COBURN MUST RESIGN!

[FOTD]

Coburn secretly arranged extortion money and tried to hide behind being a doctor and a deacon.

He should be impeached.

[Conan71]

Find the Reader's Digest version, please!  11 minutes of Maddow???  Puh lease!

[FOTD]

Find the Reader's Digest version, please!  11 minutes of Maddow???  Puh lease!

Looks to me as though by negotiating money to cover up black mail, Tom Coburn became party to a crime.

[Conan71]

Looks to me as though by negotiating money to cover up black mail, Tom Coburn became party to a crime.

So far, only source is "NYT".  Who was NYT's source?

[FOTD]

So far, only source is "NYT".  Who was NYT's source?

Why Tom "chicken Sh#t" Coburn....this is his way of cya.....the NYT will have more to come. Bank it...it will not help Coburn. He should have gone to the constitution for which he is sworn to.

[cannon_fodder]

Will someone post a not crazy Cliff's Notes version of what's going on?

[Conan71]

I read the article, same smile that's been floating since, what July?  Hampton's attorney supposedly approached Coburn about $8.5 mm to help the Hamptons move from Nevada and, uh, be whole again.

Coburn supposedly scoffed at it and later took and offer to Ensign of around $2mm of which, Ensign supposedly laughed at.

Nothing new to see here, just the times trying to stir the bucket of smile.  There's some very cloudy stuff Ensign got into with the lobbying business he got Hampton into which may be totally illegal and unethical, but there doesn't appear to be too much traction with Coburn's actions.  Sorry FOTD.  Leave this stuff to the pros, not angry agnostic lesbians posing as journalists.

[FOTD]

I read the article, same smile that's been floating since, what July?  Hampton's attorney supposedly approached Coburn about $8.5 mm to help the Hamptons move from Nevada and, uh, be whole again.

Coburn supposedly scoffed at it and later took and offer to Ensign of around $2mm of which, Ensign supposedly laughed at.

Nothing new to see here, just the times trying to stir the bucket of smile.  There's some very cloudy stuff Ensign got into with the lobbying business he got Hampton into which may be totally illegal and unethical, but there doesn't appear to be too much traction with Coburn's actions.  Sorry FOTD.  Leave this stuff to the pros, not angry agnostic lesbians posing as journalists.

" While the affair made national news in June, the role that Mr. Ensign played in assisting Mr. Hampton and helping his clients has not been previously disclosed. Several experts say those activities may have violated an ethics law that bars senior aides from lobbying the Senate for a year after leaving their posts.

In acknowledging the affair, Mr. Ensign cast it as a personal transgression, not a professional one. But an examination of his conduct shows that in trying to clean up the mess from the illicit relationship and distance himself from the Hamptons, he entangled political supporters, staff members and Senate colleagues, some of whom say they now feel he betrayed them.

For example, a longtime fund-raiser who came through with help says Mr. Ensign misled him about why Mr. Hampton needed a new job. The senator also put his chief of staff at the time, who had raised concerns that Mr. Hampton's activities could be problematic, in charge of dealing with him.

And Mr. Ensign allowed Senator Tom Coburn, a friend and fellow conservative Christian, to serve as an intermediary with the Hamptons in May in discussing a large financial settlement, to help them rebuild their lives.

"John got trapped doing something really stupid and then made a lot of other mistakes afterward," Mr. Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, said in an interview. "Judgment gets impaired by arrogance, and that's what's going on here."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/us/politics/02ensign.html?_r=2&hp

Sorry but FOTD smells a rat in this unethical pile of incestuous mayhem. Tom Coburn was mediating a pay off. "To help them rebuild their lives" ? What? Define that and put a number to it.

[Conan71]

Attorneys broker deals for money every day, FOTD.  Senators and Representatives broker deals for money all the time between lobbyists, contributors, and special interests.  One family deciding to pay another family for a transgression at their hands is not illegal.  Using a friend or colleague to act as an intermediary because the two families can no longer stand to talk to each other because one man was schtoinking the other man's wife isn't illegal either.  Granted, intermediaries in those situations aren't usually U.S. Senators.

By your theory, should the Hampton's attorney be implicated as well for trying to extort money from Ensign? 

I understand your hatred for Sen. Coburn runs deep.  Unfortunately for you, I don't see this deal, even if he did act as an intermediary, getting him impeached from office.  Could it become a campaign issue which turns voters against him in 2010, quite possibly.  You can act on your hatred for him at that time and vote to fire him if he walks away from this mess unscathed.

I think you are yelling "FIRE" where there is none.  Might be against his supposed religious ethics, sure, but I have not read anything yet that would appear he broke any laws unless he advised Ensign to pay the Hamptons out of campaign funds or some other source of funding which would be illegal.

And, while we are on the topic, since when did we REALLY expect any politician to be morally or ethically correct?  I mean really???  Politics, ethics, and morals don't even belong in the same sentence, maybe in a fairy tale.

[okiebybirth]

I really can't see how anyone could excuse Coburn's actions in negotiating a bribe.  We may not be surprised about the lack of ethics in politics, but we shouldn't forgive these transgressions either. 

http://www.newsok.com/tom-coburn-confirms-he-was-go-between/article/3405905

[Oil Capital]

I really can't see how anyone could excuse Coburn's actions in negotiating a bribe.  We may not be surprised about the lack of ethics in politics, but we shouldn't forgive these transgressions either. 

http://www.newsok.com/tom-coburn-confirms-he-was-go-between/article/3405905

I think you're using a couple of terms that are not necessarily warranted:  (1) "negotiate".  The information we have is merely that Coburn passed along one settlement offer.  (2)  "bribe".   An offer to settle a civil claim is not the same as a bribe.     If there is really bribery or extortion going on here, then Hampton's attorney should indeed be implicated (charged, disbarred...) as well, as Conan71 suggested.

[okiebybirth]

I think you're using a couple of terms that are not necessarily warranted:  (1) "negotiate".  The information we have is merely that Coburn passed along one settlement offer.  (2)  "bribe".   An offer to settle a civil claim is not the same as a bribe.     If there is really bribery or extortion going on here, then Hampton's attorney should indeed be implicated (charged, disbarred...) as well, as Conan71 suggested.

What kind of business would Coburn have talking to the lawyer of the mistress of Ensign?  A court of law may require proof beyond a reasonable doubt, but outside of court I think we can use the sniff test and know this stinks to high heaven.

And who cares about Hampton's attorney being implicated as well?  Maybe he should, but he also isn't representing the state of Oklahoma. 

And Conan, what's up with the "agnostic lesbian" comment?  Why throw out the homophobia because you are uncomfortable with the discussion?  I doubt her sexual orientation has anything to do with the story and you going there with that comment shows that you think calling her such is a terrible put down.  In actuality, it says a lot more about you. 

[jamesrage]

It looks like the liberal loons are getting desperate.

[Hoss]

It looks like the liberal loons are getting desperate.

Wow, that's rich.

How about 'birthers'?  That's the pinnacle of desparation right there.

[cannon_fodder]

So to be clear:

Asshat 1 has an affair with Slut 2 (who was some kind of staffer and the wife of an employee).

Slut 2 (and her husband) threatens to make things ugly unless the affair unless $$$ is paid.

Asshat 1 asks Coburn to make an offer to make the thing go away.
- - -

Poor judgment for sure.  Probably against his "Christian" values.  But I don't think it is a crime and I don't see an impeachable offense.  Definitely a potential "vote against" offense, but calling for impeachment is silly.