Embattled Ohio Governor Bob Taft just was found guilty of several ethics violations and was forced to pay $4000 in fines.
While I could use this as a jumping off point for my usual tirades against corruption and power-madness in the GOP, I won't. Why? Because aside from the lapse itself, I think Gov. Taft handled this exactly as a good statesman should. He plead "no contest" to the charges and immediately apologized. Furthermore, Governor Taft has fired several folks over corruption charges--though how much of it he himself was linked to, I'm not sure.
I wouldn't be so quick to give the Governor a free pass except the violations in question were extremely minor--a few unreported golf trips. If the Governor is implicated in the Coin Pension Fund scandal though (which he might), then you won't see me quite so conciliatory.
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I know I play the role of the token conservative here, but I don't particularly like Taft, so I'll point out a little secret that's only been in the national media for the last few months.
Golfgate is small change compared to the other problems Taft is facing. There's no direct link between him and coingate, the illigetimate (and possibly illegal) use of nearly $50 million for... well, we don't know yet, but it involves the Worker's Comp Bureau spending a lot of money on coin speculation, and not getting $10 million back. The money DIDN'T go to any political party, thank god, but it still is damn nasty and it looks like Taft may have attempted to assist covering it up or at least ignored it.
Best case, he ignored news that people in his government were participating in a risky business venture and not doing well at it. Worst case, he may have gotten kickbacks from a very pathetic money laundering scheme.
Either way, he needs to get out, and he certainly doesn't deserve any congratulations for biting the .22 when there's a .45 waiting for him around the corner.
Sorry, I know you mentioned it, but given how easy it can be to miss stories, I felt like this deserved a bit more attention than it got as a tagline.
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