and who sent his criminal defense lawyer to talk to the appointee

Yeah, Gaza’s being destroyed, climate change is still happening, the Chinese and heaven only knows who else are getting contracts for oil fields in Iraq, and we ahve to deal with bullshit like this.

These people involved in the Illinois Clown Show are too clever by half.

We have no way of knowing at this point. Sure, it’s tough to prove a negative, but a Governor on tape trying to sell the seat, whose new appointee spoke to his bagman about the seat months ago, and who sent his criminal defense lawyer to talk to the appointee, certainly put a cloud of possible illegality over the appointment.

I could concede “As far as we can prove, i was done according to stated procedure.” But we don’t know, and we have strong reason for suspicion.

His shingle:

Edward Genson, Criminal Defense
specializing in
Mobsters, Pedophiles and Republicans.

The hospital exec is Pamela Davis, and there are write-ups if you google. The hospital is in Naperville, which is a distant suburb, though from the vantage point of out of state, I guess it’s just Chicago.

Marcy,

I think you’re still going too easy on Burris over Lon Monk. He didn’t need the indictment to know that Monk was under the USAtty’s microscope. Everyone in the state involved in politics knew that 2 years or more ago. Here’s just one link, to a Daily Herald piece from mid-’07 (as reprinted on the BGA site, which might be a decent place for historical sources on this investigation):

http://www.bettergov.org/bga_i…..325_01.asp

Keep in mind that as the Libby trial is going on, I’m already suggesting that Fitz might pull a rare trifecta – a GOP Veep, a GOP gov and a Dem gov. This investigation is already ancient. (In fact, at the time, I thought he’d get Daley before Blagojevich, through the Sorich/Katalinic connection, which also leads to Rahm.)

I did not see the whole thing and am not sure what TV (ABC, CBS or NBC, but one of those) and am not positive it was the Blago story, but I think it was.

Incidentally, the extent to which attorney-client privilege applies is curtailed, not just by factors that are obvious to you – like Adams and Burris not having or discussing things in the relationship that activates the privilege – but also some that may not be obvious – like if what they were discussing advanced a criminal purpose, even if one of them, or neither, was aware of that effect.

I may have put that too densely, but for me to do it more clearly is going to be pretty pedantic. Ach – maybe laying out a fiction, a theoretical scenario:

Assume a state governor – let’s call him “Q” – had a number of discussions with an aide, someone Q trusts, someone who, they agree with each other, or its obvious they mutually assume without actually saying so with any great degree of precision, when he talks folks realize he does so on Q’s orders or with his authority backing him up – call him “R”.

Assume that in conversations over time, the two of them concoct a scheme – a scheme to accomplish something that’s against the law; since Q’s a governor, let’s hypothesize a scheme with a typical form of public corruption in mind: say, pay-to-play.

Assume further that Q & R mutually recognize that it’s risky to them for they themselves to execute on some, maybe even most, of the details to the scheme that need to be pursued to bring about the desired end, but that also they have at their disposal a number of ‘trustees’, if you will, each willing to do things on the request or authority of Q or R, but without necessarily requiring that they be informed fully of the implications of such asks & orders. Let’s call these trustees “S”, “T”, “U”, “V” & “W” – & while we’re at it, let’s just assume trustee W happens to be a licensed & practicing attorney with Q being among his clients.

Assume the scheme demands that, somehow, a meeting of minds be reached among Q and a outside actor: “X”. Assume Q & X have had some prior business in common, maybe quite a bit of it, but in particular one piece of business in common with another outside actor with whom each has a relationship: “Y”, with each knowing the nature of the other’s relationship with Y, being such that a sort of bond, including some level of ‘understanding’ can be achieved when the name of Y, or Y’s interests, or even just his specter, is introduced into the mix.

Under those circumstances, one can envision a scenario by which Q & R would agree that R might arrange for T to contact X, bearing a which by the mere fact of it being born by X would convey the unsaid information of it’s origins laying with Q, and at the same time would invoke the specter of Y, again without even the name of Y passing anyone’s lips – or at least not in any way that could be objectively appreciated as being in more than a passing way.

That connection made, one can envision a scenario by which Q would meet with one of his lawyers, or his lawyer of the moment, the aforementioned W, who would be dispatched to meet with X, to exercise restraint in conversation, caution in establishing mutual clarity, and care in assuring that all that needs be settled be settled, all without mentioning either Mr T or the spectral Y, altho for reasons pivotal to the scheme would not just mention but indeed invoke openly the name of Q, and by his office as well.

Moreover, while it may be conceivable that whatever W had been told by Q, & possibly other things by R, together with whatever he would have to realize was so as surely as 2 plus 2 equals 4, might suffice arguably to place W within the inner circle of those completely ‘in the know’, an outside objective observer might have to grant room for doubt in that regard, even just a little, but nonetheless enough, by virtue of or owing to the client-attorney relationship existing between Q & W.

Put crassly, the heat wouldn’t be able to simply pick up W & sweat him on what he’s been talking about with Q.

Finally however, if either W or X were to be so crass as to choose to raise the entire scheme in their meeting, the blatant criminality of the scheme as discussed would suffice to wipe out the previous efforts at discretion, including the insulating qualities of the client-attorney relationship between Q & X.