What Culture of Corruption? Where?

It's occurred to me that, in part, the raison d'etre of the Bush administration is to use the government as way to make someone else pay for the luxuries and privileges he and his buddies enjoy. Cut taxes in a way that benefits the very rich, 'privatize' government services like there's no tomorrow, use no-bid contracts, relax regulatory enforcement and run enormous deficits. Now it becomes clear who might have suggested the idea.

When Claude Allen, President Bush's longtime domestic-policy adviser, resigned suddenly on Feb. 9, it baffled administration critics and fans. The White House claimed that Allen was leaving to spend more time with his family, while the Washington Times speculated that the 45-year-old aide, a noted social conservative, might have quit to protest a new Pentagon policy about military chaplains. Allen himself never publicly explained the reason for his departure.

News today may shed light on the mystery of Allen's resignation. According to the Montgomery County Police Department, Allen was arrested yesterday and charged in a felony theft and a felony theft scheme. According to a department press release, Allen conducted approximately 25 fraudulent "refunds" in Target and Hecht's stores in Maryland. On Jan. 2, a Target employee apprehended Allen after observing him receive a refund for merchandise he had not purchased. Target then contacted the Montgomery County Police. According to a source familiar with the case, Target and the police had been observing Allen since October 2005.

Allen is charged with practicing a form of shoplifting called "refund fraud."

In general, a refund-fraud scam goes like this: You purchase an item—a CD player, let's say—and leave the store with it. Then you come back to the store and pick up exactly the same CD player; you take the CD player and receipt from the original purchase to the returns desk, claiming that this is the item you bought, and get a refund for it. You keep the original CD player, and pay nothing.

A scam I've never heard of before, yet it feels so oddly familiar...

Update: What a difference a year makes. From the Washington Post, March 29, 2005:

Operating out of his office on the second floor of the West Wing, Allen, one of the most senior African American members of the administration, advises Bush on the nation's sprawling domestic agenda: Health care, veterans' issues, labor, education, justice, housing, Native American policy, space exploration -- all that, and more, falls under his purview.

"You're really a jack of all trades in terms of domestic policy," Allen said of his role. "My job is to coordinate all the activities across the agencies and advise the president on decisions he needs to make in these areas."

Working in an administration known for tightly controlling policy from the White House, Allen has a job that is less developing policy than it is coordinating the work of Cabinet agencies across the government to ensure that they are in line with the president's agenda. Allen meets with Bush several times a week, either to provide briefings on agency activities or to present policy options for the president to choose from.

Allen had all the qualities required for a fast track role in the Bushian elite.

Bush tapped Allen for a federal appeals court seat in 2003, but congressional Democrats blocked the nomination, citing Allen's relative lack of legal experience. ...

There were also concerns about the depth of Allen's conservative ideology. During his confirmation hearing, Senate Democrats quizzed Allen about a comment he made in 1984 when he served as spokesman for the reelection campaign of then-Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.). He told a reporter that then-Gov. James B. Hunt Jr., Helms's Democratic opponent, was vulnerable because of his links to the "queers."

Critics charged that Allen used the word to disparage gays. But during his judicial confirmation hearing, Allen told skeptical members of the Senate Judiciary Committee that he intended the word to convey "odd, out of the ordinary, unusual," not to denigrate gays.

(Right. Like any American uses "queer" that way anymore. What a guy.)