MADISON, Wis. — A former Democratic Wisconsin Senate leader was sentenced to nine months in jail Thursday for felony misconduct in office and illegally funneling campaign contributions.
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Former Senate Majority Leader Chuck Chvala had reached a plea deal with prosecutors earlier this year, admitting to charges that he directed a state employee to run a political campaign and used an independent expenditure group to funnel campaign contributions to a fellow Democrat.
Dane County Circuit Judge David Flanagan said he gave Chvala more than the six months prosecutors had recommended to send a message to other politicians.
Chvala also was ordered to serve two years probation and pay a $5,500 fine. He also scheduled additional proceedings to determine restitution and prohibited Chvala from working as a lobbyist until he finished his sentence.
Chvala, 51, was once one of the most powerful politicians in Wisconsin but now becomes the second lawmaker sentenced to jail time following a probe into allegations legislators were using state employees to run their campaign machines. Three former Republican leaders in the Assembly are scheduled to go to trial in February, the week before Chvala is to report to jail.
"I am profoundly sorry for what has happened," said Chvala, who was first elected to the state Assembly in 1982 and the Senate two years later. He did not seek re-election in 2004.
"Dear Lord, if you can't make me a better man, don't worry about it. I'm having a real good time like I am.".
posted on December 15, 2005 09:29:31 PM new
Three former Republican leaders in the Assembly are scheduled to go to trial in February, the week before Chvala is to report to jail.
posted on December 16, 2005 02:45:53 AM new
Once again clear to see if it's about a democrat...they don't want to hear it. But if it's a republcan....then boy...lets talk about their wrong doing for years....
"Whenever the nation is under attack, from within or without, liberals side with the enemy. This is their essence." --Ann Coulter
And why the American Voters chose to RE-elect President Bush to four more years. YES!!!
posted on December 16, 2005 06:58:35 AM new
I'd be willing to wager that when the totaled the number of demoncratic scandals far out ways the number of Republican scandals.
"Dear Lord, if you can't make me a better man, don't worry about it. I'm having a real good time like I am.".
posted on December 16, 2005 08:05:50 AM new
OH BOY here's a good one ...
""But if it's a republcan....then boy...lets talk about their wrong doing for years....""
Like you and your sick fixation with Clinton ?
HE is no longer the president, the major scandals going on now are CURRENT ruling party in power,...what do you mean "for years" ????
LINDUH , the investigations into the reasons Delay , the CURRENT HOUSE MAJORITY LEADER of the MORAL Republican party was ARRESTED, the investigation is going on NOW.
The investigation into who in the BUSH administration is the TRAITOR who outed a CIA agent in ONGOING ...NOW, the CURRENT "family value, talk to god, ethical" party in power NOW!
And , stupid, they aren't about somebody else's sex life , they are about REAL CRIME, REAL TREASON....NATIONAL SECURITY .
posted on December 16, 2005 01:36:47 PM newI'd be willing to wager that when the totaled the number of demoncratic scandals far out ways the number of Republican scandals.
I have no doubt about that. All anyone has to do is review the clinton administration for it's eight years.
There's barely enough bandwidth to cover it all....indictments/convictions/coverups/
...speaking of which....just read in today's news some VERY interesing things about an investigative report on the clintons that their lawyers have been, so far, successful in keeping from the public eye. I'll see if I can find it and post it here.
Should THAT report be made public....Tony Snow questioned that it might just keep old hillary from being elected in 2008.
Boy...I'm keeping my fingers crossed it is made public before then.
LOL
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Here was Tony's article on townhall.com on the 9th....but there's other articles on it to be found on google.
Publish the Barrett report now
Dec 9, 2005
by Tony Snow
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- "No wonder they call us the Stupid Party," said a disgusted Republican operative in Washington. "You've got to wonder what these guys were thinking."
At issue was the publication of a report by David Barrett, an independent counsel who has spent the better part of a decade looking into some of the most hair-raising allegations of presidential malfeasance in American history.
Like most independent counsels, Barrett didn't set out on such a mission. He was assigned the duty of looking into whether former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros committed tax fraud in trying to cover up payments to a former mistress.
Yet, as published reports have indicated, he soon discovered that he was onto something much bigger. He found unsettling evidence that Justice Department officials were actively interfering with the probe and even conducting surveillance of Barrett and his office.
Worse, there were indications that Team Clinton was using key players at the IRS and Justice to harass, frighten and threaten people who somehow got in the former president's way.
The pattern was set early on, when the White House sicced the FBI on Billy Dale, who had served as the director of the White House Travel Office since the days of John F. Kennedy.
They mounted a baseless probe of Dale's finances, while chasing after his daughter, his sister and others. Dale was guilty of holding a job coveted by presidential pal Harry Thomasson. But rather than simply firing Dale, the Clinton White House chose to destroy him.
By all accounts, the 400-page Barrett report is a bombshell, capable possibly of wiping out Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential prospects. At the very least, it would bring to public attention a scandal that would make the Valerie Plame affair vanish into comical insignificance.
Democrats know this. Using provisions in the independent-counsel statute that permit people named in a report to review the allegations against them and file rebuttals, attorneys close to the Clintons have spent the better part of five years reviewing every jot and tittle of the charges arrayed against their clients and friends.
This careful and continuous monitoring of the report explains why Sens. Byron Dorgan, Dick Durbin and John Kerry took the highly unusual step earlier this year of trying to slip into an Iraq-war spending bill an amendment to suppress every word of the Barrett report.
(Every other independent counsel finding has been printed in its entirety, with the exception of small sections containing classified material.)
Alert Republicans, pushed by talk-radio listeners and bloggers, managed to short-circuit that effort, but Democrats patiently pursued their goal. They got what they wanted recently, when the House and Senate met to iron out differences in yet another appropriations bill. Democrats inserted language that would prevent public release of the 120 pages of the report listing the Clinton transgressions.
They offered what may have looked like a good deal. They promised not to object to letting Barrett continue with any prosecutions already underway.
Republicans negotiators, led by Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., and Rep. Joe Knollenberg, R-Mich, took the bait. They agreed to keep the public in the dark about the important stuff in exchange for a big, fat nothing. Unbeknownst to Bond and Knollenberg, Barrett shut down his grand juries three years ago.
The move represents more than just boneheaded politics. It's grossly irresponsible. If the report contains the kind of bombshells that have been hinted at in reports published by The Wall Street Journal and National Review, among others, the public not only has a right to know, Congress has a duty to investigate.
If Barrett has found evidence that officials at Justice and the IRS served as a praetorian guard, that means some bureaucrats felt it appropriate or beneficial to ignore their duty to the public and instead to perform dirty work for the people who oversee their budgets.
Another big "if": If such behavior were covered up, the malefactors would conclude that they may do the same thing again for other presidents.
Something stinks, and the only way to get at the truth is to release the full report. Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who fought a lonely battle to ensure the document's publication, is furious. So is House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wisc. The question is whether Republican leaders Bill Frist and Denny Hastert will step in and ensure the report's publication, or whether they'll just sigh and look the other way.
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Tony Snow is the host of the 'Tony Snow Show' on Fox News Radio.
posted on December 16, 2005 01:53:07 PM new
""that would make the Valerie Plame affair vanish into comical insignificance.""
So sad to think that jeopardizing national security and human lives, an act of treason from the highest people in THIS administration is comical to you, linda. A typical neocon with no ethics or morals.
