Kohring -Politely Corrupt

Prosecutor Bottini responding to Kohring's attorney, who comparing his client to Kott, said Kohring didn't swear or drink or any of those things, that he really is Andy Griffith.

. . . granted, he’s not Pete Kott when it comes to the colorful language, but you saw a guy who was politely corrupt. Doesn’t mean he wasn’t corrupt because he doesn’t swear. The fact that he’s - Andy Griffith - I don’t recall any shows where Andy Griffith took cash from anyone. He may be polite, but still corrupt.

This raises so many issues - about Kohring, but more importantly, about all of us. How do we judge people? How do we decide who to trust and not. We 'hire' politicians to spend our money and steer the ship of State with far less research than most organizations use to hire an administrative assistant or janitor. (And there's no disrespect intended here for admin assistants or janitors, organizations can't run without them.)

So if someone has a veneer of respectable - polite, decent clothes, good haircut, etc. - we make all sorts of positive assumptions about them.

Watching Kohring in court during his trial and even talking to him during breaks, I feel like this is someone who got in way over his head. He reminds me of a kid who has spent his life learning how to avoid trouble, maybe from an abusive parent or from bullies. He's learned to be very polite and to ask "How can I help you?" I think he really means it. But doing everything he's learned how to do, he still gets into trouble. I've written about the contradictions in Kohring's life before - the free market advocate who only has government gigs on his resume.

The rules of life are hard. Some people need hard and fast rules, others are comfortable with the ebb and tide of life. There are different kinds of smarts. Kohring seems to have 'follow the rule' smarts. The problems for this sort of person come when there are conflicting rules, or when conditions change and the rules no longer apply. He pledged early on that he wouldn't vote for taxes. And didn't, but said he would if they called it a fee. Bottini called him a frequent flier at the Legislative Ethics Ofiice meaning he constantly checked on whether he was obeying the law, but they only warned him about state law probably, not the federal law he was convicted of. He understands, I think, that "here's your money, now go vote this way" is illegal. He doesn't understand that "Here's your money" and then sometime later, "Hey, Vic, let that bill out of committee" is the same thing. Don Corleone explained all this: (hit the yellow arrow)

someday imported by AKRaven

"Someday, and that day may never come, I will call upon you to do a service for me. But until that day accept this justice as a gift on my daughter's wedding."

"Politely Corrupt" also raises a basic theme of this "What do I know?" blog. How do we know things? How do our brains affect what data from the 'real world' we consider (and what we filter out) and how do we interpret those 'facts' that do get in? "He may be polite, but still corrupt." Polite is easy to see, corrupt is far less visible. We tend not to think of the two combined. Maybe Hollywood needs to make more movies with polite villains so that we get used to looking out for them too.

How did Kohring know who to trust? He trusted Bill Allen, but now he says he was betrayed. He trusts John Henry Browne who at the end of the trial said the defense had cost about $100,000. But Browne also said yesterday, in explaining the new back surgery that Kohring needs, that Kohring had been injured in a car accident before the trial. In Browne's car. Browne was driving. It was his fault.

I guess Browne's insurance is paying for that surgery. But did Kohring check with an attorney other than Browne about a settlement? And some might even think there was a conflict of interest if his criminal defense attorney is the man he might have to litigate over his back injury. And this all happened before the trial.

My biggest hope (though I'm not holding my breath) is that people will take more care and time in studying the backgrounds and beliefs of the people on the ballot in November. That they look past labels like Republican and Democrat and look at the people. They look past 30 second television commercials. Look past bumper sticker slogans like "no taxes" and take the measure of the candidate. Get people down to Juneau and DC who think, are comfortable with themselves, know how to handle money (their own and the state's), and have a good understanding of how everything fits together.

And here's the press grilling one of the jurists after the sentencing. One of Browne's arguments for lowering the sentencing was that we don't know exactly how many of the bribery charges the jury found Kohring guilty of. Although this juror didn't say a lot, I heard her to say she had taken everything into account.