Catching up on Nebraska Senate news, let's go back to the story of Johanns possibly violating the Hatch Act, which prohibits government employees from conducting political activity. Johanns, current Republican candidate for Senate and former Agriculture Secretary, made 38 trips during the 2006 election season. He was one of Karl Rove's roving Republican officials, using the taxpayer's money to try to secure a permanent Republican majority. Even worse, he was stumping for the likes of Richard Pombo, and two congressmen whose own scandals are so egregious they've been forced to retire: John Doolittle and Rick Renzi.
He took so many of these trips, he was declared one of Rove's "superstars."
The New Nebraska Network reports on Johann's answer to a question about this issue at last week's debate in Grand Island. It's perhaps a reflection of how friendly the local press is to Johanns that the question wasn't "how do you defend these actions" but "wouldn't it be nice if these kinds of activities were illegal?"
As U.S. secretary of agriculture, Johanns attended 38 events recommended by the White House Office of Political Affairs headed by Karl Rove, according to the committee report.
Most of the travel costs for Rove-generated events were paid with federal funds, the report stated.
Answering a question posed by a panelist.., Johanns said he believes it would be "a great idea" to ban the use of taxpayer funds by the White House for such activities.
He goes on to say that it wasn't really his idea, and that it wasn't really Department of Ag funds, and that he didn't really even want to take the trips anyway. And what a really great idea it would be to make exactly what he did--38 times--illegal. So he wants retroactive illegality? Where was this conviction about the wrongness of what he was doing when he was, you know, doing it?
Scott Kleeb calls him on it, via NNN:
Kleeb: You know, it is remarkable--all the good ideas when you're running for another office. You had the opportunity to say "this is wrong, why are we using taxpayer dollars for political purpose?" I mean, that's ultimately it, right? If you break it down, we are using tax payers dollars, right now, to serve political ends to elect people of your own party to carry water for somebody that you, now, disagree with. You say you don't believe in amnesty, but you do and you campaigned for it. That this is really what we're talking about...the use of taxpayer dollars to serve campaign purposes and it's wrong. It's one thing to say that you're a fiscal conservative, it's another thing to actually act like it. To not spend $20 million on junkets for USDA officials all over the world and close down ten FSA offices here in Nebraska. That's not fiscally conservative. That's just wrong. That's a misuse of taxpayer dollars and it is extremely troubling. And it troubles me even more that all the good ideas seem to come after the fact. This is about judgment, right and wrong judgment.
It's also all about money, and Johanns has a ton of it. The road to 60 (dare we dream 61? Take that, Joe Lieberman) could very well run through Nebraska, with the attention the Obama campaign and the DCCC has focused on Omaha. A bit of a boost for Kleeb in that area, where he isn't as well known as in the western part of the state, could put this seat in reach.
On the Web:
Scott Kleeb for US Senate
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