"Corrupt-icut's" Governor Rowland Won't Quit

California Yankee's adopted state, Connecticut, is getting a little more national press than residents would like.

In today's issue, the Christian Science Montor reports:

Connecticut - founded as the refuge for the true Puritan believers - is now jokingly known as Corrupt-icut.

Some joke!

State legislators are now considering whether Governor Rowland should be impeached.

Rick Hampson, in Monday's USA Today wrote:

A month ago, John Rowland was on his way to becoming the first Connecticut governor to serve three full four-year terms. This week, he's on his way to becoming the first one to be impeached.

The Republican is under investigation for accepting gifts, and under public condemnation for lying about it. Suddenly, the most successful politician in state history has become the most disgraced.

The scandal centers on Rowland's lakeside cottage, which was outfitted with a hot tub and heating system at no cost to him by politically appointed state employees, friends and a state contractor.

[. . .]

Rowland was the wunderkind of Connecticut politics: 23 when first elected to Legislature; 27 when elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, where he was the youngest member; 37 when elected governor, the first Republican to hold the office in three decades.

He won re-election by wide margins in 1998 and 2002. He was chairman of the Republican Governors Association and appeared frequently on national television when Connecticut was touched by the 2001 anthrax scare.

Rowland fit the mold for a successful GOP governor in a mostly Democratic Northeastern state: socially progressive, fiscally conservative, personally appealing.

Yesterday's issue of the New Tork Times also focused on Rowland's troubles. Times reporter Marc Santora reported:

The governor's legal situation has also grown more precarious. Mr. Rowland is the first sitting governor in Connecticut to be served with a subpoena for personal records, as part of a vast federal corruption investigation.

[. . .]

Mr. Rowland's administration has been wrapped up in corruption investigations since 1999, when Paul J. Silvester, a former state treasurer who was appointed by Mr. Rowland, pleaded guilty to racketeering and money-laundering charges. But nothing implicated Mr. Rowland's office directly until last year, when his former deputy chief of staff, Lawrence E. Alibozek, pleaded guilty to accepting cash and gold bribes for steering state contracts.

Support for Rowland remained solid despite Silvester's and Alibozek's trading their moral convictions for criminal convictions. It wasn't until Rowland failed to tell the truth at a press conference last December that his support stared to fade. During that press conference Rowland "insisted that he had not taken gifts or had free work on his private cottage done by many of the same people now at the center of the federal corruption investigation."

According to the Times:

On a yellow legal pad, Mr. Rowland divided a page in half and labeled one side "truth" and the other "fiction," according to an aide who saw the list. At the time, even the most minor details about what had been done at the cottage were being reported, so the list was equally detailed.

For instance, in the fiction column, Mr. Rowland listed news reports about "handmade" cabinets. In the truth category, he wrote that they were from Home Depot, the aide said.

However, that was among the first details to be questioned after the news conference. The cabinetmaker told reporters the same day that his work was most definitely not from Home Depot. Mr. Rowland was also questioned about his hot tub, which he said he bought at a store in Torrington. That response also proved false; it was a gift from an aide.

Ten days later, Mr. Rowland admitted that he had lied, and his office provided details of who had worked on or helped outfit the cottage. The list of those involved was startling because so many of the people were involved in the federal corruption investigation, law enforcement officials said.

Last week, in a six minute televised statement that was seen by a third, of Connecticut's residents, Rowland apologized and asked for a another chance:

I was wrong when I accepted gifts given to me by state employees and from friends who do business with the state. For this I accept full responsibility.

But worse, I was wrong in failing to truthfully address these issues. I lied and there are no excuses.

[. . .]

And to know that I have disappointed my family and my children means that I have disappointed yours as well.

One of the first lessons we teach our children as parents is to never tell a lie. In all of this, nothing weighs heavier on my heart than my failure to speak truthfully about these issues.

I should know better and I do know better.

But I want you all to know that I have never - not once - provided any favors or taken any actions in exchange for gifts I have been given.

[. . .]

What I do ask for is the chance to allow a fair and full federal investigation to progress and reach a conclusion.

And the chance in the meantime to continue to work hard at my job and on the critical issues facing the state.

Rowland's televised plea for forgiveness did not help. Leaders of his own party are calling for Roland to resign. According to the Associated Press, eleven of the state's 15 Republican senators have called for the governor's resignation. The AP aricle also reports on a new poll:

The University of Connecticut poll found 63 percent of state residents think Rowland should resign for taking gifts for his summer house from subordinates and a contractor and lying about it. A similar poll taken last week put the number at 58 percent.

The new poll finds 56 percent of residents support an impeachment, compared with 50 percent last week.

Connecticut TV channel, NBC 30, reports that Republican Congressmen Christopher Shays and Rob Simmons have also called for Rowland to resign. Finally in today's Connecticut Post there this editorial entitled, "Rowland has lost state's faith, trust and must resign."

Governor Rowland won't quit. The Hartford Courant reports, "Rowland has pointedly suggested to state legislators that 'impeaching him could turn ugly for them, too, by shining a light on any of their own irregularities and improprieties.'"

There are a number of reasons why Rowland won't quit. Financially he is now better off remaining as governor. If he had become a private citizen two months ago, Rowland would have been able to earn hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. Now his gubernatorial salary looks good.

There are legal considerations as well. Staying in office in office would provide greater bargaining power should the federal investigation mentioned earlier results in charges.

Then there is Rowland's belief that he didn't do anything bad enough to warrant political capital punishment. He has a point there. It seems a former president has established that you shouldn't be impeached for lying.

I am ashamed of Rowland's lies and poor judgement, but I must admit I am impressed by his tenacity.

Comments

[Whistleblower]

I am a RN who blew the whistle on a Connecticut Agency: Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services in 2003 for illegal use of restraints and wasting tax payer dollars and union employees sleeping on the job. The Hartford Courant reported last week that illegal use of restraints has NOT stopped and evidence shows the Department of Children's Services AND Dept of Mental Health & Addiction Services harming CHILDREN with illegal restraints.

Corruption in Corrupticut continues to flurish.

The State of CT has retaliated against me for whistleblowing to this day.

Please come to CT and do an expose of whistleblowers affecting EVERY Agency; State Police Dept; Criminal Justice; Family Court.

We have to go OUT of state to get JUSTICE.

860-633-3957 Deborah

[Frank Butash]

Congratulations,

This is a cool-headed site that faces the issues without the inbred Democratic Party Mendacity and mentally-defective Liberal mouthings.

FB
860-232-7173