…Mark Jungers, a former Major Lindsey managing partner, told Politico that the firm hired Mrs. Roberts because it hoped to benefit from her being married to the Chief Justice, observing that her network was his network and vice versa.
He later assured Business Insider that he never saw her use the connection inappropriately, and of course he did. He is a recruiting executive protecting the industry’s most famous hire, and his denial is precisely what a denial would sound like whether or not it were true. The admission that matters is the first one. The market priced her marriage. Sophisticated law firms understood that hiring through the Chief Justice’s wife purchased something, and whether that something was influence or merely the appearance of access is beside the point, because federal ethics rules exist precisely to police the appearance. They captured none of it.
…John Roberts has done almost nothing wrong, and that is the problem. The rules let the money in, kept the names out, kept the amounts secret, and asked nothing when the forms proved incomplete. A system that a careful man can satisfy while the public learns nothing is not an ethics regime. It is camouflage, and it is a legal architecture for buying proximity to a lifetime appointee. Congress should change the rules, and conservatives should hold the pen.
One would think a member of SCOTUS wouldn’t do this… Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom ~ Benjamin Franklin. ABN
American Buddhist Net 