Another Abramoff casualty
Posted: Tuesday, March 10, 2009 1:08 PM by Domenico Montanaro
Filed Under:
Congress, Republicans, Pete Williams
From NBC’s Pete Williams
The Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal has claimed another casualty.
Today, it's
Ann Copland, a former legislative aide and executive assistant for nearly 30 years to Sen.
Thad Chochran, a Mississippi Republican.
She admitted today that from 2002 through 2004, she illegally accepted favors from Abramoff and two of his lobbying colleagues, which they gave her in hopes of getting her to help them get favorable treatment for an Indian tribe they represented.
Prosecutors say Abramoff and his colleagues gave her thousands of dollars worth of concert tickets as well as meals and drinks at Washington restaurants and bars. And they say she wasn't shy about making requests. For example, they say she sent this e-mail request in March 2002:
McCartney: 2 or 4
Ice: 2, 3, 4 or 5
And, any of the following:
Floor tickets for the Circus any day except Saturday, March 23 at 7:30. - 2, 4 or 6 tickets I'm only interested in the floor for that event, if available.
NSYNC - anything from 3 to 6 tickets
Hockey: Saturday, March 30: 5 to 7 tickets - any floor.
Greenday: 3 to 6 tickets.
Subsequent e-emails show Abramoff telling one of his lobbyists, "She'll get everything she wants."
GITMO inmates call 9/11 ‘badges of honor’
A six-page court document unsealed today, said to be signed by the five men at Guantanamo Bay charged with planning the 9/11 attacks, says the charges "are not accusations. To us they are badges of honor, which we carry with pride."
The document is written in English on a word processor, and though it says it is signed by the five -- including 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed -- it bears no signatures. It says the five men declare themselves, "The 9/11 Shura Council," using an Arabic term for an assembly.
They credit themselves with formulating "military attack plans before the blessed 11 September operation."
Most of the document is a familiar diatribe, similar to the post-9/11 messages from Osama bin Laden. They say they were motivated to attack the U.S. by such American policies as "support to the terrorist state of Israel."
Americans, they say, are "first class war criminals." "You have no values and ethics and no principles. You are a nation without a religion."
As for Islam, they describe it as "a religion of fear and terror to the enemies of God: the Jews, Christians, and pagans. With God's willing, we are terrorists to the bone."
It's unclear what legal significance this may have. It is not a formal plea, nor is it a motion asking the military court handling their case to do anything.
They style it simply as their response to the government's charges.
The military commission put their cases on a four-month hold at the request of the Obama administration, which is now considering how to put these five men, and others at Guantanamo Bay, on trial once the facility there is shut down.
