Or: It's a shame people don't read
I was replying in Hillary Failed to disclose $24 Million of Bill's Income (On the Recommended Diaries list) to the comment in the Tip Jar
Kudos for McClatchy and the Raleigh News and Observer for doint the research and releasing this bombshell before the election.
Kudos indeed but the print media has done a fine job all along. The stories are HOT enough to get to the air but they don't. They might be too complex to put out in sound bites and that might be why it didn't hit the airwaves and captured the attention of the public. Republicans are reading these though and God knows they are good at putting things into eye catching clips or attention grabbing sound bites.
My reply got a little long so now it is a diary
Obama reads them too. Remember thisfrom February 2008?
Obama said he had been vetted by his opponent in the nominating campaign.
"I have to just respond by saying that the Clinton research operation is about as good as anybody's out there," he said.
"I assure you that having engaged in a contest against them for the last year that they've pulled out all the stops. And you know I think what is absolutely true is whoever the Democratic nominee is the Republicans will go after them. The notion that somehow Senator Clinton is going to be immune from attack or there's not a whole dump truck they can't back up in a match between her and John McCain is just not true."
Clinton said there is nothing in her past that she tries to play down or hide, including the years she worked as a corporate lawyer for a Little Rock, Ark., law firm. Her oft-cited 35 years of experience includes service "in the public, private and not-for profit sectors," she said.
Obama was right.
Articles go much further back I'll focus on this Newsweek article that had a nice summary of Bills Good Friends mentioned in the Diary I was responding to. Here an F.O.B., There an F.O.B. It was in 2-4-2008 addition that came out in late January along with some other big articles that should have impacted Super Tuesday. I never did hear them talked about on TV.
The leading characters are Victor Pinchuk, a billionaire steel magnate,
Supporting character is Pinchuk's father-in-law, Ukraine's former president Leonid Kuchma. The authoritarian rule was condemned by the State Department probably because investigation linked his regime to the 2000 decapitation of a dissident journalist.
(Since I actually saved the extras on this for last I will leave it as is but many articles are about this)
Another leading FOB is the dashing billionaire Ron Burkle. "An entrepreneur with a playboy reputation" Clinton became a senior adviser to his Yucaipa Cos. (I won't go into the ladies that played supporting roles in their adventures) A nod to the sheiks and many other Middle Eastern leaders to give it a hint of mystery and danger.
In stories related to Burkle/Clinton/Yucaipa we have
Clinton’s Efforts on Ethanol Overlap Her Husband’s Interests
New York Times - Feb 28, 2008
HILL & BILL & BURKLE January 23, 2008
Clinton's Burkle Ties Include Funds in Cayman Islands Dec. 17 (Bloomberg
There are hundreds but I'll stop except to add this fun paragraph in an article about another attempted media buy that failed.
Burkle’s name surfaced last month when a union representing Dow Jones employees began working with him to drum up investors other than Murdoch. Burkle has made other, unsuccessful attempts to buy newspaper publishers, including Knight Ridder Inc. and Tribune Co.
That would have included the LA Times and the Chicago Tribune. Burkle wasn't outbid. He made the hight bid but the company pressured a Chicago billionaire to match it.
I wonder if a Burkle owned Tribune would still have endorsed Obama with glowing remarks on his character and recently re-endorsed him?
He has been going after all sorts of media. Has a seat on Yahoo! Board of Directors now too. He owns Source Interlink Cos ( Source Interlink Companies, Inc. (Nasdaq: SORC), a media and marketing services company, is one of the largest publishers of magazines and online content ) which has been trying for a year to get AMI
Holdings include 90 publications including National Enquirer, Star, The Globe, National Examiner and Weekly World News
Bet he'd like to get that through more quickly. Deal seemed reached last summer but the problem was botched financial reporting on the part of AMI has reportedly been an obstacle to the deal. That could be a handy buy for a guy really sick of being gossiped about.
Then of course we have FOB Frank Giustra,"a Canadian entrepreneur who founded Lions Gate Entertainment"
Dull sounding so lets throw in some settings and supporting roles.
Kazakhstan, uranium mines, with Bill there
He also took the opportunity to praise the country's president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, an authoritarian ruler with a poor human-rights record, for "opening up the social and political life of your country."
The NY Times went into that story more 1/31/08 with After Mining Deal, Financier Donated to Clinton
Oh, for drama this one involves lies misstatements about meetings that took place. Hey it was probably late and they were thinking about sniper fire. Wait till you're 60!
FOB 4 is Vinod Gupta, described as
a billionaire who has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the Clintons' campaigns and contributed $1 million to the Clinton Foundation. Gupta has given the Clintons the use of his private jet, and has accompanied them on vacation. When Bill Clinton was president, Gupta was a guest in the Lincoln Bedroom.
Oh Bill and Hill. Where do we start?
How about Sunday's This week appearance when George was asking Hillary about the secret donor list?
GS: Yet the foundation sold the donor list -- 38,000 names.
HC: Well I don't know anything about that, you'll have to ask the foundation.
That's surprising Hillary! Hill, can we talk? As reported on All Things Considered
Last year, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton took the unusual step of renting out some of her lists.
(snip)
Last fall, ABC News reported that the library rented out a portion of its donor list to a list broker — the same one that rented Hillary Clinton's campaign lists.
Do you know about the renting out of your campaign lists?
There is no report of any other campaign letting its donor list out into the markets while the campaign is going on. Ever.
I know campaigns need to raise money but that's the funny part. For the 3 campaign lists you netted just $8,225. Professionals say $800,000 would be a more plausible price for such a quality list. Maybe you put friendship ahead of money with your mid-west values.
I know the owner of InfoUSA is a good friend. The years and years of campaign donations, nights in the Lincoln bedroom, the $2 million for Hillary Clinton's Millennium New Year's Eve bash, millions in foundation and library donations (sorry some of the Secret List got out).
Just some kind of favor or something?
He's done them for you, like the $900,000 of corporate money spent jetting you and Bill around the world. Sorry about the stockholder lawsuit filed a year ago over those flights and the 3 million promised to Bill. And the SEC investigation too. They can be so awkward when your name is such a key part. Luckily Gupta has gotten everything delayed. It won't embarrass you. Yet.
And really it's only a guess just what financial or stock transactions went on with Bill and Gupta last year. The InfoUSA annual report would have shown it but they delayed it... so long that InfoUSA Gets Nasdaq Delisting Notice because of that pesky SEC investigation and law suit. It won't embarrass you. Yet.
Oh NPR mentions InfoUSA being involved in that scandal about selling mailing lists of elderly Americans to criminals. The new York times article about it, Bilking the Elderly with a Corporate Assist is such a sad one too. Our most vulnerable citizens completely wiped out of their life savings. I realize the company say they didn't know. Just because the lists said things like this, how would they know people would take advantage of these people?
InfoUSA advertised lists of "Elderly Opportunity Seekers," 3.3 million older people "looking for ways to make money," and "Suffering Seniors," 4.7 million people with cancer or Alzheimer’s disease. "Oldies but Goodies" contained 500,000 gamblers over 55 years old, for 8.5 cents apiece. One list said: "These people are gullible. They want to believe that their luck can change."
Some people would be suspicious just because government investigators say executives were warned that they were aiding these crimes but the company kept working with the criminals and collecting millions. They'd also suspect because of the internal infoUSA e-mails that showed they knew they weren't abiding by FTC standards and knew they were selling to criminals.
But Hillary, you wouldn't be friends with someone involved with really bad things. Wait. I get confused here. Maybe that's just like people who did bad things when you were 8 but have been a productive citizen for decades, cause their goal was just to end the war and they damaged buildings. They'd be horrible. Maybe it's OK if it is recent and during your friendship and money taking and it's crimes for profit and it's just devastated lives of old people?
But I know it's not too bad because you sold your campaign lists in December, months after this scandal broke.
Some would think Bill was thoughtless to set the foundation up this way and he understands as he says In Charity and Politics, Clinton Donors Overlap
Mr. Clinton himself echoed those concerns this fall when he pledged to make public future donors if Mrs. Clinton was elected president. While disclosure is not legally required, failure to do so, Mr. Clinton said, would raise "all these questions about whether people would try to win favor with her by giving money to me."
Even so, past donors should remain private, he insisted, "unless there is some conflict of which I am aware, and there is not."
Oh. We can trust Bill. And of course you too Hillary.
So like you told George you "didn't know anything about that". I thought you would really know a lot about it. I hope I was able to fill you in about selling those lists. Why don't you talk to everyone and get back to us on it.