A Note on Bill DeWeese

State Rep. Bill DeWeese has not (as yet) been charged with anything in the BonusGate proceedings, though his former chief of staff is considered by the grand jury to have been a ringleader. The question of what DeWeese knew and when he knew it is an interesting one.

Some of the news outlets that have written on the indictments have reported that Mike Manzo, the former chief of staff, and his wife (and fellow indictee) married in 2006. I think this is incorrect. In December of 2005 I posted a blog entry quoting from the June 2005 House Journal in which DeWeese congratulates his chief of staff on his recent marriage.

Now the question is, would even DeWeese have babbled on in this ridiculous way if he knew Manzo had created a state job for a woman whose job duties allegedly included having a physical relationship with Manzo and that she was not the new Mrs. Manzo? Names were deleted in my original post to avoid embarrassing the individuals involved, though that ship has now sailed.

I will be brief. As Senator [name deleted] used to refer to the connubial couch, he referred to those moments of bliss as the ineffable blandishments of conjugal extravaganzas. Just within the last few days, my chief of staff, [name deleted], got married on and behalf of the Speaker, who has generously allowed me to take the microphone, and our colleagues, unlike many of us, who are elected, [names deleted] and other senior staff people seem to have very few enemies. I could be misreading that, but nevertheless, [name deleted] has succumbed to those wonderful blandishments, and although I am certainly no expert on the quotidian travails of matrimony, I still wanted to doff my hat and say congratulations to my young chief of staff on his marriage. (Legislative Journal -- House, June 7, 2005, p. 1078)

According to today's Inquirer ("Court documents detail alleged Pa. job-for-sex deal," by Angela Couloumbis and Mario Cattabiani), Manzo and Angela Bertugli's initial encounter (in his car) took place in 2004 and she reported for her state job in Sept. 2005. This is about 3 months after DeWeese is announcing his chief of staff's marriage to Rachel Hursh. Did DeWeese know about Manzo's alleged relationship with Bertugli? I really hope not.

That issue of the House Journal is now online and we can see the additional remarks made by the new Mrs. Manzo's then employer, Rep. LaGrotta:

Mr. LaGROTTA. The gentleman, the Democratic leader’s chief of staff, got married to the executive director of the House Tourism and Recreational Development Committee, of which I am the chairman. They were gone, Mr. Speaker, on their wedding/honeymoon for almost 2 weeks. During that time I was very, very, very bereft – I hope that is a word; I will have to ask the minority leader that – without the assistance of Rachel Manzo, but I kept thinking about how much worse off the gentleman, Mr. DeWeese, was without his chief of staff, and that is what got me through the 2 weeks. Congratulations to both of them again, and no more vacation
this year.

No more vacation, indeed.

And given the number of raunchy jokes, bad puns, and double entendres I could have made using the word "ineffable," I'd like some credit for taking the high road.