and that was the beginning of the reporting. that initial leak about the dinner we now know was provided by the executive chef from the governor s mansion, who has been hired by governor mcdonnell and the first lady, but who eventually got into a dispute with them over their management of the mansion and the kitchen and their treatment of him as their chef. that dispute eventually devolved into the chef being convicted of two misdemeanor counts of embezzlement last fall. but the chef did not go down without a fight. when things started to go sour between him and the mcdonnells, the chef later explained to washingtonian magazine that he began documenting everything. he took cell phone pictures of anything he thought looked fishy, and he made sure to preserve, specifically, the check for the wedding catering. because the check for the wedding catering did not come from the mcdonnells. even though they were publicly claiming that they were covering the cost of everything at that wedding t
and it s the old susan, i was going to say, we ve covered this, and i ve brought up john roland, because it was a similar thing, but i can t tell you how many jesse jackson jr., personally trying to profit off of i mean, vanity is always at the center of these falls from grace. it s either financial vanity in the case of the mcdonnells or some sort of sexual vanity. in the case of an anthony weiner. and the candidates get in a situation where they re begging rich people for money, and rich people are more than often happy to give them favors, gifts, money. in virginia, it just happens to be legal to give them almost anything yeah, by the way, this would have been illegal in a lot of states. right. virginia is one of few that it s not. ethics laws and this is going to let governor mcauliffe be the great reformer how about that? political reformer because he s never been involved in fund-raising favors ever, right? but financially, he, though, is w
90% want tougher anti-corruption laws. with us at the table is john stanton, the perfect guy to talk about this crazy story that the cycle team has been debating and talking about all day long. it reminds me that politics is a multimillion game. and you can see this directly in congress if you look at the reality of 268 lawmaker that is have an average net worth topping 1 million. that was in the year of 2012. and in campaign for america s future, i think puts it perfectly. this is what they write. wealth is not a qualifier for public service nor should it be, but it should never be a prerequisite for government service. unfortunately today in the crash driven system, it usually is. only the wealthy can afford the time it takes to get elected, only the wealthy can write the checks to get the campaign started and only the wealthy have the connections needed to finance a winning campaign. affable the mcdonnells felt the pressure to live in the glitzy political lifestyle, one they
responsibility for accepting these legal gifts and loans. gifts and loans from johnny williams, sr., a political donor who according to the indictment, took his wife shopping in new york city and later was seated at a political event next to the governor in april 2011. williams also provided a $50,000 loan to the mcdonnells in may 2011 and allowed the governor s family to stay at his vacation estate. his company was able to launch its signature product at an august launch at the governor s mansion, and an e-mail sent by maureen mcdonnell to a senior staffer saying, quote, i need answers and bob is screaming about the thousands i m charging up in credit card debt. we are broke and have an unconscionable credit card debt already and this inauguration is killing us. among the $140,000 gifts are louis vuitton shoes, two gold dresses, two sets of golf clubs and a silver rolex watch engraved with 71st governor of
appropriations committee that had very little money, had like four kids in college, were struggling day in and day out and they controlled millions and millions and millions of dollars. and i sat there going it is amazing that there is as little corruption as there is here when you have some people who are not whining about any of these people. like you said, there are a lot of people that are struggling. listen, nobody did anything i never heard anybody who s done anything like the mcdonnells you are don t need a watch that s a rolex and you don t need oscar de la renta dresses. i don t think the fed should have been involved. this should have been a virginia case because he s the governor of virginia. but, secondly, there s just not that payoff. no traffic jam or anything. there s no quid pro quo here.