Kathleen Kane at press conference
For the last few months it’s been painfully obvious that someone must appoint a special prosecutor to look into the Pennsylvania court’s long-festering pornographic email chain scandal.
It’s been just as obvious that whoever investigates the court’s dirty laundry can’t be under the thumb of the state courts.
In the last few weeks, the court’s mouthpieces in the media, outlets like the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Legal Intelligencer, floated the humorous suggestion that the state supreme court itself appoint someone to put the court’s own porno email scandal to bed.
They say the high court should appoint someone connected with the court who is above reproach, someone whose integrity is unquestioned, someone above all who’s independent.
Forget for a moment that there is no one in Pennsylvania connected with our courts who’s above reproach, whose integrity is unquestioned, and who’s independent. That’s how we got into this mess, folks.
The real danger to the public was that someone on the high court might actually get around to appointing a special prosecutor, and those emails would quickly disappear down a rat’s hole and never again see the light of day.
Unfortunately for them, the old boys on the court dawdled, fooled around for months, and wasted too much time (which after all was their problem when they were trading the porno emails). Hey, the last thing they wanted to do was appoint a special prosecutor to look into their own porno emails, right?
So this Tuesday, at an unusual news conference in Philadelphia, state Attorney General Kathleen Kane announced her own appointment of a special prosecutor, Douglas Gansler, to investigate the email chain.
Gansler is an out-of-stater, and a former Maryland attorney general.
Special prosecutor Douglas Gansler introduces his team
Making him even more frightening to Pennsylvania’s old boys, Gansler was given full subpoena and grand jury power to investigate the raunchy emails, which number into the hundreds of thousands.
Though Gansler’s appointment likely will have legal, if not constitutional ramifications, Kane’s news conference introducing him at Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center was really about politics, and control.
Who would control the selection the special prosecutor? Who controls the special prosecutor himself? Who controls the agenda, and the narrative? Who controls the office of attorney general? And who controls Kane?
Much to the chagrin of her critics, AG Kane showed herself to be in control of the attorney general’s office, and in control of the agenda. And she showed that no one was in control of her.
Here’s someone who’s been indicted on the ridiculous charge of giving a news story to the Philadelphia Daily News; someone who’s been stripped of her law license before any trial; and someone whom the state senate is threatening to remove from office using provisions from the 19th century meant to cashier lunatics.
To her credit, Kathleen Kane’s still fighting.
Perhaps just as importantly, Kane this week showed herself to be finally reaching out to build political alliances with those who may help her out of her difficulties. Her difficulties, after all, are mostly political in nature.
All along, a certain political constituency has been out to get Kathleen Kane. That constituency, dominated by white Republicans males, certainly doesn’t like Kane, wants to get rid of her, control her, and silence her.
Kane’s press conference Tuesday was an appeal to a different constituency — women, people of color, and good government types.
Tuesday’s press conference began with a slide show featuring a dozen or so of the milder emails sent around by court officials: A woman whose vagina was being violated by an oversized bottle. Two blacks fighting over a bucket of fried chicken. A young boy tweaking the nipple of a woman’s breast. A woman with black eyes and the caption, “Irish sunglasses: Free pair when you forget dinner.”
Krishna Rami of Philadelphia NOW
Rami is involved in a letter writing and petition campaign aimed at encouraging Philadelphia DA Seth Williams to fire three former attorney general’s prosecutors now working in Williams’ office who traded some of the emails.
Rami read a statement denouncing DA Williams for protecting the prosecutors.
“Three public servants, charged with one of the most important jobs in our society, have broken the public’s trust in a shameful way,” she read. “Prosecutors Frank Fina, Marc Costanzo, and Patrick Blessington sent, viewed and disseminated emails that devalued, demeaned and ridiculed women, members of the LGBT community, and people of color. All within the walls of the attorney general’s office. … Philly NOW is pleased that Attorney General Kathleen Kane will appoint a special prosecutor to conduct a broad and thorough investigation into the hateful emails exchanged on government computers.”
With that AG Kane came out and read the riot act. Her message was strident, and feminist.
“The images you just saw depict racism, sexism, violence towards women as acceptable, disturbing images of a child,” Kane said. “What you haven’t seen, although the press has, are videos and photos that demonstrate discrimination against members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual communities, and religious groups. There are thousands of them. They’re not shared by your typical image of a guy in his basement; they are not in a private chat room on the Internet; they are passed along between judges, including the highest court in Pennsylvania; prosecutors; defense attorneys; law enforcement; and their close friends. They’re viewed on state, taxpayer-owned computers, and sent over state servers, government servers, and during work hours.
“They demonstrate a complete lack of respect, tolerance for others, and impartiality for the public they have sworn to protect. This behavior violates the constitution of Pennsylvania, and the United States, to which these men are sworn to protect.
“Just as importantly, their actions potentially invade and destroy a system of justice meant to protect the civil rights of the people of Pennsylvania, not the government actors.
“We’ve reached the point in Pennsylvania where some government leaders have lost their sense of dignity, of duty, and of civility. We’ve stopped progressing as a society. We’ve regressed to the 1950s, and the 1960s.
“The discovery of these emails gives us, the people, a unique opportunity to see the problem, hidden away for many years, address the problem, and progress as a unified commonwealth.
“But progress means change. These are people who are resisting change. Because it means for them a loss of power or perceived superiority. It means they can no longer bully their way to the top, or take care of their allies, while knocking down those who aren’t like them.
“They’ll complain about the appointment of a special independent prosecutor, with nonsense about my authority to appoint a special deputy, as if it is the practice of law.
“I assure you, that as the duly elected attorney general, I can,” Kane went on. “And to the few who challenge it, including some members of my own staff, I pose a simple three-prong question: Are you a white male? Are you or one of your buddies in this email network? Are you trying to get my job without the benefit of having to run for it, and being chosen by the people of Pennsylvania?”
Kane said the role of an independent attorney general was to “consistently fight for and protect the people of Pennsylvania, whether that’s from child predators, drug dealers, or those who steal our fundamental civil rights. Every person has equal rights, to fairness in the judicial system, in the criminal or civil courts, in the workplace, or in our government.
“No African American should walk into a court room where the judge, or prosecutor or defense attorney mocks or ridicules him or her behind a close network because of the color of his skin.
“No woman should go to work and be subjected to consistent treatment of disgusting indignity by women haters because they were born with one less body part, which last I heard does not contain any extra brain cells.
“No citizen of this country may be subjected to discrimination or a lack of impartiality or bias by any judge, or any government official, because of their religion or sexual orientation.
“These are fundamental principles that this country was built upon. The day or the second that we as leaders or citizens stop fighting for them is the day that we all lose. Because an injustice against one, is an injustice against all.”
Make no mistake: this wasn’t your father’s press conference. Unless, of course, your father was one of the old boys trading the porno emails with the Supreme Court justices.
With that, the new special prosecutor in town, Douglas Gansler, former Maryland attorney general, and his team were introduced.
Gansler said he had no baggage, and no dog in this fight. He’d been given subpoena power, and the ability to work with a grand jury, he said.
Should he find employees of the federal government involved in the email chain, he said he would refer the case to the appropriate federal agency to investigate.
So the old boys in the state courts, and their shills in the media, were losing control.
A newspaper reporter expressed shock that Gansler wasn’t licensed to practice law in Pennsylvania.
“That’s the point,” Gansler said.
There seemed to be a noticeable alarm growing among some of the reporters who have all along been defending the pornographers, and attacking Kane.
That could only be a good thing.
