhile, Wade's little-known company, Washington, D.C.-based MZM Inc., was increasing its federal contracting business. In 2004, MZM tripled its revenue and nearly quadrupled its staff. . .Del Mar Real Estate "Deal"
With the help of government contracts secured by Cunningham, Wade's Washington-based firm generated $150 million in revenue from 2002-2006.
Other considerations from Wade to Cunningham were provided:
a Victorian china hutch, silver candlesticks, leaded glass doors, Persian and Indian rugs, a sleigh bed, Restoration and Louis Philippe commodes, a four-wheel-drive Chevy Suburban, a secondhand Rolls Royce, and use of Wade's 42-foot yacht, the Duke-Stir (where Cunningham briefly lived rent-free).
Add to that, Wade's money laundering scheme, the Sure Foundation -- a charity in name only, apparently, that Cunningham claimed he wanted to assist in its mission "to promote the health care, education and spiritual development of children worldwide," and which
is headquartered in the same Washington town house as Wade's defense contracting firm, MZM Inc. Wade's wife, Christiane, is the foundation's president, and he is its treasurer. Cunningham's wife, Nancy, and one of his daughters, April, are listed as members of the foundation's advisory board. San Diego Union Tribune
Assist he did while on an appropriations subcommitte, to the tune of a $100K grant, according to the North County Times.
Where are all these players now? Harris sits idly by in her personal cave, a private and discredited wing-bat. Wade (up to 11 years) and Cunningham (8 years) are in the Big House. MZM, Inc. was bought out by Veritas Capital and is now Athena Innovative Solutions, Inc.
And Carol Lam put Cunningham away. For that Karl (an "I don't want my E-mail made public"-ite) Rove, who does about 95% of his e-mailing outside the White House system on the RNC "Network," may have seen to it that she be fired for that and perhaps other scandal-ridden reasons.
The financial arrangements to get Harris elected and to get Wade his government security contracts are the kind of arrangements Rove specializes in. The character assassination and career killing steps taken against the USAs have Karl Rove's footprints all over them.
And that's why Rove will refuse to testify. Because Democratic questioners will have seen forensically rescued e-mails dating from 2004 that link Rove to the convicted lobbyist/defense contractor/Congressional criminals and to the election-fixing payback arrangement in Florida.