Fieger attorney calls charges political retribution (Detroit News)

[struggle4progress]

Dismissal sought; U.S. attorney says he had no choice but to prosecute.
Norman Sinclair / The Detroit News

DETROIT -- At a Tuesday hearing before U.S. District Judge Paul Borman, lawyers for Southfield attorney Geoffrey Fieger said Fieger's prosecution by the government over campaign contributions is political retribution against a staunch Democrat.

"There has never been a case like this under circumstances like these," said Fieger lawyer Thomas Cranmer. "What happened here is a criminal conspiracy born out of the Justice Department in Washington." ...

Assistant U.S. Attorney Lynn Helland said even though this was the first criminal campaign contribution case he has seen in his 18 years heading his office's public corruption unit, the government had no choice but to prosecute.

"We don't go looking for these cases, this one walked in the door," Helland said. He said Fieger initiated the case with a letter Cranmer wrote complaining to Federal Elections Commission about an investigation into his office's contributions to the 2004 John Edwards presidential campaign ...

http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071017/METRO01/710170381/1410/METRO01

[Trillo]

1. It seems this is another fallout from polarization of incomes,

(a long-term and persistent problem that waxes and wanes). Here's some more:

Donors Stir 'Bundling' Questions

Source: Wall Street Journal

BRISTOW, Va. -- When Hillary Rodham Clinton held an intimate fund-raising event at her Washington home in late March, Pamela Layton donated $4,600, the maximum allowed by law, to Mrs. Clinton's presidential campaign.

But the 37-year-old Ms. Layton says she and her husband were reimbursed by her husband's boss for the donations. "It wasn't personal money. It was all corporate money," Mrs. Layton said outside her home here. "I don't even like Hillary. I'm a Republican."
...
The episode adds to growing questions about the practice of "bundling" donations, in which ambitious fund-raisers collect money from friends, colleagues and sometimes employees to send to a campaign. Every major presidential campaign now relies on the practice to raise large sums. It is an especially important strategy for Mrs. Clinton. She has formed a group of "HillRaisers" who get special recognition for sweeping in more than $100,000 for her campaign.

Mrs. Clinton's campaign isn't the only one to be touched by suspicions about bundlers. The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan last month indicted Geoffrey Fieger, a politically active attorney. Mr. Fieger is accused of laundering $127,000 in illegal campaign contributions through dozens of employees to the 2004 presidential campaign of Democrat John Edwards, the former senator from North Carolina, who is running again for president. Mr. Fieger denies wrongdoing and says he was set up by the Bush administration.
(more to read)

Only allowing Public Campaign Financing is the solution.