Posted: Friday, 18 September 2009 10:59AM
Will Corruption Probe Falter?
Steve Corbett Reporting
Friday, September 18, 2009
With the splendor of the Capitol rotunda all around me, I stood on the polished marble steps of the spacious building and made a prediction about the ongoing federal corruption probe in Northeastern Pennsylvania that will one day soon start sending criminals to prison.
“This investigation will continue without interruption for five years,” I told a reporter. “Thirty people will eventually go to prison.”
Since then, I’ve decided that 35 people will eventually go to jail. Maybe more will show up ready to check into a cell. Maybe the investigation will continue for a decade.
Or maybe the investigation will stop.
The next full-time prosecutor for the Middle District will make that decision. And the next full-time federal prosecutor will be a Democrat. So far, everybody caught up in the web of corruption is a Democrat.
Meanwhile we wait for an appointment from the White House.
U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr. has made his selection from the applicants and passed along his choice to President Barack Obama. The announcement could happen any day. When it does, Democrats far and wide will gush over the selection.
Even if the new prosecutor is of retirement age rather than an active, seasoned gangbuster of a prosecutor, Democrats will tell us that we’re in great hands. The new man – and he will be a man – will be called a no-nonsense crime fighter.
If that happens, the real crime fighters will know that we’ve taken one big step backwards rather than a few more strides toward a better tomorrow. The real crime fighters will know that he was chosen because he’s paid his political dues rather than his street dues in the grisly, time-consuming world of fighting political corruption.
Casey will likely disappoint us.
Casey is a political follower who does what he’s told. I hope I’m wrong but if the person Casey appoints has ties to Casey or his family, we have already lost something sacred. We will have sacrificed true public service for more political expediency.
Instead of helping his constituents, Casey will have hurt the people he is paid to serve.
The senator won’t understand what he has done and few people will tell him. Those who do should expect nothing but scorn in return – maybe even retribution.
Political expediency is how this whole Northeastern Pennsylvania political corruption mess started in the first place.
As much as ever, politics, power and money drive the selection process. Don’t ever believe that justice is above politics. Even when it works, justice is all politics.
As long as Casey and other elected officials choose who heads up these powerful law enforcement offices, politics will drive the process. There’s no way around it. Casey should spend more time looking onto what political corruption has done to our community. Casey should publicly address the damaging impact of political corruption on our state.
But he won’t do that.
Casey doesn’t want to upset the people who will help him remain in office.
On Thursday I stood in the Capitol rotunda talking with another old friend who has worked in state government public service for 32 years.
“Who’d ever think that you and I would be standing here talking while former state Sen. Vince Fumo is serving time in a federal prison in Kentucky?” I asked.
Fumo was the ultimate powerbroker. Fumo was the ultimate state crook. Fumo was a bully and a thief and a well-respected man among the highest levels of Democrats. But Fumo got the job done. Fumo negotiated. Fumo called in favors. Fumo threatened.
What Fumo did was corrupt and highly criminal. But nobody in his political party stopped him. Instead, the helped him. Decades passed while he wielded brutal power.
And, in the process, he hurt more people than he helped.
But to this day countless powerful Democratic lawmakers and lawbreakers alike will argue that we need more, not fewer, Fumos working the halls of power.
Sadly, those same political hustlers they will likely call the shots for the future.
Let’s hope Casey has the courage to appoint somebody to the prosecutor’s job with no ties to him or his family, someone who is indeed a true crime fighter who understands how purity and passion that must reign in the fight against those who pillage the public trust.
Let’s hope and pray for the best to happen. Then let’s prepare for the worst.
In Pennsylvania politics, we rarely get what we wish for or what we deserve.
We remain the Commonwealth of Corruption.
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Corbett
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