Illinois or Louisiana: Which Is More Corrupt? | Newsweek Newsweek Voices - Jacob Weisberg

The corruption in Illinois have never been mingy. And no matter what the statistics say, Illinois is the most corrupt state in the nation. It is just that the tricks of corruptions have been changing into legal schemes, like a contractor gets a public contract from a politician, but instead of giving him cash as a a bribe it does remodeling and renovation work in the politicians house for free, plus give him a legal political contribution. Or a politician buys a fixer upper, a friendly contractor rebuilds it, and then the same contractor buys from the politician by paying triple the price. And savvy lawyers create paperwork that makes all transactions apparently legal.

The laws in Illinois have so many loopholes that there is no need anymore to stuff envelopes with cash. Contractors make small political contributions to avoid headline making big sums, but money goes to the politicians through different routes. Blagojevich's children have received big checks as presents, his wife sold unlisted properties as an allegedly exclusive real estate agent, and other money went to Antoin Rezco and others before ending up in his coffer. And, as I mentioned earlier, most of those transactions are crafted within the legal perimeters. And the FBI knows about those shady deals, but it cannot do anything about. That is why it hits the crook politicians with laws made for the Mafia, such as "Conspiracy, Racketeering, Wire Fraud, Tax Evasion, etc. States do not have such laws, because state politicians won't pass laws that will send them to prison.

Illinois may be No. 18 in the U.S. corruption scale, but that is because only about 3-5% of the corrupt deals are caught by the Feds which can be prosecuted under the federal statutes. If the U.S. Department of Justice assign 200 more FBI agents in its Chicago headquarters, Illinois will surpass all the other states, and take the No. 1 place in the official U.S. corruption scale in less than 2 years. Nikos Retsos, retired professor, Illinois

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Posted By: iowacb @ 12/15/2008 9:42:58 AM

Thank god things have not changed in Illinois . You just got to love the DALEY MACHINE at least. EVERYONE KNOWS ABOUT IT and it will now move to DC to gain even more ground.

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Posted By: Zombiehero @ 12/14/2008 8:26:42 AM

Mr Weisburg forgot to mention that all the Gov from LA except for 3 since 1900 have been.....Democrats!!!

At least Ill is bi partisan when it come to the corruption of its Govs.

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Posted By: jimbo3800 @ 12/13/2008 6:03:48 PM

And they are both Democrat strongholds; hmmm, no surprise there....
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  Posted By: 40YearR @ 12/14/2008 1:31:57 AM
  
  Drago replaced a corrupt R governor.

Posted By: Retsos Nikos @ 12/13/2008 6:25:18 PM
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The corruption in Illinois have never been mingy. And no matter what the statistics say, Illinois is the most corrupt state in the nation. It is just that the tricks of corruptions have been changing into legal schemes, like a contractor gets a public contract from a politician, but instead of giving him cash as a a bribe it does remodeling and renovation work in the politicians house for free, plus give him a legal political contribution. Or a politician buys a fixer upper, a friendly contractor rebuilds it, and then the same contractor buys from the politician by paying triple the price. And savvy lawyers create paperwork that makes all transactions apparently legal.

The laws in Illinois have so many loopholes that there is no need anymore to stuff envelopes with cash. Contractors make small political contributions to avoid headline making big sums, but money goes to the politicians through different routes. Blagojevich's children have received big checks as presents, his wife sold unlisted properties as an allegedly exclusive real estate agent, and other money went to Antoin Rezco and others before ending up in his coffer. And, as I mentioned earlier, most of those transactions are crafted within the legal perimeters. And the FBI knows about those shady deals, but it cannot do anything about. That is why it hits the crook politicians with laws made for the Mafia, such as "Conspiracy, Racketeering, Wire Fraud, Tax Evasion, etc. States do not have such laws, because state politicians won't pass laws that will send them to prison.

Illinois may be No. 18 in the U.S. corruption scale, but that is because only about 3-5% of the corrupt deals are caught by the Feds which can be prosecuted under the federal statutes. If the U.S. Department of Justice assign 200 more FBI agents in its Chicago headquarters, Illinois will surpass all the other states, and take the No. 1 place in the official U.S. corruption scale in less than 2 years. Nikos Retsos, retired professor, Illinois