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By LARRY MARGASAK, Associated Press Larry Margasak, Associated Press – 1 min ago
WASHINGTON – Rep. Charles Rangel, once one of the most influential House members, was convicted Tuesday on 11 counts of breaking ethics rules and now faces punishment.

An ethics panel of eight House peers deliberated over two days before delivering a jarring blow to the 20-term New York Democrat's career. The 80-year-old Rangel was charged with 13 counts of financial and fundraising misconduct.

Only last spring, Rangel held the exalted post of Ways and Means chairman, a position that made him the House's main writer of tax legislation. The Harlem congressman was not present when the verdict was announced.

The full ethics committee will now conduct a hearing on the appropriate punishment for Rangel, the silver-haired, gravelly-voiced and sartorially flashy veteran of 20 terms in the House.

The next step for the committee is to make a recommendation on punishment to the House.

Possible sanctions include a House vote deploring Rangel's conduct, a fine and denial of privileges.

The congressional panel, sitting as a jury, found that Rangel had used House stationery and staff to solicit money for a New York college center named after him. It also concluded he solicited donors for the center with interests before the Ways and Means Committee, leaving the impression the money could influence official actions.

He also was found guilty of failing to disclose at least $600,000 in assets and income in a series of inaccurate reports to Congress; using a rent-subsidized New York apartment for a campaign office, when it was designated for residential use; and failure to report to the IRS rental income from a housing unit in a Dominican Republic resort.

DRAIN THE SWAMP!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcsJCylQRx0

Has Obama sold his job yet..??

Like Marion Barry this just gives him street cred with his peeps...Uhhh I mean constituents

Yet another mean-spirited witch hunt by the vast right-wing conspiracy.

Now we won't have anyone on CSPAN that sounds like the love child of Stevie Nicks and a Goat.

Poor Chucky.

He's only 80 and he's no Count Basie

He better learn to Sing Sing Soon though

He is lookin for a lawyer on consingment !

Intrested ?

he is the poster child for ........ TERM LIMITS !!

Being totally and utterly corrupt and hypocritical isn't exactly what I'd call "style."

That's called "Putting a ribbon on a pig".

You can dress up ANYONE into fine clothes. Give them a manicure, haircut and a shave. Teach them manners and how to walk and you'd call that "style"?

No, this man is a theif. He's a carpetbagger. He's a corrupt individual that should've been shown the door a long time ago. He's nothing to emulate or even pretend he's something worth copying. He's a charlatan.

I don't know if I am or not...you going?

YESSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!

Perhaps my next beer will be the Rangel Wangle Stout!

Yes, the CROS Wheelchair Ale it shall be named!

WASHINGTON -- The sad, wrenching spectacle we saw yesterday of a grand old man, crumpled in an armchair, his face broken, weeping into his hands, was just another dramatic display of Charlie Rangel's unstoppable charm.

That is not to say his tears were not genuine. Clearly, Rangel today is a deeply pained man.

But it is that charm -- his ability to so easily trade on his enormous personal appeal -- that has gotten Rangel into so much trouble and it is how he aims to get himself out of one last fix.

Yes, he may have been the most powerful tax master in the country, but that did not mean he would actually pay his taxes on income from his beachfront villa in the Dominican Republic.

As he once told us in all seriousness, every time he called down there to ask about the taxes, they would start speaking to him in Spanish.

About those four rent-stabilized apartments he was squatting in, using one as a campaign office when the law requires it be his primary residence? He did not ask for those. The good people at Lenox Terrace just wanted to give them to him out of the kindness of their hearts.

As for using congressional letterhead to solicit funds from those with business before his committee for an institute that would bear his name? It was just an office-supply mix-up.

Stretching the boundaries of absurdity, he admitted to us yesterday that, indeed, he was guilty of being "overzealous" in his effort to raise money for the school. That's like "admitting" that your greatest failing is that you are a perfectionist.

Anyway, he told the House ethics committee, it wasn't even his idea to name a project after himself -- it was CCNY that first approached him. He was just helping out, helpful guy that he is.

This roguish charm is a signature of Charlie Rangel. And it is his greatest sin. It is the root of a colossal hubris that has blinded him from realizing this trial is not about him.

It is about the public trust in an institution -- of which he has been among the most powerful leaders -- that takes money away from us that we have worked to earn in the name of public good.

It is an awesome responsibility, and he has made a mockery of it.

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Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/charming_betrayal_of_trust_lkaUp5N9wVWDIJYYApl82J#ixzz15kXOk8pw

I recall that we paid last year but the Tatuaje Fleur de Fleur gift sampler more than made up for it.

I can't imagine how many other "violations" Fred Sanford of Harlem has in his closet!


Why is it a violation for politians but would be a crime for you and me? (Rhetorical...)

Is there a vendor in the house?