Talk:Cunningham Scandal

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These articles need a lot of work, a lot fewer quotes, better organization. The Cunningham story is less complicated than the Abramoff one. We need to work on listing the boats and bribes etc. better. --User At Work 16:35, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

A few responses:
  • I think an inhibitor to all this is that the scandal does not revolve around Cunningham, but rather Wade and Wilkes. E.g., the one that pled guitly also addmitted to giving illegal contributions to Katherine Harris and Virgil Goode, but neither of these two Congresspeople were related to Cunningham.
  • The scandal also reaches into the Defense Dept, and probably the CIA
  • WSJ and San Diego Tribune [1] are reporting that investigators are looking into prostitution favors that Wilkes provided, and suggested that up to 6 congressman might get swept up in it.
And on top of all that, Wikes (or Wade) used Ed Bukham's lobbying firm -- making him only one step removed from DeLay, Abramoff, etc.!
My summary: because of all this, I think the scanel _is_ complicated; and, further, that calling it the Cunningham scandal is probably not accurate -- although I can't think of a better name for it right now.
My summary-II -- You are certainly correct in that these articles need a lot of work! -- Sholom
Response to the response -- people in general call this the Cunningham scandal. He's the highest profile individual associated with the scandal and is the poster boy for the bribetaking, with the yachts and houses and furniture and (evidently) prostitutes, with the explicit bribe list, etc. There are over 28,000 hits for "Cunningham scandal", and looking at the news hits, it's what the San Diego Union Tribune (which won a Pulitzer for the story) calls it, as does Hotline, The Hill, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post... [2]--User At Work 20:52, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
I agree that this is the name at the moment, but there are parts of the scandal that have no bearing on Cunningham. Katherine Harris was up to some pretty stinky bribe taking from Wade as well. Quite what the scandal is going to be known as next week after the Watergate prostitution angle is elaborated on is anyone's guess. It is quite likely to end up being called Porter-Goss.--Gorgonzilla 00:48, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
Two points:
  • I still think this may need a more correct/better name; and
  • I also think that we don't know a better name yet, we may need to wait until the press settles one one.
I will also point out, that there are a few references to this scandal as "Hookergate". See here, where Ed Rollins thinks a number of Congressman are going to get nailed. Also see here where they even muse what the scandal will be called (with mentions of "Watergate II" and "Hookergate", since some of the activities took place at the Watergate). And apparently Joe Scarborough also used that "Hookergate" term [3]. I actually don't like that term (yet), because it takes away from the real scandal -- curruption involving national defense, and $millions wasted. -- Sholom 13:54, 4 May 2006 (UTC)