Filed under: News, Politics, Race and Civil Rights
Plenty of people with power and influence would like to get on the good side of a Supreme Court justice, but they can't exactly run up the steps of the court and slip a few bucks in to the justice's robes during oral arguments.
So what's the next best thing? Maybe it's slipping cash to the wife or husband of the justice.
That, in effect, is what's going on with Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife, Virginia, who heads a conservative non-profit organization, Liberty Central. Mrs. Thomas said in a recently televised interview that Liberty Central will become bigger than the Tea Party as a mouthpiece for right-wing thinkers.
It's fine for Mrs. Thomas to give voice to her conservative leanings, but the problem is that Liberty Central is accepting large donations, and since the group is a 501 (c) (4), she does not have to tell the public who is donating.
In 2009, she received two $500,000 gifts to the group, and the public doesn't have the right to know who is supplying the cash for the money train that Virgina Thomas is driving?
Is anyone following any rules here?
Legal people know that you don't need to have a iron-clad example of a misdeed to cause a legal problem. The mere "appearance of a conflict" is all that it takes for most lawmakers to back away from an underhanded scheme.
The fact that the wife of a Supreme Court justice can accept huge donations and not tell who is giving goes way beyond the appearance of a conflict.
Let's be honest. She might be a longtime conservative activist and all but no one would give Virginia Thomas the time of day, much less half-a-million-dollar donations, if she weren't married to one of the most powerful lawmakers in the country.
But the sleazy Virginia Thomas deal should come as no surprise to anyone who watches how business gets done in the nation's capitol.
The city of Washington is built on the principal of buying access and influence among lawmakers. That is why K Street and the entire lobbying industry runs our government.
It's a sad truth that both the Democratic and Republican parties have corrupted our political system by surviving on the rivers of cash generated by donors, fundraisers, advertisers and lobbyists.
But even in this ethically and morally polluted political environment, the Clarence and Virginia Thomas money deal smells particularly rotten.