Editorials

A load of utter nonsense came clattering into the inbox Thursday. Behold a press release with a nifty header worthy of a bad after-school special: “Artur Davis and His Carnival of Conspiracy,” authored by state Rep. Mike Hubbard, R-Auburn.

Documents

Read Mike Hubbard's Letter

“Carnival” tells a distorted story of U.S. Rep. Davis’ efforts on the House Judiciary Committee to discover if the prosecution of former Gov. Don Siegelman was politically motivated.

Let’s get this straight. The issue is bigger than Siegelman’s guilt or innocence; it’s about the potential stain of politics on the U.S. legal system.

Yet to hear state Republican Party Chairman Hubbard tell it, you would think Davis was using a phony conspiracy to pump up his political profile. The press release paints the Birmingham Democrat as a partisan, saying Davis is pandering to that horrible bunch of heathens, the liberal left.

Along the way, Hubbard manages the character assassination of a former Republican operative, Dana Jill Simpson, a north Alabama attorney who has signed a sworn affidavit suggesting Siegelman’s prosecution could have been politically motivated. In one particularly stunning passage, Hubbard compares Simpson’s version of events to the plot of a John Grisham novel.

What’s at play is nothing more than a clunky attempt by the state GOP to push back at a potentially big problem.

The Justice Department under the Bush administration has been a disaster and the evidence that high- and low-profile Democrats were targeted for political purposes is growing. The more you poke around, the more disturbing stories you unearth.

Surprising to Hubbard, no doubt, is the fact that the partisan drift of the Justice Department is as disturbing to many Republicans as it is to Democrats.

Former U.S. Attorney General Richard Thornburg, a Republican who served under President Reagan and the first President Bush, is upset. He lit into the U.S. attorney in Pittsburgh and the Justice Department for what he called the politically-motivated prosecution of one of his clients, an outspoken Democratic coroner in Pennsylvania.

Similar cases in Mississippi and Wisconsin are also being looked at, and are certainly worthy of deeper investigation.

If critics such as Hubbard had their way, we wouldn’t even be talking about any of this. Of course, when Congress was under GOP control, we didn’t.

Some Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee think this entire exercise is a waste of time. Gov. Bob Riley thinks so too. He’s recently taken to attacking Davis, saying he’s disappointed in the man. The governor claims Davis is accusing him of being involved in the effort to bring Siegelman down.

Then, there’s the federal prosecutor over the Siegelman case in Montgomery, Louis Franklin. As to Davis’ attempts to look into the Siegelman matter, Franklin told the Birmingham News that, “it was just Artur Davis, classic political grandstanding.”

For his part, Davis continues to insist that he has a good relationship with the governor and respects the U.S. attorneys in Montgomery, including Franklin.

For Artur Davis, this is obviously about more than increasing his political profile and playing to his base. It is about determining whether or not the Justice Department undertook politically-motivated prosecutions.

Davis, unlike the author of the “Carnival of Conspiracy,” Louis Franklin and others, seems less interested in politics and more interested in maintaining the integrity of one of the nation’s most important institutions.

Artur Davis and His Carnival of Conspiracy

By Rep. Mike Hubbard

It is not often that the Chairman of one political party has praise for a member of another party, but, at one point, I actually thought highly of Congressman Artur Davis. He seemed to be one who was willing to reach across partisan lines and depart from the extreme liberal views of the Democrat Party when reason and common sense told him to do so.

My opinion recently changed 180 degrees when, in a remarkable turn of events, Davis became the top defender and advocate of former Alabama governor and convicted felon Don Siegelman.

It was only a few months ago that Congressman Davis dismissed the ridiculous and unfounded accusations that Don Siegelman's conviction by jury was the result of a politically-motivated prosecution rather than the greed, graft and corruption that ran rampant in his administration.

But in a congressional hearing held this week, he showed his true colors — that of a partisan who will say anything and do anything to gain the attention of the media and the liberal left. He showed that he is willing to sell his soul for political gain.

Much of Davis' supposed argument for Siegelman's innocence centers around the affidavit of a shadowy attorney with ties to some of the Riley administration's biggest political enemies. In her filing, attorney Dana Jill Simpson claims knowledge of a conspiracy to falsely prosecute Siegelman that sounds more like the plot of a John Grisham novel than anything that could happen in the real world.

According to her story, the Ku Klux Klan, the White House, Karl Rove, one of Richard Scrushy's defense attorneys and a host of other characters arranged an elaborate plan to unjustly place Siegelman behind bars. When questioned by attorneys with the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, however, Simpson's story fell to pieces, and she has since refused to talk with the press or anyone else about her concocted tale.

Some members of the House Judiciary Committee have even suggested that her affidavit be investigated for possible perjury charges. Similarly, newspapers across the state have looked into her claims and proven time and time again that her facts simply do not add up.

When the facts are objectively reviewed, it is obvious that the only person to blame for Don Siegelman currently residing in Oakdale, Louisiana as federal inmate #24775-007 is Don Siegelman. Yet the conspiracy theorists and the liberal left, including Artur Davis, continue to spin tales to the contrary.

I honestly believe Congressman Davis knows as well as anyone that Siegelman was convicted by an unbiased jury because he corrupted government and committed crimes while serving as governor.

Unfortunately, Artur Davis' personal political ambitions will not allow him to publicly admit the truth.

Rep. Mike Hubbard (R-Auburn) is the Chairman of the Alabama Republic Party and also serves in the Legislature as the House Minority Caucus Leader.