

On 9/19,
I wrote about Del. John O'Bannnon III (R-73) donating $1,000 to
Del. Phil Hamilton on August 6, 2009, even though serious allegations of ethics violations had been raised against
Hamilton as early as July 30. At the time, I asked:
What does this say about John O'Bannon? There seem to be two main possibilities: 1) he was completely oblivious and clueless to what's going on with his fellow Republican delegates, even a major ethics scandal reported in the Virginian-Pilot and other major newspapers; or 2) he was aware of the scandal but didn't think there was anything wrong with it.
Well, now
O'Bannon has
donated another $1,000 to Hamilton (at the beginning of September). Obviously, at this point,
O'Bannon can't still be "completely oblivious and clueless" about
Hamilton's legal/ethical difficulties, not to mention the fact that just about everyone - with the notable exception of
Ken Cuccinelli - has asked that
Hamilton resign. Which brings us to the second possibility, now a high probability, that
O'Bannon simply sees
absolutely nothing wrong with Hamilton's corrupt behavior. That really says it all about
John O'Bannon, and pretty much makes the argument for
Tom Shields an open-and-shut case.