Out of Slammer, Ney Slams Bush Admin: "They've Taken Bloodsport to a Whole New Level

27 Aug 2008 // Freshly released from prison, former Ohio Republican Rep. Bob Ney is ripping into the administration, leveling charges that they were behind his prosecution.

Ney, who has taken to the airwaves as a radio commentator, recently appeared on the Thom Hartmann show to talk about the Bush administration's role in his prosecution and his past life as a felon.

"I made the bullets, I gave them the bullets," Ney says of his prosecution for bribery, but goes on to suggest that his willingness to challenge the administration's head-in-the sand approach to Iran made him a target.

From the transcript:

[Thom]: You were prosecuted by the Bush Administration for what Ellen [Ellen Ratner of Talk Radio News] has characterized to me as, you know, one possibly serious crime, one largely irrelevant crime. But mostly something that probably, a number of things that probably many members of congress could be gone after, and she seems to be of the opinion that your prosecution was a political prosecution because you were pushing back on Iran. You want to, can you speak to that, please?

[Ney]: But at the end of the day, you know, I brought a lot of things on myself. . . And I did some things that were wrong. But I also believe that part of this was fueled in the sense of the Iran issue. It's been no secret that when I went to prison I gave permission for a secret meeting I'd had with Mr. Guldimann [Tim Guldimann, then Swiss Ambassador in Tehran] who came from Switzerland. He presented a document that was absolutely incredible, where Iran would have recognized Israel and a whole host of other things, would have let our inspectors on their ground; and I sent that to the White House.

I'll stand by that today; the White House denies it, but Colin Powell's former assistant admits that that came over to the State Department and the White House wanted no part of it. And I believe that every step of the way, and I think it came more from Cheney's people, but every step of the way that I attempted to deal with Iran, it got pretty harsh back. And so I think part of this, I made the bullets, I gave them the bullets, but I think some of the force was also involved with, you know, Iran and people that would rather see those countries not communicate, no matter who is head of Iran.

Later, Ney amps up his critique, saying that the administration has "taken bloodsport to a new level":

[Thom]: It so sounds like the Don Siegelman story and the Paul Minor story, and if you're not familiar with those two stories, I encourage you to do a little Googling. I think that we have political prisoners in the United States now.

[Ney]: Well, I know that the harshness of the administration, and again, I take culpability, I did some wrong things, but when you get in their path, I think they've taken bloodsport to a new level in this administration.