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Column: Wasichus testify on lobbying scandal
Thursday, June 23, 2005
"In three hours yesterday, [Sen. Byron] Dorgan and John McCain (R-Ariz.), chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, quizzed witnesses on what the lawmakers described as an elaborate web of fraud and greed -- 'even by Washington standards,' as Dorgan unkindly put it.
There were phony grass-roots Christian groups. Phony billing statements. Nonprofits with phony purposes. And, perhaps phoniest of all, a "premiere international think tank" called the American International Center, directed by two boyhood friends of Abramoff partner Michael Scanlon: yoga instructor Brian Mann and lifeguard-cum-excavator David Grosh. Mann refused to answer questions, but Grosh, who never consulted a lawyer, was happy to tell his story.
'I'm embarrassed and disgusted to be a part of this whole thing,' Grosh said in his two-sentence statement. 'The Lakota Indians have a word, wasichu, which aptly describes all of us right now.'"
Get the Story:
Washington Sketch by Dana Milbank: One Committee's Three Hours of Inquiry, in Surreal Time
(The Washington Post 6/23)
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Witness List/Testimony:
Oversight
Hearing Before the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs on the In Re Tribal
Lobbying Matters, Et Al (June 22, 2005)
Relevant Links:
Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians -
http://www.choctaw.org
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