Brain Wilson from Faux answered my email

[brettdale]

"basically he sent me a transcript from his show, although he started off the email saying he thinks is report is fair and baalnced"


MY EMAIL

"Over Earle's 27-year tenure, his Public Integrity Unit has prosecuted 15 elected officials, including 12 Democrats."


HIS REPLY

my report from last night -- i think it is fair and balanced

Tom Delay -- the number two republican in the House of representatives -- today indicted by a Travis County, Texas Grand jury under the direction of democratic district attorney Ronnie Earle.

The Indictment alleges that Delay conspired with two political associates in 2002 to violateTexas election laws.

(sound bite Earle) 14:34:19
the indictment describes a scheme whereby corporate money which cannot be given to candidates in Texas, was sent to the Republican Ntl Cmte and where it was exchanged for money raised by individuals and then sent to those TX legislative candidates.

Democrats argue that the contributions resulted in the GOP taking control of the both houses of the Texas State legislature. Once in control ... Texas republicans pushed through their plan to redraw US congressional districts in Texas. That re-districting resulted in republicans picking up 5 seats in the last US congressional election.

DeLay called the indictment baseless -- insisted he was innocent -- and that he would be exonerated. He accused of Earle of conducting a partisan investigation.

(sound bite DeLay)52:51
This act is the product of a coordinated, premeditated campaign of political retribution; the all-too-predictable result of a vengeful investigation led by a partisan fanatic. 53:04\ Mr. Earle is abusing the power of his office to exact personal revenge for the role I played in the Texas Republican legislative campaign in 2002

In Austin, Delay's attorneys -- who called it "a skunky indictment" -- said they would ask that the case be tried in a expedited manner.

(sound Bite Deguerin) 15:42:55
we want a trial right away we want a trial by the end of the year.

Under House GOP rules -- DeLay must step aside as House majority Leader -- Republicans meeting late this afternoon agreed that GOP house whip Roy Blunt would take over for DeLay temporarily.

(sound Blunt) 16:06:51 It's not easy to fill the gap left by our leader, Tom DeLay, who's done a tremendous job. But all of our team has got to come together, like we haven't come together ever before..."

Moments after the announcement came from Texas -- democrats went on the attack. Nancy Pelosi -- the top democrat in the house described Delay's idictment as the ...

(graphic Pelosi)
"... latest example that Republicans in Congress are plagued by a culture of corruption at the expense of the American people."

(stand up wilson)
It is true that DA Ronnie Earle has brought charges against a fair number of democrats in his long career. But Republicans often point to the fact that shortly after Texas Republican Kay Bailey Hutchison was elected to the US senate in 1993 -- Earle got a Travis County grand jury to indict her on a "misuse of public office" charge. That case fell apart before it could go to trial. Brit?

[JuniperLea]

1. regardless...

the prosecutor cannot under any circumstance issue an indictment. the grand jury did after finding there was enough evidence to prosecute.

one case where an indictment fell apart before it went to trial... in how many years?

grasping at straws...

[melissinha]

7. how could grand jury indict but there was not enough evidence

I ahve read excerpts here and there, but can't make heads or tails of it...

Apparently...

The Hutchison evidence was thrown out on an inf of a technicality. According to the trial judge, Earle should have issued a subpoena for the documents from Hutchinson that show she broke the law rather than obtaining a perfectly valid search warrant based on a mountain of legitimate probable cause signed by a Texas judge in good standing and then executing the warrant in such a manner that Hutchison and her office staff could not destroy the offending documents.

[JuniperLea]

8. as i said, regardless of all that

the grand jury makes the call... you should also check out the number of republicans on that particular jury

i can't make out heads or tails of your pasted post either. seems there are several typos and other errors...

[melissinha]

13. i copied from Burnt Orange Report

just a blog.... there is limited info about Hutchison's indictment out there and that seemed to be the most in depth explanation I could find.

[KarenS]

2. Faux "NewsPeople" = Plug-monkeys for this Culture of Corruption,,,,

:shrug:

[ThoughtCriminal]

3. That's not much of a reply

except for "Republicans say" there is no substance to the charge and he's still ignoring Earle's willingness to go after Democrats. More significant, there seems to be no attempt to refute the charges against DeLay.

I guess it plays with the Fox audience.

[CottonBear]

4. Typical RW/Freeper type: he can't construct a real sentence

or capitalize properly.

[tex-wyo-dem]

5. At first I thought you had emailed the Beach Boy...:)

[gratuitous]

6. Isn't that nice?

He thinks his own report is "fair and balanced." How very sweet. It seems that his sign-off point, that "Earle has brought charges against a fair number of Democrats" really could use some expansion. When he takes 2½ minutes talking about partisanship and and the skunkiness of the indictment, one throwaway comment hardly constitutes "balance," unless you're talking about the "balance" necessary to equate lying, cheating, thieving, and corruption with the truth. Then in that case, a 40-1 ratio of lies to truth is probably necessary.

Oddly enough, Mr. Wilson, like so many other lazy journalists, points to the prosecution of Kay Bailey Hutchison from 12 years ago as the defining moment of Earle's career, but fails to find the time to quite get all the details of that case in. Earle had the goods on Hutchison, but a friendly judge excluded virtually all of the evidence Earle had against her. Rather than allow Earle to withdraw the charges for re-filing at a later date, the judge took the unusual step of forcing the prosecution forward, then finding Hutchison innocent because Earle's evidence was excluded. Hutchison can't be reprosecuted for her corruption because that would be double jeopardy, so she gets off scot-free.

So I guess Wilson was fair and balanced if you're not very intelligent, which means that he totally was for the average Faux viewer.

[UofIDem]

9. As an aside...

I don't really think you get anywhere on the "well the GJ thought there was enough evidence argument" As I've heard repeatedly in law school, even a bad prosecutor can get a grand jury to indict just about anyone up to and including Mother Theresa. I'm not saying he's not guilty, I'm just saying that the grand jury is designed to set an incredibly low bar to indictment.

[gratuitous]

12. I didn't make that argument, but . . .

Yes, a prosecutor can probably get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich. However, in order to get an indictment, a good prosecutor puts on just enough evidence to persuade the grand jury that there's probable cause to believe a crime has been committed. Several commentators yesterday prattled on about how thin the beef seemed, as if the indictment was all the evidence that would be presented. Anyone experienced in criminal procedure, particularly with such a high-profile defendant, knows or should know that the indictment is not going to contain every last scrap of evidence the prosecutor has.

[brettdale]

10. He emailed me back telling me hes human

""Well I took Du's advice and emailed Wilson about the Hutchison case, here is what he wrote back to me"


Brian Wilson

"well -- there were a number of acquittals. What you characterize as friendly judge excluding evidence in the Hutchison case --- can also be viewed as a case falling apart because the evidence was weak. Many reporters in Texas at the time viewed it that way.

I don't know about that -- i do know this -- I'm trying to play it straight up the middle. I'm human and therefore imperfect -- but I'm trying.

Thanks for the dialogue"

[KnowerOfLogic]

11. Tony Snow supposedly answered mine once, and judging from the

language used, it did sound like him. of course he answered it with an argument that i could have blown out of the water in seconds flat if i had had the chance.