Oct 16, 2009 3:51 pm US/Eastern
DeFede: Crist Anti-Corruption Plan Bad Theater
MIAMI (CBS4) ―
This week Charlie Crist announced that he was petitioning the Florida Supreme Court to empanel a grand jury to investigate corruption throughout the state.
As political theater goes, the governor's press conference was rather pedestrian. There was no flare in the performance. No show-stopping moments. If he really wanted to sell the idea that he was angry about the recent spate of corruption across the Sunshine State, he needed to do something dramatic. Pound his fist on the podium or flip over a table like a New Jersey housewife.
Props would have been good – maybe a chainsaw or a sledgehammer.
Imagine how wonderfully cheesy it would have been if Crist looked directly into the camera and, in his best Dirt Harry voice, said: "And this message is for you crooked politicians out there – you can run for office but you can not hide."
Or perhaps something snappy, like a new catch phrase: "Hasta la vista, bad pols!"
If you are going to put on a show, at least make it entertaining.
Crist's performance on Wednesday was a snooze fest.
Why do I doubt the governor's sincerity and believe his press conference was nothing more than bad dinner theater? Well, let me see. Alan Mendelsohn, one of the governor's biggest fundraisers – a man he appointed to be on his gubernatorial transition team after the election – was just indicted by the feds for influence peddling. And while the governor hasn't been implicated in any wrongdoing, the stink certainly is wafting in his general direction.
So what does he do? He announces that he is shocked – SHOCKED! – at the rampant corruption in the state and calls for a grand jury to look into corruption everywhere.
"Since I have been governor, unfortunately, I have had to remove over 30 people from public office," Crist said at the press conference. "That's almost one a month. And it's obvious to me that something's wrong with the system."
But when he was asked to explain his ties to Mendelsohn during the press conference, the governor refused.
Crist is right. Something is wrong with the system. And if the Governor really cared then he might want to go back and look at another Grand Jury report he was given five months ago.
In May, a Grand Jury in Palm Beach County issued a lengthy and well researched report on public corruption. The findings were not limited to Palm Beach County – where in recent years three county commissioners and two city commissioners have pleaded guilty to public corruption charges. The panel also examined systemic problems throughout the state.
"The Grand Jury find that a serious disconnect exists throughout the State of Florida regarding ethics and governance," the report states. "Not only do State ethics statutes not have a criminal punishment component, the Florida Commission on Ethics is viewed as largely ineffective."
The report goes on to explain: "With regard to the state anti-corruption laws, the Grand Jury learned that many of the statutes utilized to combat corruption in the federal court do not exist in Florida state law."
For instance, state gift and conflict-of-interest statutes are non-criminal. Extortion offences by officers of the state are misdemeanor offenses. And there are no laws which state that it is a crime for an elected official to scheme or conspire to deprive the citizens of the state of Florida "the intangible right of honest services."
"The Grand Jury easily concludes that the current tools available to state prosecutors in cases of public corruption are fundamentally inadequate," the report concluded. "State prosecutors lack both the necessary statutes and the resources to combat public corruption in a manner that the public should expect."
The Grand Jury then went on to list a series of specific recommendations – including specific laws that need to be enacted – that would help state prosecutors root out public corruption.
The recommendations were comprehensive and meaningful and devoid of any political games. The recommendations weren't about trying to make one party look bad at the expense of the other. It was evident the problems were rampant in both parties and that something needed to be done.
The State Attorney in Palm Beach, Michael McAuliffe, forwarded the Grand Jury report and its findings to Crist in May. Other politicians in the state called on the governor to get behind the recommendations and urge the Legislature to act.
But Crist did nothing.
Well, maybe if his good friend and fundraiser, Alan Mendelsohn had been indicted in May, the governor would have been more interested.
If Crist really cared about fighting corruption then he would start by championing the reforms outlined by the Palm Beach County Grand Jury, instead of passing the problem on to another Grand Jury to study for a year.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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