The Associated Press reports that the ex-Malaysian Prime Minister claims that Jack Abramoff was paid $1.2 million to help set up his 2002 meeting with President Bush.

Former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said Monday that disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff was paid $1.2 million to organize his 2002 meeting with President Bush, but denied the money came from the Malaysian government.

Mahathir told reporters he was aware a payment was made to Abramoff, but he didn't know who made it. He said he had been persuaded by the U.S. think tank Heritage Foundation to meet with Bush at the time.

Ties between the GOP leadership, Korean business interests--including pharmaceutical companies, PhRMA, and a "grassroots" seniors organization--Sixty Plus, reveal just how money fuels a vast GOP propaganda machine that foists bad public policy on the American public.

In 2000, Hanwha Group, a Korean company with extremely close ties to Speaker Dennis Hastert, Rep. Tom DeLay, Rep. Roy Blunt and other GOP leaders donated $300,000 to a "grassroots" seniors organization, Sixty Plus, that has assisted the GOP with their legislative agenda, including their Medicare prescription drug proposal.

The SacBee has an interesting story about Rep. John Doolittle's actions on behalf of Jack Abramoff's clients. the Choctaw Indians.

When Rep. John Doolittle praised a "great American success story" on Sept. 16, 1998, it was one of the earliest signs that he shared interests with Jack Abramoff and Rep. Tom DeLay.

"One tribe that has been a national leader in exercising its self-determination to build a strong tribal government and reservation-based economy is the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians," the Roseville Republican said in a five-paragraph statement he entered in the Congressional Record. The Bee found the statement after conducting a review of his public remarks.

In this piece, NDN Chair Simon Rosenberg lays out how he sees 2006 shaping up.

 Here's his bottom line:

I've been skeptical about the fall elections becoming a 1994-like "change election." But given that in Mid-February the President has dropped below 40 percent, their weak agenda has nowhere to go, foreign policy and security issues are as likely to be as damaging to them as helpful, and the criminal cases against their leadership will spread and deepen, I think even the skeptics have to now acknowledge that 2006 is likely to become an historically bad year for the governing party.

Federal prosecutors have joined with Jack Abramoff's lawyers in requesting a 90 delay in his sentencing so that he can keep cooperating with the ongoing  federal corruption probe.

From the AP:

The U.S. Department of Justice as well as defense lawyers asked to delay the upcoming sentencing of lobbyist Jack Abramoff after his conviction in a fraud case.

Officials are asking for more time so Abramoff can continue to assist with the overall government investigation into charges of corruption. The scandal has reached members of Congress and lit a political firestorm through much of Washington.

The Abramoff scandal appears to be sticking to Senator Conrad Burns.  Check out the story from today's LA Times.

A huge outfitting store on the edge of this mountain-ringed town should be a conservative bastion: The ranchers and farmers who come to shop tend to be reliable Republicans.

But here at Murdoch's Ranch and Home Supply — amid the calf pens, muck buckets and bags of horse feed — there are signs of trouble for the GOP. And that could be bad news for the party from coast to coast.

Jack Bolender, a retiree who voted for three-term Sen. Conrad Burns because the Republican delivered mounds of federal aid to Montana, said he was deserting the incumbent in the state's November election. Allegations that Burns was cozy with Jack Abramoff, the lobbyist central to a wide-ranging corruption scandal in Washington, have Bolender steamed.

"I appreciate what [Burns] brought to the state, but at what cost?" Bolender said one cold afternoon outside Murdoch's. "We seem to be selling out to the special interests."

Voters such as Bolender are at the center of a political storm that threatens to roil this year's midterm elections.

Interestingly, after years of cultivating an image of being crazy like a fox, Burns now wants Montanans to believe that he is the most naive fellow in Congress and had no idea what that Abramoff fellow was up to.  We'll see if he pulls it off.

Rep. John Doolittle is being very careful when he talks about "his friend" Jack Abramoff. Could he be trying to keep Abramoff from turning on him in his conversations with the Feds?

Some think so.

A GOP front group that helped pushed for passage of the fatally flawed Medicare prescription drug benefit was funded, at least in part, by felon-lobbyist Jack Abramoff, likely at the request of Rep. Tom DeLay.

Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi recently called for a congressional investigation into the passage of the Medicare law based on the role played by yet another group with strong ties to DeLay and Abramoff, the Alexander Strategy Group.

In her call for an investigation, Pelosi laid out the troubled history of this legislation:

The latest subpoenas of the U.S. Family Network in the GOP Corruption investigation are very bad news for Rep. Tom DeLay, and anyone who has ever had anything to do with him.

I've previously pointed out that the U.S. Family Network was a repository of some of the dirtiest money for DeLay, Inc.  Apparently the feds now think so too. 

Here's the National Journal story on the subpoenas.

President Bush is keeping the money raised by a second Pioneer who has been indicted.  Tom Noe, a prolific fundraiser for Bush, was recently indicted on 53 counts.  Noe has also been a major source of embarassment for Republican Governor Bob Taft, of Ohio.

From the Toledo Blade:

Democratic National Committee officials said yesterday's indictment of Tom Noe is a prime example of the corruption plaguing Washington and Columbus.