Marcy,

What a time to be gone! Your email to the right doesn’t work… otherwise I’d have sent this juicy bit under wraps:

“A legal secretary at one of Washington’s most prominent law firms, Akin Gump, has been suspended after telling her bosses she secretly worked at night for the escort service run by the so-called D.C. Madam, Jeane Palfrey,”

(snip)

In addition, an email from the woman sent to Palfrey suggested that they restart Pamela Martin and Associates from the Akin Gump offices.

(snip)

The woman, who worked directly for one of the firm’s many prominent lawyers, has been placed on administrative leave.

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/….._0503.html

OK, so which prominent lawyer is missing his paralegal? Was it anybody advising Monica Goodling, for example, or another of our DoJ buddies?

Who else at Akin Gump was a prostitute by night? Did they mix business with pleasure by gathering information from their clients? How did this particular woman think she could run a brothel from a prestigious law office? Is this how they added to their client list and database?

I feel like we are dealing with a many-headed hydra in the swamplands, and that everything is connected under the mire.

Posted by: hauksdottir | May 03, 2007 at 19:54

I then followed it with a couple of posts on the Simon Dodge thread:

Hey! Remember when I brought this juicy quote in?

“A legal secretary at one of Washington’s most prominent law firms, Akin Gump, has been suspended after telling her bosses she secretly worked at night for the escort service run by the so-called D.C. Madam, Jeane Palfrey,”

http://thenexthurrah.typepad.c….._bull.html

:wide evil grin:

My twitchy little nose was almost certainly following the right scent through the musk:

OMG: The Akin Gump Escort Worked For… Monica Goodling’s Lawyer!!!

http://www.abovethelaw.com/200…..p.php#more

So far, tips and unnamed sources confirming those tips. Akin Gump refuses to officially confirm it. They didn’t deny it either, like they denied the other possible position. However, if this blond busty bitch with an attitude was Dowd’s paralegal or personal secretary, they won’t be able to keep it contained much longer. As a government witness, too many people must know her identity.

On its official website, Akin Gump proudly bills itself as a “full-service” law firm.

“Over the years, we’ve handled a number of cases that have captured national attention. As a result, we know how to guide events in the press as well as in the courtroom.”

http://www.akingump.com/about_litigation.cfm

Posted by: hauksdottir | May 05, 2007 at 05:09

Hmmm… Lam was investigating Foggo (rented hotel suite with lots of bedrooms, poker-players, hookers, limosine services, and money floating around like little boats of sushi waiting to be taken). Goodling and Sampson booted Lam to stop her for continuing that line of investigation. Congress was opening an investigation of how Shirlington Limo got a DHS contract; was the DoJ doing anything in DC, or was it just San Diego running with the case? Goodling ends up represented by Dowd, a top-tier attorney far beyond her salary-range. Who is paying for Dowd? Was Goodling promised protection? Does Dowd or anyone else at Akin Gump have an interest in quieting the investigation of USAs before the real reasons for their firing becomes common wisdom?

And, if Dowd’s right-hand woman was assisting the DC Madam and was thinking of opening her own branch, had she already ventured into that arena? If the dots connect (and it is still a big if), we’ll see a trail of breadcrumbs between the graduate of Messiah U and the Madam. [Even opera doesn’t get quite so over-the-top. Usually. Khovanshchina is a political affair, with religious meddling, where everybody self-immolates at the end because they are afraid of the sweeping changes to come.]

One way to keep people in line is through blackmail. People who do opposition research get the dirt on everyone. Providing temptation in the form of money and sex and then using the results to persuade people is really low. But believable, given what we already know about operations in Karl’s Shop.

I think the direction has been moving more towards the idea that this could be another sort Jack Abramoff style scandal in which you see that women, prostitutes here or call girls, were given to people as part of lobbying efforts, part of efforts to persuade people to do things on Capitol Hill.

(Juan Williams on NPR, from Atrios)

The inference was pretty clear: If Wilkes was bribing Duke Cunningham to get Cunningham to earmark contracts for him, he might not have been doing it just with money, but women — and possibly other legislators beyond Cunningham as well as CIA officials were involved as well. A senior official in the Cunningham investigation last year confirmed that this was a highly possible scenario, and would, in fact, constitute a next phase of the Cunningham probe.

http://pogoblog.typepad.com/po….._nine.html

A phase which has been cut short?

Posted by: hauksdottir | May 05, 2007 at 07:55

[Mod Note; lengthy comments with multiple links will trip the moderation filters. In the future, you may want to shorten your comment and reduce the number of links. Thanks.]

…there’s no crying in politics.

There are gonna be plenty of non-Bushies hurt in this prostitution scandal. And — who knows? — some of them may turn out to be from our side.

With all the prostitution rings in this country, why did the FBI walk into this one? H/T to Casablanca.

Obviously someone pointed them in that direction.
Silly wabbit.

noen @ 33

jayt @ 30

Well, perhaps Ms. Palfrey ought to just take that phone list, scan it into a computer, and “dump” it onto the internet.
The internet sharks will feast on that list. Nothing but bones would be left…and lots and lots of interesting names.

But, but Brian Ross of ABC said that the names on the list are “boring”.

And ABC wouldn’t lie or cover for the admin, would they? [/snark]

No more than they would produce a sham documentary that blamed 911 on Clinton.

Well, there *is* that.

I’m sure it was all just a misunderstanding.

More likely this is pressure on Monica to keep her mouth shut. I suspect Ms. Palfrey is getting off, er, that is to say, she’s going to get out from under, er that is, she’s not going to be placed in handcuffs…oh, you get the idea…in exchange for having handed over the phone number list, so Repubs could nail, er blackmail Monica into staying quiet.

So, if this is close to the truth, then what’s the Naval guy being outed for? What does he have on the Bushies they want kept quiet?

So how can the top dogs at AkinGump ignore and refuse to use the INSIDER info of their specially-placed secretary? How could they and her not make use of such awesome blackmail leverage?

Please do not be reasonable and think they did not know.

I do not auomatically include Goodling as a knowing party. She is a neophyte by comparison to the principals.

Thanks for the post TSF. Based on prior experience with Monica types, I would guess that she has no f*cking clue as to where her professional relationships end and her personal relationships begin.

She was educated in the Judith Miller School of Deportment.