Full Version: Ethics/Values in politics
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What do you want? The next several generations of Bushs will be juuuuust fine. Everyone else can pick shitt with the sparrows.
QUOTE(davisął @ Dec 15 2005, 01:51 PM)
What do you want? The next several generations of Bushs will be juuuuust fine. Everyone else can pick shitt with the sparrows.
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This your version of homoin' in the habitat?
You have chosen to ignore Repub_Bub. View this post · Un-ignore Repub_Bub
ahhhh, it's a wonderful day.
ahhhh, it's a wonderful day.
QUOTE(Bee @ Dec 15 2005, 07:40 AM)
Yep. Open the National Parks to mining, open a Nature Preserve to drilling.
fark the next generation, they are getting "theirs."
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fark the next generation, they are getting "theirs."
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Put commuter train lines instead. The goverment already owns the land.
Now the IRS to look at Abramoff/Delay money laundering.
Abramoff charity's claims disputed
Groups listed as beneficiaries of more than $330,000 in gifts say they never got them
By Chuck Lindell
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Thursday, December 15, 2005
Capital Athletic Foundation, a charity run by disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff now at the center of an influence-peddling investigation on Capitol Hill, told the IRS it gave away more than $330,000 in grants in 2002 to four other charities that say they never received the money.
The largest grant the foundation listed in its 2002 tax filing was for $300,000 to P'TACH of New York, a nonprofit that helps Jewish children with learning disabilities.
"We've never received a $300,000 gift, not in our 28 years," a surprised Rabbi Burton Jaffa, P'TACH's national director, told the Austin American-States- man. "It would have been gone by now. I guess I would have been able to pay some teachers on time."
Federal investigators have not contacted P'TACH about the grant, Jaffa said. Representa- tives of three other nonprofits that supposedly received Capital Athletic money also said they have not been contacted.
The grant-reporting discrepancy raises further questions about Abramoff's use of the foundation's finances as he built one of the most successful and well-connected lobbying practices in Washington. Abramoff's dealings already have led to the indictment of a Bush administration official, a subpoena for a GOP committee chairman and investigations by the Justice Department, Internal Revenue Service and U.S. Senate.
The discrepancy also follows e-mails between Abramoff and members of his lobbying team that say then-House Republican Leader Tom DeLay of Sugar Land wanted to raise money through Capital Athletic for an unspecified purpose. In one of those e-mails, Abramoff announced a $200,000 fundraising goal.
DeLay does not recall making such a request, his lawyer, Richard Cullen, said Wednesday. Capital Athletic's tax return does not indicate whether Abramoff reached his $200,000 goal.
But around the time Capital Athletic's tax form was filed in fall 2003, listing the $300,000 donation P'TACH says it didn't get, a DeLay-created charity called Celebrations for Children was begun with $300,000 in seed money.
Celebrations for Children was a short-lived effort to raise money for children's charities by providing donors with special access to DeLay, plus yacht trips and other enticements, during the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York. Watchdog groups protested, claiming the fundraiser violated a new ban on accumulating unlimited "soft" money, and DeLay dropped it in May 2004.
E-mails and documents released so far in the ongoing investigations do not detail where Capital Athletic's elusive $300,000 went, or if it was money raised at DeLay's behest in possible violation of federal law.
Abramoff, who knows the answers, is not talking.
Abramoff spokesman Andrew Blum declined to comment on whether Capital Athletic donated to Celebrations for Children. Blum also refused to discuss the missing grants.
"No comment on your entire set of questions," he said. DeLay lawyer Cullen, asked Wednesday afternoon if Capital Athletic gave $300,000 to Celebrations for Children, said he could not reply, noting there was not enough time to track that information down.
The ultimate answers may be important for DeLay. Federal law prohibits members of Congress from requesting "anything of value" from anyone seeking official action from the House or doing business with the House. Lobbyists in particular should not be solicited, according to an ethics committee memo explaining the House Ethics Manual.
An exchange of e-mails in the summer of 2002 between Abramoff and lobbying partner Tony Rudy, DeLay's former chief of staff, demonstrate that the men were not shy about using DeLay's name to solicit money for Capital Athletic, particularly from Indian tribe clients that had proven lucrative to Abramoff's lobbying practice.
Capital Athletic's financial records also show that the foundation spent money on political endeavors unrelated to the foundation's stated mission of promoting sportsmanship.
In June 2002, Abramoff told Rudy in an e-mail that DeLay wanted Capital Athletic to raise some money for him, and Abramoff suggested hitting up one of the six casino-operating Indian tribes that enriched Abramoff and a partner with $82 million in lobbying fees.
"I recommend we hit everyone who cares about Tom's requests. I have another few to hit still, " Abramoff wrote. "I think that, if we can do $200K, that would be good."
Abramoff suggested that Rudy contact the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe of Michigan, saying, "it'll look better coming from you as a former DeLay (chief of staff). We'z gonna make a bundle here."
Rudy, however, made a mistake, passing off the task of approaching the tribe to Todd Boulanger, an Abramoff team lobbyist who was out of the loop.
Boulanger replied: "What is it? I've never heard of it."
Rudy: "It is something our friends are raising money for."
Boulanger: "I'm sensing shadiness. I'll stop asking."
Rudy: "If you have to say Leadership is asking, please do. I already have."
When the e-mail exchange was copied to Abramoff, he replied to Rudy with an expletive-punctuated tirade: "I did not want you to bring Todd into this!!! . . . You should have followed my request to get in touch with (the tribe) directly. Dammit. Now this is out."
Despite Abramoff's concern, the tribe did contribute $25,000.
Bernie Sprague, subchief for the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe, opposed the contribution. While the tribal council was told Capital Athletic was a worthy charity that helped needy children in the Washington area, "my response was we have our own kids that we need to take care of, we shouldn't be worrying about the kids in D.C.," he said.
The majority of tribal council members, however, agreed to the contribution, warming to the sales pitch that the organization "was supported by Tom DeLay and others, and they would appreciate the tribe's donation in the future if we had issues that had to go before them," Sprague said in an interview this week.
Capital Athletic's tax return also shows a $50,000 donation from the Alabama-Coushatta tribe of East Texas, but that money was solicited to pay for U.S. Rep. Bob Ney's golf outing to Scotland, said Fred Petti, a lawyer for the tribe.
That 2002 trip, financed by Capital Athletic, also included David Safavian, then chief of staff at the General Services Administration. Safavian has been charged with lying to federal investigators about his dealings with Abramoff and is scheduled to stand trial in April.
Ney, R-Ohio and chairman of the House Administration Committee, has said he has not been formally notified that he is a target of federal investigators, but a plea agreement entered last month by former Abramoff business partner Michael Scanlon asserts that Ney accepted meals and trips "in exchange for a series of official acts and influence."
P'TACH's $300,000 grant is the largest of four listed on the foundation's 2002 tax filing that representatives of nonprofit groups told the American-Statesman they had no records of receiving:
•$20,000 for Chabad Lubavitch, a Jewish center in Potomac, Md.
•$6,000 for the Waldorf School, a private school with fewer than 200 students in Atlanta
• $5,452 for Taylor University, an evangelical Christian college in Fort Wayne, Ind.
A $6,000 donation would have been big news at the Waldorf School, business manager Debra Kahn said.
"That's so weird. Why would (Abramoff) even know us?" Kahn said. "The interesting thing about it is if we had a grant it would have been an unsolicited one because we weren't writing grant proposals back then. We're in the process of getting accredited, so we really can't qualify for a lot of foundation grants anyway."
According to an archived version of Capital Athletic's Web site, it did not accept unsolicited grant proposals. Abramoff and his wife, Pamela, are the sole managing members of the charity, according to tax records.
For Craig Holman, campaign finance lobbyist with Public Citizen in Washington who also monitors nonprofits, the discrepancies raise troubling questions.
"Those charitable contributions have to show up (accurately) in IRS records. If they don't show up there, something terribly wrong has happened," he said.
IRS spokesman Phil Beasley in Dallas, while prohibited from discussing specific cases, said charities that misrepresent tax return information risk losing their nonprofit status.
"Depending on the intent and severity, an organization or individual could find themselves under criminal investigation by the IRS," Beasley said.
Other charities did receive the listed grants, including $14,500 for the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Academy in Maryland, and $2,500 for a Washington film festival by the Voice Beyond, a faith-based media concern.
Capital Athletic reported making $2.3 million in charitable grants in 2002, including almost $1.9 million for Eshkol Academy, Abramoff's Jewish school for boys, and $97,000 for Kollel Ohel Tiferet in Israel to purchase military gear for an Orthodox Jewish settlement in the West Bank. There is no public listing for the Kollel group, and the town's mayor said he did not know of the organization, according to Newsweek magazine.
For 2002, Capital Athletic reported almost $2.6 million in revenue.
clindell@statesman.com, 912-2569
Abramoff charity's claims disputed
Groups listed as beneficiaries of more than $330,000 in gifts say they never got them
By Chuck Lindell
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Thursday, December 15, 2005
Capital Athletic Foundation, a charity run by disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff now at the center of an influence-peddling investigation on Capitol Hill, told the IRS it gave away more than $330,000 in grants in 2002 to four other charities that say they never received the money.
The largest grant the foundation listed in its 2002 tax filing was for $300,000 to P'TACH of New York, a nonprofit that helps Jewish children with learning disabilities.
"We've never received a $300,000 gift, not in our 28 years," a surprised Rabbi Burton Jaffa, P'TACH's national director, told the Austin American-States- man. "It would have been gone by now. I guess I would have been able to pay some teachers on time."
Federal investigators have not contacted P'TACH about the grant, Jaffa said. Representa- tives of three other nonprofits that supposedly received Capital Athletic money also said they have not been contacted.
The grant-reporting discrepancy raises further questions about Abramoff's use of the foundation's finances as he built one of the most successful and well-connected lobbying practices in Washington. Abramoff's dealings already have led to the indictment of a Bush administration official, a subpoena for a GOP committee chairman and investigations by the Justice Department, Internal Revenue Service and U.S. Senate.
The discrepancy also follows e-mails between Abramoff and members of his lobbying team that say then-House Republican Leader Tom DeLay of Sugar Land wanted to raise money through Capital Athletic for an unspecified purpose. In one of those e-mails, Abramoff announced a $200,000 fundraising goal.
DeLay does not recall making such a request, his lawyer, Richard Cullen, said Wednesday. Capital Athletic's tax return does not indicate whether Abramoff reached his $200,000 goal.
But around the time Capital Athletic's tax form was filed in fall 2003, listing the $300,000 donation P'TACH says it didn't get, a DeLay-created charity called Celebrations for Children was begun with $300,000 in seed money.
Celebrations for Children was a short-lived effort to raise money for children's charities by providing donors with special access to DeLay, plus yacht trips and other enticements, during the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York. Watchdog groups protested, claiming the fundraiser violated a new ban on accumulating unlimited "soft" money, and DeLay dropped it in May 2004.
E-mails and documents released so far in the ongoing investigations do not detail where Capital Athletic's elusive $300,000 went, or if it was money raised at DeLay's behest in possible violation of federal law.
Abramoff, who knows the answers, is not talking.
Abramoff spokesman Andrew Blum declined to comment on whether Capital Athletic donated to Celebrations for Children. Blum also refused to discuss the missing grants.
"No comment on your entire set of questions," he said. DeLay lawyer Cullen, asked Wednesday afternoon if Capital Athletic gave $300,000 to Celebrations for Children, said he could not reply, noting there was not enough time to track that information down.
The ultimate answers may be important for DeLay. Federal law prohibits members of Congress from requesting "anything of value" from anyone seeking official action from the House or doing business with the House. Lobbyists in particular should not be solicited, according to an ethics committee memo explaining the House Ethics Manual.
An exchange of e-mails in the summer of 2002 between Abramoff and lobbying partner Tony Rudy, DeLay's former chief of staff, demonstrate that the men were not shy about using DeLay's name to solicit money for Capital Athletic, particularly from Indian tribe clients that had proven lucrative to Abramoff's lobbying practice.
Capital Athletic's financial records also show that the foundation spent money on political endeavors unrelated to the foundation's stated mission of promoting sportsmanship.
In June 2002, Abramoff told Rudy in an e-mail that DeLay wanted Capital Athletic to raise some money for him, and Abramoff suggested hitting up one of the six casino-operating Indian tribes that enriched Abramoff and a partner with $82 million in lobbying fees.
"I recommend we hit everyone who cares about Tom's requests. I have another few to hit still, " Abramoff wrote. "I think that, if we can do $200K, that would be good."
Abramoff suggested that Rudy contact the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe of Michigan, saying, "it'll look better coming from you as a former DeLay (chief of staff). We'z gonna make a bundle here."
Rudy, however, made a mistake, passing off the task of approaching the tribe to Todd Boulanger, an Abramoff team lobbyist who was out of the loop.
Boulanger replied: "What is it? I've never heard of it."
Rudy: "It is something our friends are raising money for."
Boulanger: "I'm sensing shadiness. I'll stop asking."
Rudy: "If you have to say Leadership is asking, please do. I already have."
When the e-mail exchange was copied to Abramoff, he replied to Rudy with an expletive-punctuated tirade: "I did not want you to bring Todd into this!!! . . . You should have followed my request to get in touch with (the tribe) directly. Dammit. Now this is out."
Despite Abramoff's concern, the tribe did contribute $25,000.
Bernie Sprague, subchief for the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe, opposed the contribution. While the tribal council was told Capital Athletic was a worthy charity that helped needy children in the Washington area, "my response was we have our own kids that we need to take care of, we shouldn't be worrying about the kids in D.C.," he said.
The majority of tribal council members, however, agreed to the contribution, warming to the sales pitch that the organization "was supported by Tom DeLay and others, and they would appreciate the tribe's donation in the future if we had issues that had to go before them," Sprague said in an interview this week.
Capital Athletic's tax return also shows a $50,000 donation from the Alabama-Coushatta tribe of East Texas, but that money was solicited to pay for U.S. Rep. Bob Ney's golf outing to Scotland, said Fred Petti, a lawyer for the tribe.
That 2002 trip, financed by Capital Athletic, also included David Safavian, then chief of staff at the General Services Administration. Safavian has been charged with lying to federal investigators about his dealings with Abramoff and is scheduled to stand trial in April.
Ney, R-Ohio and chairman of the House Administration Committee, has said he has not been formally notified that he is a target of federal investigators, but a plea agreement entered last month by former Abramoff business partner Michael Scanlon asserts that Ney accepted meals and trips "in exchange for a series of official acts and influence."
P'TACH's $300,000 grant is the largest of four listed on the foundation's 2002 tax filing that representatives of nonprofit groups told the American-Statesman they had no records of receiving:
•$20,000 for Chabad Lubavitch, a Jewish center in Potomac, Md.
•$6,000 for the Waldorf School, a private school with fewer than 200 students in Atlanta
• $5,452 for Taylor University, an evangelical Christian college in Fort Wayne, Ind.
A $6,000 donation would have been big news at the Waldorf School, business manager Debra Kahn said.
"That's so weird. Why would (Abramoff) even know us?" Kahn said. "The interesting thing about it is if we had a grant it would have been an unsolicited one because we weren't writing grant proposals back then. We're in the process of getting accredited, so we really can't qualify for a lot of foundation grants anyway."
According to an archived version of Capital Athletic's Web site, it did not accept unsolicited grant proposals. Abramoff and his wife, Pamela, are the sole managing members of the charity, according to tax records.
For Craig Holman, campaign finance lobbyist with Public Citizen in Washington who also monitors nonprofits, the discrepancies raise troubling questions.
"Those charitable contributions have to show up (accurately) in IRS records. If they don't show up there, something terribly wrong has happened," he said.
IRS spokesman Phil Beasley in Dallas, while prohibited from discussing specific cases, said charities that misrepresent tax return information risk losing their nonprofit status.
"Depending on the intent and severity, an organization or individual could find themselves under criminal investigation by the IRS," Beasley said.
Other charities did receive the listed grants, including $14,500 for the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Academy in Maryland, and $2,500 for a Washington film festival by the Voice Beyond, a faith-based media concern.
Capital Athletic reported making $2.3 million in charitable grants in 2002, including almost $1.9 million for Eshkol Academy, Abramoff's Jewish school for boys, and $97,000 for Kollel Ohel Tiferet in Israel to purchase military gear for an Orthodox Jewish settlement in the West Bank. There is no public listing for the Kollel group, and the town's mayor said he did not know of the organization, according to Newsweek magazine.
For 2002, Capital Athletic reported almost $2.6 million in revenue.
clindell@statesman.com, 912-2569
QUOTE
But around the time Capital Athletic's tax form was filed in fall 2003, listing the $300,000 donation P'TACH says it didn't get, a DeLay-created charity called Celebrations for Children was begun with $300,000 in seed money.
Celebrations for Children was a short-lived effort to raise money for children's charities by providing donors with special access to DeLay, plus yacht trips and other enticements, during the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York. Watchdog groups protested, claiming the fundraiser violated a new ban on accumulating unlimited "soft" money, and DeLay dropped it in May 2004.
E-mails and documents released so far in the ongoing investigations do not detail where Capital Athletic's elusive $300,000 went, or if it was money raised at DeLay's behest in possible violation of federal law.
Celebrations for Children was a short-lived effort to raise money for children's charities by providing donors with special access to DeLay, plus yacht trips and other enticements, during the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York. Watchdog groups protested, claiming the fundraiser violated a new ban on accumulating unlimited "soft" money, and DeLay dropped it in May 2004.
E-mails and documents released so far in the ongoing investigations do not detail where Capital Athletic's elusive $300,000 went, or if it was money raised at DeLay's behest in possible violation of federal law.
The children's charity was a front. If you donated, I think it was $100,000, $75,000 went to the children but $25,000 went directly to the Republican in charge of the convention. By donating to the charity you could avoid political donation guidelines and laws, get a tax deduction and dinner with DeLay and his wife.
Frist had one set up the same way.
It may have been a larger donation, I can't remember the specifics.
If Earl doesn't get him, the IRS will. Or both. Even better.
DeLay Fails in Bid to Get Quick Answer From Judge in Texas Case
Dec. 17 (Bloomberg) -- The Texas judge hearing a campaign- finance abuse case against former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said he won't yet rule on one of DeLay's motions, dealing a setback to the lawmaker's bid for a quick resolution of the case.
After being indicted in his home state of Texas, DeLay was forced by Republican rules to step down from his leadership position in the U.S. House of Representatives. He denied wrongdoing and sought a quick trial so that he can have the chance to reclaim his majority leader position.
DeLay's lawyers asked Judge Pat Priest to split up the charges facing their client and proceed to trial on a count of money laundering as soon as possible. Priest, in an e-mail sent to reporters today, said he's decided that he won't rule on that request until an appeals court has reviewed a challenge by prosecutors to one of his earlier rulings.
``The law directs the Court of Appeals to give precedence'' to this type of appeal by prosecutors, Priest said. He said he was confident that the appeals court would act with ``with all reasonable dispatch.''
DeLay's lawyer, Dick DeGuerin, said his team will work through the weekend to come up with a response. ``This fight's not over yet,'' DeGuerin said.
DeLay says the prosecution is politically motivated, and his attorneys have alleged misconduct by prosecutor Ronnie Earle, which Earle denies. The case has been marked by volleys of motions back and forth since an original Sept. 28 indictment.
Indictments
Earle says DeLay and two associates conspired to take corporation donations, funnel them through an arm of the Republican National Committee and then use them in state races, in violation of Texas law. He got two sets of indictments against DeLay, one on Sept. 28 and another on Oct. 3.
A grand jury initially charged DeLay with conspiracy to violate the election code. DeLay's lawyers said the charge should be thrown out because the alleged infraction wasn't illegal at the time. Priest agreed, and dismissed that count on Dec. 5.
On Oct. 3, a different grand jury charged DeLay with money laundering and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Priest declined on Dec. 5 to dismiss the money laundering charge and struck some of the language from the charge of conspiracy to commit money laundering but otherwise let it stand as well.
Earle is appealing Priest's decision to throw out the original charge, and it's that appeal that Priest decided to wait for today before ruling on DeLay's other request. He said he made his decision ``out of considerations of judicial economy.''
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=100...=top_world_news
Dec. 17 (Bloomberg) -- The Texas judge hearing a campaign- finance abuse case against former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said he won't yet rule on one of DeLay's motions, dealing a setback to the lawmaker's bid for a quick resolution of the case.
After being indicted in his home state of Texas, DeLay was forced by Republican rules to step down from his leadership position in the U.S. House of Representatives. He denied wrongdoing and sought a quick trial so that he can have the chance to reclaim his majority leader position.
DeLay's lawyers asked Judge Pat Priest to split up the charges facing their client and proceed to trial on a count of money laundering as soon as possible. Priest, in an e-mail sent to reporters today, said he's decided that he won't rule on that request until an appeals court has reviewed a challenge by prosecutors to one of his earlier rulings.
``The law directs the Court of Appeals to give precedence'' to this type of appeal by prosecutors, Priest said. He said he was confident that the appeals court would act with ``with all reasonable dispatch.''
DeLay's lawyer, Dick DeGuerin, said his team will work through the weekend to come up with a response. ``This fight's not over yet,'' DeGuerin said.
DeLay says the prosecution is politically motivated, and his attorneys have alleged misconduct by prosecutor Ronnie Earle, which Earle denies. The case has been marked by volleys of motions back and forth since an original Sept. 28 indictment.
Indictments
Earle says DeLay and two associates conspired to take corporation donations, funnel them through an arm of the Republican National Committee and then use them in state races, in violation of Texas law. He got two sets of indictments against DeLay, one on Sept. 28 and another on Oct. 3.
A grand jury initially charged DeLay with conspiracy to violate the election code. DeLay's lawyers said the charge should be thrown out because the alleged infraction wasn't illegal at the time. Priest agreed, and dismissed that count on Dec. 5.
On Oct. 3, a different grand jury charged DeLay with money laundering and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Priest declined on Dec. 5 to dismiss the money laundering charge and struck some of the language from the charge of conspiracy to commit money laundering but otherwise let it stand as well.
Earle is appealing Priest's decision to throw out the original charge, and it's that appeal that Priest decided to wait for today before ruling on DeLay's other request. He said he made his decision ``out of considerations of judicial economy.''
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=100...=top_world_news
Here we go again.
Dec. 17, 2005, 1:35PM
Frist charity paid $500,000 to political consultants
By JONATHAN M. KATZ and JOHN SOLOMON
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist's AIDS charity paid nearly a half-million dollars in consulting fees to members of his political inner circle, according to tax returns providing the first financial accounting of the presidential hopeful's nonprofit.
The returns for World of Hope Inc., obtained by The Associated Press, also show the charity raised the lion's share of its $4.4 million from just 18 sources. They gave between $97,950 and $267,735 each to help fund Frist's efforts to fight AIDS.
The tax forms, filed nine months after they were first due, do not identify the 18 major donors by name.
Frist's lawyer, Alex Vogel, said Friday that he would not give their names because tax law does not require their public disclosure. Frist's office provided a list of 96 donors who were supportive of the charity, but did not say how much each contributed.
The donors included several corporations with frequent business before Congress, such as insurer Blue Cross/Blue Shield, manufacturer 3M, drug maker Eli Lilly and the Goldman Sachs investment firm.
World of Hope gave $3 million it raised to charitable AIDS causes, such as Africare and evangelical Christian groups with ties to Republicans — Franklin Graham's Samaritan Purse and the Rev. Luis Cortes' Esperanza USA, for example.
The rest of the money went to overhead. That included $456,125 in consulting fees to two firms run by Frist's longtime political fundraiser, Linus Catignani. One is jointly run by Linda Bond, the wife of Sen. Christopher "Kit" Bond, R-Mo.
The charity also hired the law firm of Vogel's wife, Jill Holtzman Vogel, and Frist's Tennessee accountant, Deborah Kolarich.
Kolarich's name recently surfaced in an e-mail involving Frist's controversial sale of stock in his family founded health care company. That transaction is now under federal investigation.
Jill Holtzman Vogel, who is raising money for a run for the state Senate in Virginia in 2007, has received thousands in contributions this year from Catignani & Bond and from her husband, among numerous other sources, according to data released by the Virginia Public Access Project.
Alex Vogel said Frist picked people to work on his charity whom he trusted and knew, such as Vogel's wife, and was proud that overhead costs amounted to less than $1 of every $5 raised. "It's leaner than the average charity," Vogel said.
Frist is listed as the charity's president and his wife was listed as secretary. Neither was compensated.
Political experts said both the size of charity's big donations and its consulting fees raise questions about whether the tax-exempt group benefited Frist's political ambitions.
"One of the things people who are running for president try to do is keep their fundraising staff and political people close at hand. And one of the ways you can do that is by putting them in some sort of organization you run," said Larry Noble, the government's former chief election lawyer who now runs the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics that studies fundraising.
Kent Cooper, the Federal Election Commission's former public disclosure chief, said the big donors' motives are also suspect.
"These tax deductible gifts were earmarked through Senator Frist," Cooper said. "They were raised in the political arena at the 2004 Republican Convention and the natural question is were they given to the Senate majority leader to gain favor or were they given for true charitable purposes?"
Cooper said the consulting fees were "excessively high" and the fact that they were "paid to primarily political consultants also raises questions about the long-range strategic benefits for the 2008 presidential race."
A charity could lose its tax-exempt status if it is found to be involved with political activity, said Marcus S. Owens, a former director of the Internal Revenue Service's Exempt Organizations Division.
"If the IRS were to conduct an examination, what they would look for would be the relationship between the organization and any incumbent politician or candidate," Owens said. "They'd be particularly interested in transactions of money or assistance of any kind being provided."
Frist formed the charity in 2003. It drew attention in August 2004 when it held a benefit concert in New York during the Republican National Convention at which President Bush was nominated for re-election.
The group's 2004 tax return was due April 15, 2005, but it filed for two extensions and only reported its activity to the IRS last month.
The tax forms show at least 11 of the charity's 18 biggest donors gave $97,950 each, that one gave $100,000 and that the rest gave more than $245,000 each.
Vogel said Catignani was paid the fees because he helped arrange the New York concert that featured country stars Brooks & Dunn, handling both the event arrangements and fundraising.
The tax forms show Catignani's fundraising firm, Catignani & Bond, was paid a total of $276,125 and his event-planning arm, Consulting Services Group, was paid $180,000.
The amount Catignani was paid by Frist's charity in 2004 is roughly the same as what his firms received over the past three years for work for Frist's political action committee, Volunteer PAC. The firm collected $523,666 in fees from the PAC since 2003, FEC records show.
World of Hope's beneficiaries include evangelical Christian groups with Republican connections.
Cortes, Esperanza USA's president, is an influential evangelical leader who hosted Bush at this year's National Hispanic Prayer Breakfast.
Frist has worked and traveled extensively with Samaritan's Purse in Africa as well as during the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Franklin Graham is the son of the Rev. Billy Graham.
Weeks before Frist's convention fundraiser, the senate leader traveled to Chad, Sudan and Kenya on a trip underwritten by Samaritan's Purse, Senate records show.
Samaritan's Purse spokesman Jeremy Blume said the $490,000 that World of Hope donated to Samaritan's Purse in 2004 was spent on AIDS programs in sub-Saharan Africa.
The recipients of the charity's money were Africare, Samaritan's Purse, Esperanza USA, Nashville's Meharry Medical College, Taso-Uganda and Save the Children.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/headli...on/3531890.html
Dec. 17, 2005, 1:35PM
Frist charity paid $500,000 to political consultants
By JONATHAN M. KATZ and JOHN SOLOMON
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist's AIDS charity paid nearly a half-million dollars in consulting fees to members of his political inner circle, according to tax returns providing the first financial accounting of the presidential hopeful's nonprofit.
The returns for World of Hope Inc., obtained by The Associated Press, also show the charity raised the lion's share of its $4.4 million from just 18 sources. They gave between $97,950 and $267,735 each to help fund Frist's efforts to fight AIDS.
The tax forms, filed nine months after they were first due, do not identify the 18 major donors by name.
Frist's lawyer, Alex Vogel, said Friday that he would not give their names because tax law does not require their public disclosure. Frist's office provided a list of 96 donors who were supportive of the charity, but did not say how much each contributed.
The donors included several corporations with frequent business before Congress, such as insurer Blue Cross/Blue Shield, manufacturer 3M, drug maker Eli Lilly and the Goldman Sachs investment firm.
World of Hope gave $3 million it raised to charitable AIDS causes, such as Africare and evangelical Christian groups with ties to Republicans — Franklin Graham's Samaritan Purse and the Rev. Luis Cortes' Esperanza USA, for example.
The rest of the money went to overhead. That included $456,125 in consulting fees to two firms run by Frist's longtime political fundraiser, Linus Catignani. One is jointly run by Linda Bond, the wife of Sen. Christopher "Kit" Bond, R-Mo.
The charity also hired the law firm of Vogel's wife, Jill Holtzman Vogel, and Frist's Tennessee accountant, Deborah Kolarich.
Kolarich's name recently surfaced in an e-mail involving Frist's controversial sale of stock in his family founded health care company. That transaction is now under federal investigation.
Jill Holtzman Vogel, who is raising money for a run for the state Senate in Virginia in 2007, has received thousands in contributions this year from Catignani & Bond and from her husband, among numerous other sources, according to data released by the Virginia Public Access Project.
Alex Vogel said Frist picked people to work on his charity whom he trusted and knew, such as Vogel's wife, and was proud that overhead costs amounted to less than $1 of every $5 raised. "It's leaner than the average charity," Vogel said.
Frist is listed as the charity's president and his wife was listed as secretary. Neither was compensated.
Political experts said both the size of charity's big donations and its consulting fees raise questions about whether the tax-exempt group benefited Frist's political ambitions.
"One of the things people who are running for president try to do is keep their fundraising staff and political people close at hand. And one of the ways you can do that is by putting them in some sort of organization you run," said Larry Noble, the government's former chief election lawyer who now runs the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics that studies fundraising.
Kent Cooper, the Federal Election Commission's former public disclosure chief, said the big donors' motives are also suspect.
"These tax deductible gifts were earmarked through Senator Frist," Cooper said. "They were raised in the political arena at the 2004 Republican Convention and the natural question is were they given to the Senate majority leader to gain favor or were they given for true charitable purposes?"
Cooper said the consulting fees were "excessively high" and the fact that they were "paid to primarily political consultants also raises questions about the long-range strategic benefits for the 2008 presidential race."
A charity could lose its tax-exempt status if it is found to be involved with political activity, said Marcus S. Owens, a former director of the Internal Revenue Service's Exempt Organizations Division.
"If the IRS were to conduct an examination, what they would look for would be the relationship between the organization and any incumbent politician or candidate," Owens said. "They'd be particularly interested in transactions of money or assistance of any kind being provided."
Frist formed the charity in 2003. It drew attention in August 2004 when it held a benefit concert in New York during the Republican National Convention at which President Bush was nominated for re-election.
The group's 2004 tax return was due April 15, 2005, but it filed for two extensions and only reported its activity to the IRS last month.
The tax forms show at least 11 of the charity's 18 biggest donors gave $97,950 each, that one gave $100,000 and that the rest gave more than $245,000 each.
Vogel said Catignani was paid the fees because he helped arrange the New York concert that featured country stars Brooks & Dunn, handling both the event arrangements and fundraising.
The tax forms show Catignani's fundraising firm, Catignani & Bond, was paid a total of $276,125 and his event-planning arm, Consulting Services Group, was paid $180,000.
The amount Catignani was paid by Frist's charity in 2004 is roughly the same as what his firms received over the past three years for work for Frist's political action committee, Volunteer PAC. The firm collected $523,666 in fees from the PAC since 2003, FEC records show.
World of Hope's beneficiaries include evangelical Christian groups with Republican connections.
Cortes, Esperanza USA's president, is an influential evangelical leader who hosted Bush at this year's National Hispanic Prayer Breakfast.
Frist has worked and traveled extensively with Samaritan's Purse in Africa as well as during the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Franklin Graham is the son of the Rev. Billy Graham.
Weeks before Frist's convention fundraiser, the senate leader traveled to Chad, Sudan and Kenya on a trip underwritten by Samaritan's Purse, Senate records show.
Samaritan's Purse spokesman Jeremy Blume said the $490,000 that World of Hope donated to Samaritan's Purse in 2004 was spent on AIDS programs in sub-Saharan Africa.
The recipients of the charity's money were Africare, Samaritan's Purse, Esperanza USA, Nashville's Meharry Medical College, Taso-Uganda and Save the Children.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/headli...on/3531890.html
RE-ELECT NOBODY!!
Reed's Greed
Dec. 17, 2005
(The American Prospect) This column was written by Terence Samuel.The Bush Administration finds itself in a very odd place — under and sinking fast — and for them, the dislocation must be staggering. And while it is interesting to watch as the White House unveils its new candor campaign in trying to right itself, that effort may be the definition of 'too little, too late.' All you have to do to understand the extent of the GOP's problems is to look at what is going on with one-time Golden Boy Ralph Reed, who is on the 2006 ballot in Georgia. He is going under fast and taking other Republicans with him, in magenta-red Georgia no less.
The founding executive director of the Christian Coalition, who ten years ago appeared on the cover of Time under the headline, "The Right Hand of God: Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition," has GOP leaders in Georgia so worried that some of them are asking him to withdraw, fearing he will kill their entire ticket.
For Reed, this run for lieutenant governor is part of an assault on greatness: lieutenant governor in 2006, governor in 2010, and president after that. But Reed is an example of what Jack Abramoff will mean to the GOP next year. Reed was an integral part of the Abramoff gambling swindle in Texas in 2002, in which the former super lobbyist worked both sides of the gambling debate, working for one client to get a casino shut down, with Reed's help, then signing up the vanquished Indian tribe for more than $4 million to get the casino reopened, which he tried to do with the help of the now embattled Rep. Bob Ney of Ohio.
It is hard to measure but impossible to deny the damage that Abramoff has done to the GOP's chance in 2006, and Reed may become the poster boy for the Abramoff Effect in the 2006 midterms. If Republicans can't pull off the political reversal they need in the wake of Iraq and Katrina and get rid of the scandal cloud over the Congress, the 2006 elections may go down in history as the end of the GOP revolution of 1994, a 12-year period during which they not only ran the government, but developed a pugnacious, unsentimental way of doing business and an overconfidence that Democrats still have not figured out how to match. And in a lot of ways, Reed and Abramoff were archetypes of the times, and weaved into the collapse of their personal and political fortunes, is the demise of a political movement.
Obviously, they are not alone: Tom DeLay is in trouble with the Justice Department, Conrad Burns is paving the way for a Democratic senator from Montana, Bob Ney needs a criminal lawyer, and Duke Cunningham is going to jail. But Reed and Abramoff were part of that GOP crowd that seemed to have figured out something fundamental about American politics that would make them unbeatable. Two other notables on that list, Karl Rove and Grover Norquist, have also attracted the attention of federal investigators.
But, what is clear now is that they just had a better game face, just wanted it more, and it has been tragic to watch them become what they so often evangelized against: corrupt, self-dealing, political prima donnas.
Reed and Abramoff came to Washington about the same time, the beginning of the Reagan Administration. Abramoff had just been elected chairman of the College Republican National Committee and Reed would be his first executive director. Norquist had been Abramoff's campaign manager. They were driven, young idealists. When we last see them, however, Abramoff is a millionaire lobbyist and Reed is begging him for business from corporate clients. In one of the thousands of e-mails that federal authorities confiscated from Abramoff, one from Reed reads: "Hey, now that I'm done with the electoral politics, I need to start humping in corporate accounts! I'm counting on you to help me with some contacts."
In 2001 and 2002, Abramoff and his partner Michael Scanlon began funneling money to Reed to fight gambling in Texas, mostly an effort to shutdown the El Paso casino run by the Texas Tiguas. After they shut it down, Abramoff calls the Tiguas and promises to get it reopened in return for a few million bucks.
But of course the friends begin haggling, not over the direction of the conservative movement or how to change the world, but over money. Abramoff wrote an e-mail to Scanlon in early 2002 about Reed, which asserted, "He is a bad version of us! No more money for him."
And there goes your revolution, folks.
Terence Samuel is a political writer in Washington, D.C.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/12/16/...in1133619.shtml
Dec. 17, 2005
(The American Prospect) This column was written by Terence Samuel.The Bush Administration finds itself in a very odd place — under and sinking fast — and for them, the dislocation must be staggering. And while it is interesting to watch as the White House unveils its new candor campaign in trying to right itself, that effort may be the definition of 'too little, too late.' All you have to do to understand the extent of the GOP's problems is to look at what is going on with one-time Golden Boy Ralph Reed, who is on the 2006 ballot in Georgia. He is going under fast and taking other Republicans with him, in magenta-red Georgia no less.
The founding executive director of the Christian Coalition, who ten years ago appeared on the cover of Time under the headline, "The Right Hand of God: Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition," has GOP leaders in Georgia so worried that some of them are asking him to withdraw, fearing he will kill their entire ticket.
For Reed, this run for lieutenant governor is part of an assault on greatness: lieutenant governor in 2006, governor in 2010, and president after that. But Reed is an example of what Jack Abramoff will mean to the GOP next year. Reed was an integral part of the Abramoff gambling swindle in Texas in 2002, in which the former super lobbyist worked both sides of the gambling debate, working for one client to get a casino shut down, with Reed's help, then signing up the vanquished Indian tribe for more than $4 million to get the casino reopened, which he tried to do with the help of the now embattled Rep. Bob Ney of Ohio.
It is hard to measure but impossible to deny the damage that Abramoff has done to the GOP's chance in 2006, and Reed may become the poster boy for the Abramoff Effect in the 2006 midterms. If Republicans can't pull off the political reversal they need in the wake of Iraq and Katrina and get rid of the scandal cloud over the Congress, the 2006 elections may go down in history as the end of the GOP revolution of 1994, a 12-year period during which they not only ran the government, but developed a pugnacious, unsentimental way of doing business and an overconfidence that Democrats still have not figured out how to match. And in a lot of ways, Reed and Abramoff were archetypes of the times, and weaved into the collapse of their personal and political fortunes, is the demise of a political movement.
Obviously, they are not alone: Tom DeLay is in trouble with the Justice Department, Conrad Burns is paving the way for a Democratic senator from Montana, Bob Ney needs a criminal lawyer, and Duke Cunningham is going to jail. But Reed and Abramoff were part of that GOP crowd that seemed to have figured out something fundamental about American politics that would make them unbeatable. Two other notables on that list, Karl Rove and Grover Norquist, have also attracted the attention of federal investigators.
But, what is clear now is that they just had a better game face, just wanted it more, and it has been tragic to watch them become what they so often evangelized against: corrupt, self-dealing, political prima donnas.
Reed and Abramoff came to Washington about the same time, the beginning of the Reagan Administration. Abramoff had just been elected chairman of the College Republican National Committee and Reed would be his first executive director. Norquist had been Abramoff's campaign manager. They were driven, young idealists. When we last see them, however, Abramoff is a millionaire lobbyist and Reed is begging him for business from corporate clients. In one of the thousands of e-mails that federal authorities confiscated from Abramoff, one from Reed reads: "Hey, now that I'm done with the electoral politics, I need to start humping in corporate accounts! I'm counting on you to help me with some contacts."
In 2001 and 2002, Abramoff and his partner Michael Scanlon began funneling money to Reed to fight gambling in Texas, mostly an effort to shutdown the El Paso casino run by the Texas Tiguas. After they shut it down, Abramoff calls the Tiguas and promises to get it reopened in return for a few million bucks.
But of course the friends begin haggling, not over the direction of the conservative movement or how to change the world, but over money. Abramoff wrote an e-mail to Scanlon in early 2002 about Reed, which asserted, "He is a bad version of us! No more money for him."
And there goes your revolution, folks.
Terence Samuel is a political writer in Washington, D.C.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/12/16/...in1133619.shtml
THE TOLEDO BLADE is starting a new investigative series on pay to play politics.
Today's was about the Bush mega-buck supporters and what they got for their contributions.
A BLADE INVESTIGATION
Bush fund-raisers cash in by giving — then receiving
By JIM TANKERSLEY,
JOSHUA BOAK, AND
CHRISTOPHER D. KIRKPATRICK
BLADE STAFF WRITERS
First of three parts
President Bush's corporate champions see the spoils of his administration in coal. And timber. And credit-card payments, Afghan electric lines, Japanese bank transfers, and fake crab.
America's business leaders supplied more than $75 million to return Mr. Bush to the White House last year - and he has paid dividends.
Bush Administration policies, grand and obscure, have financially benefited companies or lobbying clients tied to at least 200 of the President's largest campaign fund-raisers, a Blade investigation has found. Dozens more stand to gain from Bush-backed initiatives that recently passed or await congressional approval.
The investigation examined targeted tax breaks, regulatory changes, pro-business legislation, high-profile salaried appointments, and federal contracts.
Mr. Bush's policies often followed specific requests from his 548 "Pioneers" and "Rangers," who each raised at least $100,000 or $200,000 for his 2004 re-election. The help to business fund-raisers sometimes came at the expense of consumers or public health concerns.
The beneficiaries span industries and the nation. Examples include:
Timber barons who pay lower tax rates on logging sales and face fewer barriers to harvesting trees in national forests because of administrative changes and laws Mr. Bush signed.
Energy producers who dodged potential legal fees and cleanup costs after federal officials revised clean-air standards.
Heads of stock brokerages and other multinational firms, which, under a special tax incentive in the American Jobs Creation Act of 2004, are bringing hundreds of millions of dollars they earned or stored abroad back into the United States this year at reduced rates.
Executives of defense contractors United Technologies and the Washington Group, which won contracts potentially totaling more than $6 billion to supply American troops in Afghanistan and Iraq and rebuild both countries' infrastructure. The same contractors won far less government work under President Bill Clinton.
Mining executives who tapped new veins of coal, thanks to administrative rule changes that opened swaths of hills and forests to their backhoes and left once-protected streams vulnerable to pollution.
With rare exception - such as a California Pioneer recently implicated in a congressional bribery scandal - the Bush supporters' benefits appear to come through legal channels of lobbying, rule-making, and legislation.
But a federal investigation of Ohio Pioneer Tom Noe, indicted in October on charges he laundered money into the President's campaign, has focused attention on Mr. Bush's network of elite fund-raisers, who accounted for at least 28 percent of Mr. Bush's $271.8 million in individual contributions for the 2004 campaign.
A Blade investigation beginning in April led to accusations by state officials that Mr. Noe stole millions of dollars the state invested in his rare-coin funds. The probe also brought the money-laundering allegations against Mr. Noe to light.
A Blade report in October showed Ohio's 30 Pioneers and Rangers have secured more than $1.2 billion from taxpayers since 2001 for their companies and lobbying clients.
All of the Pioneers and Rangers who agreed to talk to the Blade for this series said they supported Mr. Bush's ideology and style of governance and said they expected no reward but his victory.
"I was pleased he was a candidate. I liked what his father had done," said Herbert Boeckmann, a California Bush Pioneer who owns the world's largest Ford dealership. "He was a little bit of a maverick, but he recognized the key was to get the job done."
For the rest of the story link to:
http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a...EWS09/512180341
The Blade is famous for it's investigative reporting. The Coingate fiasco keeps us up to date on the republican meltdown in Ohio.
Any more race riots in Toledo lately?
The NAZI'S want to come to town again. KKK skinshead nazi jerks. Nobody will show up for their march this time.
What did you rightwingers think of Alaska's ® Stevens hooking the ANWAR drilling to the Defense bill? Was that a shitty thing to do or what? Playing politics with our military budget in a time of war. For shame.
Just another lowlife tactic from yet another morals and values kind of guy. How much will he stand to profit? Who can tell? Ask Duke Cunningham.
And then McCain gets on TV, says it's wrong, but he has to vote for the defense bill.
Just another lowlife tactic from yet another morals and values kind of guy. How much will he stand to profit? Who can tell? Ask Duke Cunningham.
And then McCain gets on TV, says it's wrong, but he has to vote for the defense bill.
Corporate whores, one and all. Yet another reason to hate Republican forqs.
God damned shameless pigs at the trough. How low can they go?
Dec. 19, 2005, 9:30AM
Vote opens way for drilling in wildlife refuge
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — House lawmakers opened the way for oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and approved $29 billion for hurricane relief during an all-night session today bringing their legislative year to a close.
The House also narrowly passed a plan to cut deficits by almost $40 billion over five years in legislation hailed by GOP conservatives as fiscal discipline and assailed by Democrats as victimizing medical and education programs for the poor.
The ANWR provision was attached to a major defense bill, forcing many opponents of oil and gas exploration in the barren northern Alaska range to vote for it. The bill, passed 308-106, devoted money to bird flu preventive measures and $29 billion to hurricane relief, including funds for reconstructing New Orleans' levees.
The deficit measure, passed 212-206, carried an extension of expiring welfare laws and repealed a program that compensates companies hurt by trading partners who "dump" their exports in this country.
The votes came before sunrise as bleary-eyed legislators struggled to wrap up their work for the year. Democratic anger over the process was put aside briefly as lawmakers greeted Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, who returned to vote after suffering a heart attack Thursday.
While House lawmakers were heading for the exits, the end was not in sight for the Senate, which can't leave for Christmas until it deals with spending bills and the deficit-cutting package and overcomes a filibuster on renewing the Patriot Act. A Senate vote on the deficit reduction bill could come today.
A $453 billion defense spending bill became the flypaper for issues that have eluded congressional compromise. Those included, along with the ANWR provision, $29 billion in federal aid for victims of Katrina and other storms; an additional $2 billion to help low-income families with home heating costs; and $3.8 billion to prepare for a possible bird flu pandemic. Of the defense money, $50 billion is for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/3534543.html
God damned shameless pigs at the trough. How low can they go?
Dec. 19, 2005, 9:30AM
Vote opens way for drilling in wildlife refuge
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — House lawmakers opened the way for oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and approved $29 billion for hurricane relief during an all-night session today bringing their legislative year to a close.
The House also narrowly passed a plan to cut deficits by almost $40 billion over five years in legislation hailed by GOP conservatives as fiscal discipline and assailed by Democrats as victimizing medical and education programs for the poor.
The ANWR provision was attached to a major defense bill, forcing many opponents of oil and gas exploration in the barren northern Alaska range to vote for it. The bill, passed 308-106, devoted money to bird flu preventive measures and $29 billion to hurricane relief, including funds for reconstructing New Orleans' levees.
The deficit measure, passed 212-206, carried an extension of expiring welfare laws and repealed a program that compensates companies hurt by trading partners who "dump" their exports in this country.
The votes came before sunrise as bleary-eyed legislators struggled to wrap up their work for the year. Democratic anger over the process was put aside briefly as lawmakers greeted Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, who returned to vote after suffering a heart attack Thursday.
While House lawmakers were heading for the exits, the end was not in sight for the Senate, which can't leave for Christmas until it deals with spending bills and the deficit-cutting package and overcomes a filibuster on renewing the Patriot Act. A Senate vote on the deficit reduction bill could come today.
A $453 billion defense spending bill became the flypaper for issues that have eluded congressional compromise. Those included, along with the ANWR provision, $29 billion in federal aid for victims of Katrina and other storms; an additional $2 billion to help low-income families with home heating costs; and $3.8 billion to prepare for a possible bird flu pandemic. Of the defense money, $50 billion is for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/3534543.html
QUOTE(davisął @ Dec 19 2005, 07:03 AM)
What did you rightwingers think of Alaska's ® Stevens hooking the ANWAR drilling to the Defense bill? Was that a shitty thing to do or what? Playing politics with our military budget in a time of war. For shame.
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I guess all those Dems trying to make sure we don't produce any oil think that will make us less dependent on the middle east?
QUOTE(Arturo_Vandelay @ Dec 19 2005, 11:35 AM)
I guess all those Dems trying to make sure we don't produce any oil think that will make us less dependent on the middle east?
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What do you think of it being attatched to the defense bill?
The oilmen are already ahead of the game. They are going to places that have melted because of global warming. The polar bears are drowning because the ice pack has shrunk so far that they have no where to go.
The new land is already being checked out for possible drilling. Soon it won't matter, the park will be just another oil patch. As will most of Alaska. It will resemble the Houston area. And smell as bad.
The new land is already being checked out for possible drilling. Soon it won't matter, the park will be just another oil patch. As will most of Alaska. It will resemble the Houston area. And smell as bad.
QUOTE(davisął @ Dec 19 2005, 10:42 AM)
What do you think of it being attatched to the defense bill?
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I hate attaching riders to bills. McCain tied his torture bill to military appropriations. Anyone bitch? It's nothing new, just another case of whose ox is gored.
QUOTE(Arturo_Vandelay @ Dec 19 2005, 12:30 PM)
I hate attaching riders to bills. McCain tied his torture bill to military appropriations. Anyone bitch? It's nothing new, just another case of whose ox is gored.
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Jeez artie.
You know, the torture thing actually had something to do with the military. Does that mean anything to you?
Ellen Ratner
Liberal and Proud
Time for a change
Posted: December 19, 2005
Events this week offered columnists a "target rich opportunity" for subjects – what with the elections in Iraq and disclosures of President Bush's secret wiretapping and eavesdropping on American citizens (Gee, why is this liberal not surprised?). But I'm going to forego these current topics in favor of some bigger concerns, ones that actually go beyond the usual Left vs. Right conversation.
The issue is one of political dynasties and the problems they pose to both parties in governing America. I have two dynasties in mind – one already made (the Bushes) and one in the process of being made (the Clintons). Consider this: If Hillary Clinton wins the presidency in 2008 and serves a full two terms until 2016, that means that only two families will have controlled the American executive branch for 26 years.
It's not just about the confusion that already circulates around Bush-I and Bush-II (as if we're numbering our presidents the way the English did their kings) or the inevitable jokes that will swirl around a Hillary presidency, such as a "Mr. First Gentleman" or whatever the designation may be for former president Bill Clinton. It really has to do with the republic's dire need for fresh faces and fresh policies.
Consider the number of Americans who believe that Bush-II overthrew Saddam because of Bush-I: He wanted to either finish the job Daddy started, or, get even with Saddam for the attempted assassination of Dad in 1993. I don't know the extent to which either reason played a role in Bush-II's decision to invade Iraq. I do suspect, however, that it played a larger role than it should have.
The republic deserves better than the sacrifice of its citizens for personal vendettas – it also deserves to have a public policy without any reference to personal hang-ups.
This is not simply a "Bush" problem. The Clintons left office with a fair amount of, to put it gently, "unfinished business." There were the little matters of Republican tactics over perjury investigation, Clinton's impeachment, the failed Mideast negotiations, the last-minute pardons, continuing speculation about what Clinton did or didn't do about al-Qaida, North Korea, Iran, and so on. Dollars to donuts, everything that a Hillary administration would do regarding the Middle East, terrorism, pardons, relations with her husband's former Republican adversaries (many still in positions of power), would be prejudiced by suspicions that she was still working on Bill's issues, not the nation's.
And it's not just people whose last names are Bush or Clinton who trouble me. As every student of the American presidency knows, running for office requires the creation of vast numbers of friends, advisers, loyalists, worker bees and contributors. Once elected, this network, resonant of the old "Spoils System," demands payback. Fair enough – one expects to see qualified loyalists fill White House staff and executive positions. Indeed, every newly elected president probably considers his "FOBs" (Friends of Bill or Friends of Bush, take your pick) to be the smartest pack of players since the guys who wrote the Constitution.
But there's a problem – they're never as smart as the guys who wrote the Constitution, and, for dynastic administrations like the Bushes and potentially, the Clintons, they're also likely to be retreads. Rumsfeld, Powell, Cheney, James Baker, etc., etc., needed no introduction when Bush-II appointed them, campaigned with them or hired them to win the 2000 election. Why? Because they were already known quantities from the Bush-I administration.
Was anyone surprised when Bush-II used this aging set of family loyalists to turn Gulf War-I into Gulf War-II? Don't' get me wrong here – I don't question the sincerity of "Bush's people" (sounds like servants who belong to a plantation), but was it the right set of guys to figure out how to respond to 9-11? And does anyone doubt that a Hillary Clinton presidency will bring in some awfully familiar faces, raising some awfully familiar (bad) memories, and always leaving her suspect to being influenced by "dynastic considerations" (i.e., Bill's input based on his uncompleted agenda)? I think so. And I think the republic deserves better.
When Abraham Lincoln sent his famous 1862 Annual Message to Congress, he included some of his most memorable words. "As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country." Today, no one fears a rebel army marching on Washington, but we do have concerns about terrorist attacks, Americans with no health insurance, rebuilding the Gulf Coast, and so on.
Our case is surely new, and, given the magnitude of the problems we're confronting, we had better think anew and act anew – and I sometimes think that what we must disenthrall ourselves from in order to save the country are the same old faces and names and the same by now old and tired approaches to things.
This issue will not be addressed by electing as president somebody we've all heard of before. As the politicians love to say, "It's time for a change!"
Click Here
Liberal and Proud
Time for a change
Posted: December 19, 2005
Events this week offered columnists a "target rich opportunity" for subjects – what with the elections in Iraq and disclosures of President Bush's secret wiretapping and eavesdropping on American citizens (Gee, why is this liberal not surprised?). But I'm going to forego these current topics in favor of some bigger concerns, ones that actually go beyond the usual Left vs. Right conversation.
The issue is one of political dynasties and the problems they pose to both parties in governing America. I have two dynasties in mind – one already made (the Bushes) and one in the process of being made (the Clintons). Consider this: If Hillary Clinton wins the presidency in 2008 and serves a full two terms until 2016, that means that only two families will have controlled the American executive branch for 26 years.
It's not just about the confusion that already circulates around Bush-I and Bush-II (as if we're numbering our presidents the way the English did their kings) or the inevitable jokes that will swirl around a Hillary presidency, such as a "Mr. First Gentleman" or whatever the designation may be for former president Bill Clinton. It really has to do with the republic's dire need for fresh faces and fresh policies.
Consider the number of Americans who believe that Bush-II overthrew Saddam because of Bush-I: He wanted to either finish the job Daddy started, or, get even with Saddam for the attempted assassination of Dad in 1993. I don't know the extent to which either reason played a role in Bush-II's decision to invade Iraq. I do suspect, however, that it played a larger role than it should have.
The republic deserves better than the sacrifice of its citizens for personal vendettas – it also deserves to have a public policy without any reference to personal hang-ups.
This is not simply a "Bush" problem. The Clintons left office with a fair amount of, to put it gently, "unfinished business." There were the little matters of Republican tactics over perjury investigation, Clinton's impeachment, the failed Mideast negotiations, the last-minute pardons, continuing speculation about what Clinton did or didn't do about al-Qaida, North Korea, Iran, and so on. Dollars to donuts, everything that a Hillary administration would do regarding the Middle East, terrorism, pardons, relations with her husband's former Republican adversaries (many still in positions of power), would be prejudiced by suspicions that she was still working on Bill's issues, not the nation's.
And it's not just people whose last names are Bush or Clinton who trouble me. As every student of the American presidency knows, running for office requires the creation of vast numbers of friends, advisers, loyalists, worker bees and contributors. Once elected, this network, resonant of the old "Spoils System," demands payback. Fair enough – one expects to see qualified loyalists fill White House staff and executive positions. Indeed, every newly elected president probably considers his "FOBs" (Friends of Bill or Friends of Bush, take your pick) to be the smartest pack of players since the guys who wrote the Constitution.
But there's a problem – they're never as smart as the guys who wrote the Constitution, and, for dynastic administrations like the Bushes and potentially, the Clintons, they're also likely to be retreads. Rumsfeld, Powell, Cheney, James Baker, etc., etc., needed no introduction when Bush-II appointed them, campaigned with them or hired them to win the 2000 election. Why? Because they were already known quantities from the Bush-I administration.
Was anyone surprised when Bush-II used this aging set of family loyalists to turn Gulf War-I into Gulf War-II? Don't' get me wrong here – I don't question the sincerity of "Bush's people" (sounds like servants who belong to a plantation), but was it the right set of guys to figure out how to respond to 9-11? And does anyone doubt that a Hillary Clinton presidency will bring in some awfully familiar faces, raising some awfully familiar (bad) memories, and always leaving her suspect to being influenced by "dynastic considerations" (i.e., Bill's input based on his uncompleted agenda)? I think so. And I think the republic deserves better.
When Abraham Lincoln sent his famous 1862 Annual Message to Congress, he included some of his most memorable words. "As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country." Today, no one fears a rebel army marching on Washington, but we do have concerns about terrorist attacks, Americans with no health insurance, rebuilding the Gulf Coast, and so on.
Our case is surely new, and, given the magnitude of the problems we're confronting, we had better think anew and act anew – and I sometimes think that what we must disenthrall ourselves from in order to save the country are the same old faces and names and the same by now old and tired approaches to things.
This issue will not be addressed by electing as president somebody we've all heard of before. As the politicians love to say, "It's time for a change!"
Click Here
QUOTE
Rep. David Obey of Wisconsin, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, denounced the ANWR provision and another last-minute addition sought by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.: liability protection for vaccine makers in most circumstances, coupled with a compensation fund to individuals harmed by the shots they receive.
"There is something especially outrageous about the willingness of the majority party leadership to allow the Defense Department bill, in a time of war, to be held hostage to totally unrelated special interest items," Obey said.
"There is something especially outrageous about the willingness of the majority party leadership to allow the Defense Department bill, in a time of war, to be held hostage to totally unrelated special interest items," Obey said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/115...ngress_Rdp.html
Has anyone even seen this? I knew about ANWAR but this hasn't even been mentioned at all. My god, how deceptive are these weasels? Frist is a fine, upstanding man of of integrity and an outstanding example of Christians in positions of power.
Here's the second in the Toledo Blade series about pay to play in Bush World.
Article published December 19, 2005
Bush money network rooted in Florida, Texas
By STEVE EDER
AND JIM DREW
BLADE STAFF WRITERS
Second of three parts
DALLAS - Long before George W. Bush began campaigning for the White House, his family built a fund-raising network of wealthy supporters to bankroll his political ambitions and propel him to the presidency.
The network - including oilmen, lobbyists, developers, and agricultural executives - became accustomed to the Bush family's style of government, with George W. Bush as governor of Texas and brother Jeb Bush as governor of Florida.
The political financiers made an investment in the Bush family, an investment that paid off.
By 2004, President Bush's re-election campaign had assembled 66 elite fund-raisers in Texas and 55 in Florida. Some of the supporters, known as Pioneers and Rangers for raising at least $100,000 or $200,000, respectively, say they collected contributions for Mr. Bush because he was a trusted friend with common political ideas.
Some, though, acknowledge that being a prolific fund-raiser translates into access for those who want to influence government decisions.
"If you support someone, it's going to give you a leg up on getting an audience. There's nothing wrong with that," said Pioneer Charles Beggs Moncrief of Moncrief Oil in Fort Worth.
Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, the federal government has awarded more than $3 billion in contracts to the President's elite 2004 Texas fund-raisers, their businesses, and lobbying clients, a Blade investigation shows. In Florida, massive sugar companies and development firms led by Bush Pioneers and Rangers have reaped millions of dollars from government policies, which environmentalists say have sided with sprawl and development over the restoration of the Everglades.
The Bush strongholds of Texas and Florida became the roots of a fund-raising tree that by 2004 had enlisted 548 Pioneers and Rangers nationwide - including 30 in Ohio.
A Blade report in October showed that Mr. Bush's top Ohio fund-raisers collected more than $1.2 billion in taxpayers' dollars for their companies and lobbying clients.
One Ohio "Pioneer," former Toledo-area rare-coin dealer Tom Noe, was indicted in October on three felony charges that he illegally laundered money into the Bush re-election campaign. The Blade first reported on April 3 that the Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation gave Mr. Noe $50 million to invest in his rare-coin funds. State officials accuse him of stealing millions of dollars from the funds.
Supporting the 'cause'
Members of President Bush's prestigious fund-raising clubs in Texas and Florida - who raised at least $17.1 million of the $40 million collected for his re-election effort last year in the two states - stood to win millions of dollars through federal energy, environmental, or agricultural policies. Others had federal contracts to supply accounting services to government agencies or electricity to the Department of Defense, while some won high-ranking appointments and ambassadorships.
Bill Ceverha, a Bush Pioneer and political strategist who spent 12 years in the Texas Legislature, believes that most of Mr. Bush's key fund-raisers didn't expect anything from the President besides sound governance.
"These are people of a stature that they don't want any appointments. They don't need anything from the government," said Mr. Ceverha, who works as a political adviser to Louis Beecherl, an oilman and Bush Pioneer who declines to speak with the media. "They are just doing it because they believe in the cause."
In the early 1990s, Mr. Ceverha was among the Texans who helped persuade George W. Bush to run for governor. Today, there are photos of Mr. Bush on the wall of his Dallas office, and Mr. Ceverha says he and his wife are invited to White House Christmas parties.
He said being a Bush Pioneer or Ranger provides access but no guarantees from the President.
"I don't know any of them who are looking for anything in particular," Mr. Ceverha said. "They know they are going to get an audience when they go to Washington, not necessarily with the President, but with this senator or that senator, or this congressman."
As Texas's governor during the 1990s, Mr. Bush established a loyal following that included deep-pocketed political financiers by selling them on his straight-forward style of leadership and looking out for their interests in the statehouse, said Tom Smith of the Texas chapter of Public Citizen, a nonprofit public interest organization.
"The Texas Pioneers and Rangers learned through the Bush gubernatorial era that their investments would pay off, so they were more than willing to be leaders when Bush began to run for president," Mr. Smith said.
Pilgrim's poultry
Lonnie "Bo" Pilgrim, the chairman of Texas-based Pilgrim's Pride, is adamant that his fund-raising activities aren't done for "selfish reasons."
"I do it, first of all, for what I believe is right and people I contribute to have the same philosophy I have," said Mr. Pilgrim, a Bush Pioneer. "You know, I'm a conservative. I believe in integrity. I believe in a minimum of regulations. I don't believe in high taxes."
Mr. Pilgrim, who founded his company 60 years ago, has seen it grow into the nation's second-largest poultry producer. Last year, the company posted more than $5 billion in sales.
Since President Bush took office in 2001, Mr. Pilgrim's business collected nearly $60 million from the federal government for selling poultry to the Agricultural Marketing Service, a government agency that assists farmers and provides food for the poor.
Mr. Pilgrim said he didn't know that his company had received federal money, but he characterized the federal payments as a "small number," considering his business does "$20 million a day."
He said he's only asked President Bush once for a favor - that he speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin about stopping Russia's ban on the import of U.S. chickens. In May, 2002, President Bush spoke with Mr. Putin about the so-called "chicken war" - and the Russians eventually allowed the import of the U.S. products.
The discussions came after the two presidents signed a historic nuclear arms treaty at the Kremlin.
"President Putin and I also agree that we'll work to resolve disputed areas of trading, such as poultry or steel, in a spirit of mutual respect and trust," President Bush said at a news conference after the signing of the joint declaration.
Mr. Pilgrim, who said he requested Mr. Bush's intervention on behalf of the chicken industry, called the process "slow and even discouraging" at times.
"I think President Putin didn't have total control of many things down there in Russia, just like politicians here in America don't have total control," said Mr. Pilgrim, who added that Mr. Bush, his wife, Laura, and his two daughters, Jenna and Barbara, spent a night at his home while Mr. Bush was running for governor in Texas.
Defense and accounting
Of the more than $3 billion in federal contracts awarded to President Bush's key Texas fund-raisers and their lobbying clients, more than $1.7 billion went to the customers of Tom Loeffler, a lobbyist, former Texas congressman, and Bush Ranger.
Two of Mr. Loeffler's clients, American Management Systems and Motorola, collected the majority of the federal contract money. Motorola supplied security and communications products to the Department of Defense and other agencies, while American Management provided computer services to a number of agencies including the Coast Guard and Defense Department.
Mr. Loeffler's clients, in total, collected more than $960 million in Department of Defense contracts since Mr. Bush took office.
Julian Read, a spokesman for Mr. Loeffler, who is based in San Antonio, said the lobbying clients might have "gotten the contracts whether or not he was involved."
Adding that Mr. Loeffler has been a friend and supporter of the President for many years, Mr. Read said: "There are many, many factors involved in awarding contracts ... They probably don't have anything to do with lobbyists."
Besides chicken and defense contractors, the accounting giant PricewaterhouseCoopers also helped keep President Bush in the White House.
The firm last year lent two of its top executives, Carter Pate and Richard Kilgust, to the Bush campaign to raise money. The two men were so successful they were named Bush Rangers.
Pricewaterhouse has collected more than $353 million for accounting and auditing services from federal agencies since Mr. Bush took office in 2001.
To bolster its business with the government, the accounting firm in late October hired a business strategy firm, California-based SM&A, as an adviser.
Mr. Pate, a Texas resident and managing partner of Pricewaterhouse's Washington office, said in a statement: "SM&A's 22-year history of winning leadership in federal business capture made them the logical choice for moving forward with us."
A spokesman declined to comment on behalf of Mr. Pate and Mr. Kilgust, another senior partner with the accounting firm.
Kingdom of sugar
For miles and miles, the land along U.S. 27 through Florida's Broward and Palm Beach counties is barren, either under water, or black with a soil that locals call "muck."
But about six miles south of Lake Okeechobee, the smokestacks of the massive Florida Crystals refinery dominate the landscape, the smoke blending with the steel-gray sky.
And in the nearby town of Clewiston, which bills itself as "America's Sweetest Town,'' workers stream out of the U.S. Sugar Corp.'s refinery as rain falls on another humid, 75-degree day in December.
The federal and state governments call it the "Everglades Agricultural Area."
It is the kingdom of the sugar giants.
Two of President Bush's top Florida fund-raisers in 2004 were Jose "Pepe" Fanjul, president of Florida Crystals Corp., and Robert Edward Coker, senior vice president of U.S. Sugar.
The sugar industry and developers have profited under President Bush and his brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, in part by gutting the purpose of the federal Everglades Restoration Act, said Jonathan Ullman, Everglades field representative for the Sierra Club.
The law was signed in 2000 by President Bill Clinton.
Under the Bush Administration:
The Army Corps of Engineers has weakened the rules governing the proposed restoration of the Everglades, in part by restricting the Department of Interior's oversight power.
In 2002, the federal government gave the green light to rock-mining companies that want to destroy about 20,000 acres of wetlands. Environmental groups, saying the mining would contaminate groundwater, have sued.
Two years ago, at the request of Florida sugar companies and several lobbyists they hired, Governor Bush signed a bill into law to amend the state's Everglades Forever Act, which has set a 2006 deadline for the cleanup of phosphorus. Governor Bush signed legislation that delayed the planned cleanup of phosphorous pollution from the sugar industry by another 10 years.
The administrations of both President Bush and Governor Bush have allowed residential development on land environmentalists say is needed to restore the Everglades. Critics also say the administrations have not provided enough money for a proposal to replace a roadway in Miami-Dade County with an 11-mile elevated skyway that would allow for natural flow of water into Everglades National Park.
In 2000, Mr. Coker and Mr. Fanjul were at Governor Bush's side at Everglades National Park when he signed legislation into law implementing the federal Everglades Restoration Act.
"There are certain milestones in our careers and lives where everything comes together, and we recognize that we have actually done something of lasting importance,'' Governor Bush said at the time.
The Sierra Club had generally supported the $8 billion blueprint, but the group now only supports parts of it.
"We could see that both Bush administrations in Tallahassee and Washington were abandoning the plan and it was being turned into a water-supply project for the benefit of developers, specifically sprawl development," said Mr. Ullman, the group's Everglades field representative in Miami.
Russell Schweiss, Governor Bush's senior press secretary, rejected the charge and said environmental groups have distorted the governor's record.
"It is abundantly clear that Everglades restoration is one of his top priorities, based solely on the investment he has committed to the project. A lot of the governor's critics have argued that it is simply to get water for South Florida, but the fact is you can't restore the Everglades without providing a better water source to South Florida," said Mr. Schweiss, who added that phosphorous levels have declined in the Everglades during Governor Bush's tenure.
Three Florida Bush Rangers - Al Austin, Alfred Hoffman, Jr., and H. Gary Morse - served on Governor Bush's Council of 100, a business advisory group which in 2003 recommended that water from rural northern parts of the state be moved to urban areas in the south. Because of extensive opposition, Governor Bush has shelved the recommendation.
Mr. Hoffman, chairman of one of the state's largest development firms, was the council's chairman. In 2004, he was national co-chairman and Florida finance chairman for President Bush's re-election campaign. President Bush in July nominated him as ambassador to Portugal.
Mr. Austin, a Tampa-based developer, was a fund-raiser for Governor Bush's 1998 campaign.
Mr. Morse is a developer who gave more than $80,000 to the Florida Republican Party when Jeb Bush ran successfully for governor in 1998.
Another Florida Bush fund-raiser, attorney C. David Brown - a Pioneer in 2000 and a Ranger in 2004 - helped convince the Scripps Research Institute of California to locate a biotech research center on a 1,920-acre site in Palm Beach County near the Everglades.
Governor Bush has supported the project. It is on hold, in part, because a federal judge said the Army Corps of Engineers should have conducted a comprehensive environmental review of whether the institute could use the site.
Mr. Brown's law firm received about $200,000 from the state of Florida for working on the project.
Development of the land, now covered with orange groves, would damage the Everglades, the Sierra Club's Mr. Ullman said.
Energy industry
President Bush faced criticism when he was governor of Texas for aiding his financial supporters.
Critics charged that his hands-off approach to the state's booming energy industry was because he was beholden to oil and energy interests, which had provided millions of dollars for his campaigns.
Tom Smith of the Texas chapter of Public Citizen said recently that Mr. Bush had a record in Texas of deregulating utilities and allowing polluters to police themselves - policies which would foreshadow the actions he would take in the White House.
"His attempts to forgive utilities on every turn can only be figured out in the context of its payback for their help in his election," Mr. Smith said.
After his election in 2000, President Bush assembled an energy transition team that included a number of Bush fund-raisers, such as former Enron executive Ken Lay, a 2000 Pioneer, and Erle Nye, a 2004 Pioneer and the former chairman of TXU, a large Texas energy company.
Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, TXU has collected more than $147 million in federal contracts for supplying gas and electric services to several agencies, including the Department of Defense. On Dec. 5, 2001, the Defense Logistics Agency authorized a $71 million contract to TXU for fuel oils. TXU also received a $600 million tax refund in 2003, according to the company's official filings.
During President Clinton's eight years in office, TXU received $69 million in federal contracts.
Mr. Nye, who left TXU earlier this year, could not be reached for comment. Mr. Nye was appointed by Mr. Bush to serve on the Texas A&M University System Board of Regents.
Charles Beggs Moncrief of Moncrief Oil in Fort Worth, another Bush Pioneer, said he's never asked for any favors from the Bush Administration.
Mr. Moncrief said being a Bush fund-raiser "obviously" could help someone gain access.
"That works whether you are a Republican or a Democrat," he said.
Mr. Moncrief's father, W.A. "Tex" Moncrief, the longtime owner of Moncrief Oil and a major Republican contributor, said he believes one of the "big reasons" Mr. Bush decided to invade Iraq was oil. And the decision, he said, will pay dividends for the U.S. oil market.
"The Iraq situation doesn't look good, but my honest opinion is that if we hadn't gone into Iraq, then we would be in worse shape with the oil situation," he said. "The Iraqis probably would have gone into Saudi Arabia and certainly gotten into a squabble with Iran or taken them over and have a lock on all of the oil, which they don't have now."
Money: a loud voice
Texas is "a prime example of money running things," said Fred Lewis, an Austin-based attorney and leader of Clean Up Texas Politics.
"Those that give money do well," he said. "Money speaks pretty loud down here on all sorts of issues, whether it's consumer rights, environmental issues."
The same is true in Florida, where the leading sugar companies have held on to their "enormous power" by contributing millions of dollars to federal and state candidates, said Nancy Watzman, senior analyst for Public Campaign, which advocates public financing of political races.
In 1992, Alfonso "Alfy" Fanjul, an executive with Florida Crystals Corp., was co-chairman of Mr. Clinton's presidential campaign in Florida.
Four years later, his brother, "Pepe," was national vice chairman of finance for Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole, the former Senate GOP leader from Kansas.
After Vice President Al Gore suggested that a tax on sugar producers could help pay for Everglades restoration, "Alfy" Fanjul called President Clinton on Feb. 19, 1996.
Monica Lewinsky, the White House intern who was having an affair with Mr. Clinton, was in the Oval Office at the time and later told investigators that someone named "Fanuli" had called while she was there. White House phone records showed that the caller was "Alfy" Fanjul.
Mr. Gore's sugar-tax proposal never moved forward.
Also that year, J. Nelson Fairbanks, the president and CEO of U.S. Sugar, led a successful effort to block a proposed state sugar tax.
In 2000, Mr. Fairbanks attained Bush Pioneer status, and when he retired in 2003, Robert Edward Coker, a senior vice president, took his place as a Bush fund-raiser.
"If you wanted to have a textbook example of a business interest that has learned how to work the system by giving campaign money, these folks would be near the top of the list,'' said Ms. Watzman of Public Campaign. "They know how to play the money and politics game to the max."
Michael M. Boone, a Bush Ranger and co-founder of the Dallas-based law firm Haynes and Boone, said contributors who expect paybacks from the White House for campaign contributions are not unique to Republicans.
"I'm sure a lot of people supported Clinton in hopes that they could get something in exchange ... and I'm sure there's somebody like that for George Bush," he said, adding that he's never asked for any favors.
"Knowing George Bush, I would never, ever trade on anything with him because I think he'd throw me out of his office. He is as clean as I can think of as a person on that kind of issue."
Contact Steve Eder at: seder@theblade.com or 614-221-0496.
The third and last in the series will be tomorrow.
Article published December 19, 2005
Bush money network rooted in Florida, Texas
By STEVE EDER
AND JIM DREW
BLADE STAFF WRITERS
Second of three parts
DALLAS - Long before George W. Bush began campaigning for the White House, his family built a fund-raising network of wealthy supporters to bankroll his political ambitions and propel him to the presidency.
The network - including oilmen, lobbyists, developers, and agricultural executives - became accustomed to the Bush family's style of government, with George W. Bush as governor of Texas and brother Jeb Bush as governor of Florida.
The political financiers made an investment in the Bush family, an investment that paid off.
By 2004, President Bush's re-election campaign had assembled 66 elite fund-raisers in Texas and 55 in Florida. Some of the supporters, known as Pioneers and Rangers for raising at least $100,000 or $200,000, respectively, say they collected contributions for Mr. Bush because he was a trusted friend with common political ideas.
Some, though, acknowledge that being a prolific fund-raiser translates into access for those who want to influence government decisions.
"If you support someone, it's going to give you a leg up on getting an audience. There's nothing wrong with that," said Pioneer Charles Beggs Moncrief of Moncrief Oil in Fort Worth.
Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, the federal government has awarded more than $3 billion in contracts to the President's elite 2004 Texas fund-raisers, their businesses, and lobbying clients, a Blade investigation shows. In Florida, massive sugar companies and development firms led by Bush Pioneers and Rangers have reaped millions of dollars from government policies, which environmentalists say have sided with sprawl and development over the restoration of the Everglades.
The Bush strongholds of Texas and Florida became the roots of a fund-raising tree that by 2004 had enlisted 548 Pioneers and Rangers nationwide - including 30 in Ohio.
A Blade report in October showed that Mr. Bush's top Ohio fund-raisers collected more than $1.2 billion in taxpayers' dollars for their companies and lobbying clients.
One Ohio "Pioneer," former Toledo-area rare-coin dealer Tom Noe, was indicted in October on three felony charges that he illegally laundered money into the Bush re-election campaign. The Blade first reported on April 3 that the Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation gave Mr. Noe $50 million to invest in his rare-coin funds. State officials accuse him of stealing millions of dollars from the funds.
Supporting the 'cause'
Members of President Bush's prestigious fund-raising clubs in Texas and Florida - who raised at least $17.1 million of the $40 million collected for his re-election effort last year in the two states - stood to win millions of dollars through federal energy, environmental, or agricultural policies. Others had federal contracts to supply accounting services to government agencies or electricity to the Department of Defense, while some won high-ranking appointments and ambassadorships.
Bill Ceverha, a Bush Pioneer and political strategist who spent 12 years in the Texas Legislature, believes that most of Mr. Bush's key fund-raisers didn't expect anything from the President besides sound governance.
"These are people of a stature that they don't want any appointments. They don't need anything from the government," said Mr. Ceverha, who works as a political adviser to Louis Beecherl, an oilman and Bush Pioneer who declines to speak with the media. "They are just doing it because they believe in the cause."
In the early 1990s, Mr. Ceverha was among the Texans who helped persuade George W. Bush to run for governor. Today, there are photos of Mr. Bush on the wall of his Dallas office, and Mr. Ceverha says he and his wife are invited to White House Christmas parties.
He said being a Bush Pioneer or Ranger provides access but no guarantees from the President.
"I don't know any of them who are looking for anything in particular," Mr. Ceverha said. "They know they are going to get an audience when they go to Washington, not necessarily with the President, but with this senator or that senator, or this congressman."
As Texas's governor during the 1990s, Mr. Bush established a loyal following that included deep-pocketed political financiers by selling them on his straight-forward style of leadership and looking out for their interests in the statehouse, said Tom Smith of the Texas chapter of Public Citizen, a nonprofit public interest organization.
"The Texas Pioneers and Rangers learned through the Bush gubernatorial era that their investments would pay off, so they were more than willing to be leaders when Bush began to run for president," Mr. Smith said.
Pilgrim's poultry
Lonnie "Bo" Pilgrim, the chairman of Texas-based Pilgrim's Pride, is adamant that his fund-raising activities aren't done for "selfish reasons."
"I do it, first of all, for what I believe is right and people I contribute to have the same philosophy I have," said Mr. Pilgrim, a Bush Pioneer. "You know, I'm a conservative. I believe in integrity. I believe in a minimum of regulations. I don't believe in high taxes."
Mr. Pilgrim, who founded his company 60 years ago, has seen it grow into the nation's second-largest poultry producer. Last year, the company posted more than $5 billion in sales.
Since President Bush took office in 2001, Mr. Pilgrim's business collected nearly $60 million from the federal government for selling poultry to the Agricultural Marketing Service, a government agency that assists farmers and provides food for the poor.
Mr. Pilgrim said he didn't know that his company had received federal money, but he characterized the federal payments as a "small number," considering his business does "$20 million a day."
He said he's only asked President Bush once for a favor - that he speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin about stopping Russia's ban on the import of U.S. chickens. In May, 2002, President Bush spoke with Mr. Putin about the so-called "chicken war" - and the Russians eventually allowed the import of the U.S. products.
The discussions came after the two presidents signed a historic nuclear arms treaty at the Kremlin.
"President Putin and I also agree that we'll work to resolve disputed areas of trading, such as poultry or steel, in a spirit of mutual respect and trust," President Bush said at a news conference after the signing of the joint declaration.
Mr. Pilgrim, who said he requested Mr. Bush's intervention on behalf of the chicken industry, called the process "slow and even discouraging" at times.
"I think President Putin didn't have total control of many things down there in Russia, just like politicians here in America don't have total control," said Mr. Pilgrim, who added that Mr. Bush, his wife, Laura, and his two daughters, Jenna and Barbara, spent a night at his home while Mr. Bush was running for governor in Texas.
Defense and accounting
Of the more than $3 billion in federal contracts awarded to President Bush's key Texas fund-raisers and their lobbying clients, more than $1.7 billion went to the customers of Tom Loeffler, a lobbyist, former Texas congressman, and Bush Ranger.
Two of Mr. Loeffler's clients, American Management Systems and Motorola, collected the majority of the federal contract money. Motorola supplied security and communications products to the Department of Defense and other agencies, while American Management provided computer services to a number of agencies including the Coast Guard and Defense Department.
Mr. Loeffler's clients, in total, collected more than $960 million in Department of Defense contracts since Mr. Bush took office.
Julian Read, a spokesman for Mr. Loeffler, who is based in San Antonio, said the lobbying clients might have "gotten the contracts whether or not he was involved."
Adding that Mr. Loeffler has been a friend and supporter of the President for many years, Mr. Read said: "There are many, many factors involved in awarding contracts ... They probably don't have anything to do with lobbyists."
Besides chicken and defense contractors, the accounting giant PricewaterhouseCoopers also helped keep President Bush in the White House.
The firm last year lent two of its top executives, Carter Pate and Richard Kilgust, to the Bush campaign to raise money. The two men were so successful they were named Bush Rangers.
Pricewaterhouse has collected more than $353 million for accounting and auditing services from federal agencies since Mr. Bush took office in 2001.
To bolster its business with the government, the accounting firm in late October hired a business strategy firm, California-based SM&A, as an adviser.
Mr. Pate, a Texas resident and managing partner of Pricewaterhouse's Washington office, said in a statement: "SM&A's 22-year history of winning leadership in federal business capture made them the logical choice for moving forward with us."
A spokesman declined to comment on behalf of Mr. Pate and Mr. Kilgust, another senior partner with the accounting firm.
Kingdom of sugar
For miles and miles, the land along U.S. 27 through Florida's Broward and Palm Beach counties is barren, either under water, or black with a soil that locals call "muck."
But about six miles south of Lake Okeechobee, the smokestacks of the massive Florida Crystals refinery dominate the landscape, the smoke blending with the steel-gray sky.
And in the nearby town of Clewiston, which bills itself as "America's Sweetest Town,'' workers stream out of the U.S. Sugar Corp.'s refinery as rain falls on another humid, 75-degree day in December.
The federal and state governments call it the "Everglades Agricultural Area."
It is the kingdom of the sugar giants.
Two of President Bush's top Florida fund-raisers in 2004 were Jose "Pepe" Fanjul, president of Florida Crystals Corp., and Robert Edward Coker, senior vice president of U.S. Sugar.
The sugar industry and developers have profited under President Bush and his brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, in part by gutting the purpose of the federal Everglades Restoration Act, said Jonathan Ullman, Everglades field representative for the Sierra Club.
The law was signed in 2000 by President Bill Clinton.
Under the Bush Administration:
The Army Corps of Engineers has weakened the rules governing the proposed restoration of the Everglades, in part by restricting the Department of Interior's oversight power.
In 2002, the federal government gave the green light to rock-mining companies that want to destroy about 20,000 acres of wetlands. Environmental groups, saying the mining would contaminate groundwater, have sued.
Two years ago, at the request of Florida sugar companies and several lobbyists they hired, Governor Bush signed a bill into law to amend the state's Everglades Forever Act, which has set a 2006 deadline for the cleanup of phosphorus. Governor Bush signed legislation that delayed the planned cleanup of phosphorous pollution from the sugar industry by another 10 years.
The administrations of both President Bush and Governor Bush have allowed residential development on land environmentalists say is needed to restore the Everglades. Critics also say the administrations have not provided enough money for a proposal to replace a roadway in Miami-Dade County with an 11-mile elevated skyway that would allow for natural flow of water into Everglades National Park.
In 2000, Mr. Coker and Mr. Fanjul were at Governor Bush's side at Everglades National Park when he signed legislation into law implementing the federal Everglades Restoration Act.
"There are certain milestones in our careers and lives where everything comes together, and we recognize that we have actually done something of lasting importance,'' Governor Bush said at the time.
The Sierra Club had generally supported the $8 billion blueprint, but the group now only supports parts of it.
"We could see that both Bush administrations in Tallahassee and Washington were abandoning the plan and it was being turned into a water-supply project for the benefit of developers, specifically sprawl development," said Mr. Ullman, the group's Everglades field representative in Miami.
Russell Schweiss, Governor Bush's senior press secretary, rejected the charge and said environmental groups have distorted the governor's record.
"It is abundantly clear that Everglades restoration is one of his top priorities, based solely on the investment he has committed to the project. A lot of the governor's critics have argued that it is simply to get water for South Florida, but the fact is you can't restore the Everglades without providing a better water source to South Florida," said Mr. Schweiss, who added that phosphorous levels have declined in the Everglades during Governor Bush's tenure.
Three Florida Bush Rangers - Al Austin, Alfred Hoffman, Jr., and H. Gary Morse - served on Governor Bush's Council of 100, a business advisory group which in 2003 recommended that water from rural northern parts of the state be moved to urban areas in the south. Because of extensive opposition, Governor Bush has shelved the recommendation.
Mr. Hoffman, chairman of one of the state's largest development firms, was the council's chairman. In 2004, he was national co-chairman and Florida finance chairman for President Bush's re-election campaign. President Bush in July nominated him as ambassador to Portugal.
Mr. Austin, a Tampa-based developer, was a fund-raiser for Governor Bush's 1998 campaign.
Mr. Morse is a developer who gave more than $80,000 to the Florida Republican Party when Jeb Bush ran successfully for governor in 1998.
Another Florida Bush fund-raiser, attorney C. David Brown - a Pioneer in 2000 and a Ranger in 2004 - helped convince the Scripps Research Institute of California to locate a biotech research center on a 1,920-acre site in Palm Beach County near the Everglades.
Governor Bush has supported the project. It is on hold, in part, because a federal judge said the Army Corps of Engineers should have conducted a comprehensive environmental review of whether the institute could use the site.
Mr. Brown's law firm received about $200,000 from the state of Florida for working on the project.
Development of the land, now covered with orange groves, would damage the Everglades, the Sierra Club's Mr. Ullman said.
Energy industry
President Bush faced criticism when he was governor of Texas for aiding his financial supporters.
Critics charged that his hands-off approach to the state's booming energy industry was because he was beholden to oil and energy interests, which had provided millions of dollars for his campaigns.
Tom Smith of the Texas chapter of Public Citizen said recently that Mr. Bush had a record in Texas of deregulating utilities and allowing polluters to police themselves - policies which would foreshadow the actions he would take in the White House.
"His attempts to forgive utilities on every turn can only be figured out in the context of its payback for their help in his election," Mr. Smith said.
After his election in 2000, President Bush assembled an energy transition team that included a number of Bush fund-raisers, such as former Enron executive Ken Lay, a 2000 Pioneer, and Erle Nye, a 2004 Pioneer and the former chairman of TXU, a large Texas energy company.
Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, TXU has collected more than $147 million in federal contracts for supplying gas and electric services to several agencies, including the Department of Defense. On Dec. 5, 2001, the Defense Logistics Agency authorized a $71 million contract to TXU for fuel oils. TXU also received a $600 million tax refund in 2003, according to the company's official filings.
During President Clinton's eight years in office, TXU received $69 million in federal contracts.
Mr. Nye, who left TXU earlier this year, could not be reached for comment. Mr. Nye was appointed by Mr. Bush to serve on the Texas A&M University System Board of Regents.
Charles Beggs Moncrief of Moncrief Oil in Fort Worth, another Bush Pioneer, said he's never asked for any favors from the Bush Administration.
Mr. Moncrief said being a Bush fund-raiser "obviously" could help someone gain access.
"That works whether you are a Republican or a Democrat," he said.
Mr. Moncrief's father, W.A. "Tex" Moncrief, the longtime owner of Moncrief Oil and a major Republican contributor, said he believes one of the "big reasons" Mr. Bush decided to invade Iraq was oil. And the decision, he said, will pay dividends for the U.S. oil market.
"The Iraq situation doesn't look good, but my honest opinion is that if we hadn't gone into Iraq, then we would be in worse shape with the oil situation," he said. "The Iraqis probably would have gone into Saudi Arabia and certainly gotten into a squabble with Iran or taken them over and have a lock on all of the oil, which they don't have now."
Money: a loud voice
Texas is "a prime example of money running things," said Fred Lewis, an Austin-based attorney and leader of Clean Up Texas Politics.
"Those that give money do well," he said. "Money speaks pretty loud down here on all sorts of issues, whether it's consumer rights, environmental issues."
The same is true in Florida, where the leading sugar companies have held on to their "enormous power" by contributing millions of dollars to federal and state candidates, said Nancy Watzman, senior analyst for Public Campaign, which advocates public financing of political races.
In 1992, Alfonso "Alfy" Fanjul, an executive with Florida Crystals Corp., was co-chairman of Mr. Clinton's presidential campaign in Florida.
Four years later, his brother, "Pepe," was national vice chairman of finance for Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole, the former Senate GOP leader from Kansas.
After Vice President Al Gore suggested that a tax on sugar producers could help pay for Everglades restoration, "Alfy" Fanjul called President Clinton on Feb. 19, 1996.
Monica Lewinsky, the White House intern who was having an affair with Mr. Clinton, was in the Oval Office at the time and later told investigators that someone named "Fanuli" had called while she was there. White House phone records showed that the caller was "Alfy" Fanjul.
Mr. Gore's sugar-tax proposal never moved forward.
Also that year, J. Nelson Fairbanks, the president and CEO of U.S. Sugar, led a successful effort to block a proposed state sugar tax.
In 2000, Mr. Fairbanks attained Bush Pioneer status, and when he retired in 2003, Robert Edward Coker, a senior vice president, took his place as a Bush fund-raiser.
"If you wanted to have a textbook example of a business interest that has learned how to work the system by giving campaign money, these folks would be near the top of the list,'' said Ms. Watzman of Public Campaign. "They know how to play the money and politics game to the max."
Michael M. Boone, a Bush Ranger and co-founder of the Dallas-based law firm Haynes and Boone, said contributors who expect paybacks from the White House for campaign contributions are not unique to Republicans.
"I'm sure a lot of people supported Clinton in hopes that they could get something in exchange ... and I'm sure there's somebody like that for George Bush," he said, adding that he's never asked for any favors.
"Knowing George Bush, I would never, ever trade on anything with him because I think he'd throw me out of his office. He is as clean as I can think of as a person on that kind of issue."
Contact Steve Eder at: seder@theblade.com or 614-221-0496.
The third and last in the series will be tomorrow.
So I would say my description of these people as corporate whores is an accurate one.
You are correct in your very apt description.
just call them how I see them
as do I
QUOTE
all those Dems trying to make sure we don't produce any oil think that will make us less dependent on the middle east?
That's just a laugher. You know enough Economics to know that the above is weak, weak, weak.
QUOTE(Nomarchy @ Dec 19 2005, 07:55 PM)
That's just a laugher. You know enough Economics to know that the above is weak, weak, weak.
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It's a silly, "rich uninformed" kinda argument.
They kinda live in a bubble like Bushie.
I like to get my news from cartoonists.
Yeah, right.
Yeah, right.
"Don't worry your pretty little head about a thing."
QUOTE(Bee @ Dec 19 2005, 10:36 PM)
"Don't worry your pretty little head about a thing."
[right][snapback]165289[/snapback][/right]
[right][snapback]165289[/snapback][/right]
Okay....
MMMM.. I hope there's a lot of white meat on that thing.
QUOTE(SherryB @ Dec 19 2005, 03:23 PM)
Here's the second in the Toledo Blade series about pay to play in Bush World.
Article published December 19, 2005
Bush money network rooted in Florida, Texas
By STEVE EDER
AND JIM DREW
BLADE STAFF WRITERS
Second of three parts
DALLAS - Long before George W. Bush began campaigning for the White House, his family built a fund-raising network of wealthy supporters to bankroll his political ambitions and propel him to the presidency.
The network - including oilmen, lobbyists, developers, and agricultural executives - became accustomed to the Bush family's style of government, with George W. Bush as governor of Texas and brother Jeb Bush as governor of Florida.
The political financiers made an investment in the Bush family, an investment that paid off.
By 2004, President Bush's re-election campaign had assembled 66 elite fund-raisers in Texas and 55 in Florida. Some of the supporters, known as Pioneers and Rangers for raising at least $100,000 or $200,000, respectively, say they collected contributions for Mr. Bush because he was a trusted friend with common political ideas.
Some, though, acknowledge that being a prolific fund-raiser translates into access for those who want to influence government decisions.
"If you support someone, it's going to give you a leg up on getting an audience. There's nothing wrong with that," said Pioneer Charles Beggs Moncrief of Moncrief Oil in Fort Worth.
Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, the federal government has awarded more than $3 billion in contracts to the President's elite 2004 Texas fund-raisers, their businesses, and lobbying clients, a Blade investigation shows. In Florida, massive sugar companies and development firms led by Bush Pioneers and Rangers have reaped millions of dollars from government policies, which environmentalists say have sided with sprawl and development over the restoration of the Everglades.
The Bush strongholds of Texas and Florida became the roots of a fund-raising tree that by 2004 had enlisted 548 Pioneers and Rangers nationwide - including 30 in Ohio.
A Blade report in October showed that Mr. Bush's top Ohio fund-raisers collected more than $1.2 billion in taxpayers' dollars for their companies and lobbying clients.
One Ohio "Pioneer," former Toledo-area rare-coin dealer Tom Noe, was indicted in October on three felony charges that he illegally laundered money into the Bush re-election campaign. The Blade first reported on April 3 that the Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation gave Mr. Noe $50 million to invest in his rare-coin funds. State officials accuse him of stealing millions of dollars from the funds.
Supporting the 'cause'
Members of President Bush's prestigious fund-raising clubs in Texas and Florida - who raised at least $17.1 million of the $40 million collected for his re-election effort last year in the two states - stood to win millions of dollars through federal energy, environmental, or agricultural policies. Others had federal contracts to supply accounting services to government agencies or electricity to the Department of Defense, while some won high-ranking appointments and ambassadorships.
Bill Ceverha, a Bush Pioneer and political strategist who spent 12 years in the Texas Legislature, believes that most of Mr. Bush's key fund-raisers didn't expect anything from the President besides sound governance.
"These are people of a stature that they don't want any appointments. They don't need anything from the government," said Mr. Ceverha, who works as a political adviser to Louis Beecherl, an oilman and Bush Pioneer who declines to speak with the media. "They are just doing it because they believe in the cause."
In the early 1990s, Mr. Ceverha was among the Texans who helped persuade George W. Bush to run for governor. Today, there are photos of Mr. Bush on the wall of his Dallas office, and Mr. Ceverha says he and his wife are invited to White House Christmas parties.
He said being a Bush Pioneer or Ranger provides access but no guarantees from the President.
"I don't know any of them who are looking for anything in particular," Mr. Ceverha said. "They know they are going to get an audience when they go to Washington, not necessarily with the President, but with this senator or that senator, or this congressman."
As Texas's governor during the 1990s, Mr. Bush established a loyal following that included deep-pocketed political financiers by selling them on his straight-forward style of leadership and looking out for their interests in the statehouse, said Tom Smith of the Texas chapter of Public Citizen, a nonprofit public interest organization.
"The Texas Pioneers and Rangers learned through the Bush gubernatorial era that their investments would pay off, so they were more than willing to be leaders when Bush began to run for president," Mr. Smith said.
Pilgrim's poultry
Lonnie "Bo" Pilgrim, the chairman of Texas-based Pilgrim's Pride, is adamant that his fund-raising activities aren't done for "selfish reasons."
"I do it, first of all, for what I believe is right and people I contribute to have the same philosophy I have," said Mr. Pilgrim, a Bush Pioneer. "You know, I'm a conservative. I believe in integrity. I believe in a minimum of regulations. I don't believe in high taxes."
Mr. Pilgrim, who founded his company 60 years ago, has seen it grow into the nation's second-largest poultry producer. Last year, the company posted more than $5 billion in sales.
Since President Bush took office in 2001, Mr. Pilgrim's business collected nearly $60 million from the federal government for selling poultry to the Agricultural Marketing Service, a government agency that assists farmers and provides food for the poor.
Mr. Pilgrim said he didn't know that his company had received federal money, but he characterized the federal payments as a "small number," considering his business does "$20 million a day."
He said he's only asked President Bush once for a favor - that he speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin about stopping Russia's ban on the import of U.S. chickens. In May, 2002, President Bush spoke with Mr. Putin about the so-called "chicken war" - and the Russians eventually allowed the import of the U.S. products.
The discussions came after the two presidents signed a historic nuclear arms treaty at the Kremlin.
"President Putin and I also agree that we'll work to resolve disputed areas of trading, such as poultry or steel, in a spirit of mutual respect and trust," President Bush said at a news conference after the signing of the joint declaration.
Mr. Pilgrim, who said he requested Mr. Bush's intervention on behalf of the chicken industry, called the process "slow and even discouraging" at times.
"I think President Putin didn't have total control of many things down there in Russia, just like politicians here in America don't have total control," said Mr. Pilgrim, who added that Mr. Bush, his wife, Laura, and his two daughters, Jenna and Barbara, spent a night at his home while Mr. Bush was running for governor in Texas.
Defense and accounting
Of the more than $3 billion in federal contracts awarded to President Bush's key Texas fund-raisers and their lobbying clients, more than $1.7 billion went to the customers of Tom Loeffler, a lobbyist, former Texas congressman, and Bush Ranger.
Two of Mr. Loeffler's clients, American Management Systems and Motorola, collected the majority of the federal contract money. Motorola supplied security and communications products to the Department of Defense and other agencies, while American Management provided computer services to a number of agencies including the Coast Guard and Defense Department.
Mr. Loeffler's clients, in total, collected more than $960 million in Department of Defense contracts since Mr. Bush took office.
Julian Read, a spokesman for Mr. Loeffler, who is based in San Antonio, said the lobbying clients might have "gotten the contracts whether or not he was involved."
Adding that Mr. Loeffler has been a friend and supporter of the President for many years, Mr. Read said: "There are many, many factors involved in awarding contracts ... They probably don't have anything to do with lobbyists."
Besides chicken and defense contractors, the accounting giant PricewaterhouseCoopers also helped keep President Bush in the White House.
The firm last year lent two of its top executives, Carter Pate and Richard Kilgust, to the Bush campaign to raise money. The two men were so successful they were named Bush Rangers.
Pricewaterhouse has collected more than $353 million for accounting and auditing services from federal agencies since Mr. Bush took office in 2001.
To bolster its business with the government, the accounting firm in late October hired a business strategy firm, California-based SM&A, as an adviser.
Mr. Pate, a Texas resident and managing partner of Pricewaterhouse's Washington office, said in a statement: "SM&A's 22-year history of winning leadership in federal business capture made them the logical choice for moving forward with us."
A spokesman declined to comment on behalf of Mr. Pate and Mr. Kilgust, another senior partner with the accounting firm.
Kingdom of sugar
For miles and miles, the land along U.S. 27 through Florida's Broward and Palm Beach counties is barren, either under water, or black with a soil that locals call "muck."
But about six miles south of Lake Okeechobee, the smokestacks of the massive Florida Crystals refinery dominate the landscape, the smoke blending with the steel-gray sky.
And in the nearby town of Clewiston, which bills itself as "America's Sweetest Town,'' workers stream out of the U.S. Sugar Corp.'s refinery as rain falls on another humid, 75-degree day in December.
The federal and state governments call it the "Everglades Agricultural Area."
It is the kingdom of the sugar giants.
Two of President Bush's top Florida fund-raisers in 2004 were Jose "Pepe" Fanjul, president of Florida Crystals Corp., and Robert Edward Coker, senior vice president of U.S. Sugar.
The sugar industry and developers have profited under President Bush and his brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, in part by gutting the purpose of the federal Everglades Restoration Act, said Jonathan Ullman, Everglades field representative for the Sierra Club.
The law was signed in 2000 by President Bill Clinton.
Under the Bush Administration:
The Army Corps of Engineers has weakened the rules governing the proposed restoration of the Everglades, in part by restricting the Department of Interior's oversight power.
In 2002, the federal government gave the green light to rock-mining companies that want to destroy about 20,000 acres of wetlands. Environmental groups, saying the mining would contaminate groundwater, have sued.
Two years ago, at the request of Florida sugar companies and several lobbyists they hired, Governor Bush signed a bill into law to amend the state's Everglades Forever Act, which has set a 2006 deadline for the cleanup of phosphorus. Governor Bush signed legislation that delayed the planned cleanup of phosphorous pollution from the sugar industry by another 10 years.
The administrations of both President Bush and Governor Bush have allowed residential development on land environmentalists say is needed to restore the Everglades. Critics also say the administrations have not provided enough money for a proposal to replace a roadway in Miami-Dade County with an 11-mile elevated skyway that would allow for natural flow of water into Everglades National Park.
In 2000, Mr. Coker and Mr. Fanjul were at Governor Bush's side at Everglades National Park when he signed legislation into law implementing the federal Everglades Restoration Act.
"There are certain milestones in our careers and lives where everything comes together, and we recognize that we have actually done something of lasting importance,'' Governor Bush said at the time.
The Sierra Club had generally supported the $8 billion blueprint, but the group now only supports parts of it.
"We could see that both Bush administrations in Tallahassee and Washington were abandoning the plan and it was being turned into a water-supply project for the benefit of developers, specifically sprawl development," said Mr. Ullman, the group's Everglades field representative in Miami.
Russell Schweiss, Governor Bush's senior press secretary, rejected the charge and said environmental groups have distorted the governor's record.
"It is abundantly clear that Everglades restoration is one of his top priorities, based solely on the investment he has committed to the project. A lot of the governor's critics have argued that it is simply to get water for South Florida, but the fact is you can't restore the Everglades without providing a better water source to South Florida," said Mr. Schweiss, who added that phosphorous levels have declined in the Everglades during Governor Bush's tenure.
Three Florida Bush Rangers - Al Austin, Alfred Hoffman, Jr., and H. Gary Morse - served on Governor Bush's Council of 100, a business advisory group which in 2003 recommended that water from rural northern parts of the state be moved to urban areas in the south. Because of extensive opposition, Governor Bush has shelved the recommendation.
Mr. Hoffman, chairman of one of the state's largest development firms, was the council's chairman. In 2004, he was national co-chairman and Florida finance chairman for President Bush's re-election campaign. President Bush in July nominated him as ambassador to Portugal.
Mr. Austin, a Tampa-based developer, was a fund-raiser for Governor Bush's 1998 campaign.
Mr. Morse is a developer who gave more than $80,000 to the Florida Republican Party when Jeb Bush ran successfully for governor in 1998.
Another Florida Bush fund-raiser, attorney C. David Brown - a Pioneer in 2000 and a Ranger in 2004 - helped convince the Scripps Research Institute of California to locate a biotech research center on a 1,920-acre site in Palm Beach County near the Everglades.
Governor Bush has supported the project. It is on hold, in part, because a federal judge said the Army Corps of Engineers should have conducted a comprehensive environmental review of whether the institute could use the site.
Mr. Brown's law firm received about $200,000 from the state of Florida for working on the project.
Development of the land, now covered with orange groves, would damage the Everglades, the Sierra Club's Mr. Ullman said.
Energy industry
President Bush faced criticism when he was governor of Texas for aiding his financial supporters.
Critics charged that his hands-off approach to the state's booming energy industry was because he was beholden to oil and energy interests, which had provided millions of dollars for his campaigns.
Tom Smith of the Texas chapter of Public Citizen said recently that Mr. Bush had a record in Texas of deregulating utilities and allowing polluters to police themselves - policies which would foreshadow the actions he would take in the White House.
"His attempts to forgive utilities on every turn can only be figured out in the context of its payback for their help in his election," Mr. Smith said.
After his election in 2000, President Bush assembled an energy transition team that included a number of Bush fund-raisers, such as former Enron executive Ken Lay, a 2000 Pioneer, and Erle Nye, a 2004 Pioneer and the former chairman of TXU, a large Texas energy company.
Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, TXU has collected more than $147 million in federal contracts for supplying gas and electric services to several agencies, including the Department of Defense. On Dec. 5, 2001, the Defense Logistics Agency authorized a $71 million contract to TXU for fuel oils. TXU also received a $600 million tax refund in 2003, according to the company's official filings.
During President Clinton's eight years in office, TXU received $69 million in federal contracts.
Mr. Nye, who left TXU earlier this year, could not be reached for comment. Mr. Nye was appointed by Mr. Bush to serve on the Texas A&M University System Board of Regents.
Charles Beggs Moncrief of Moncrief Oil in Fort Worth, another Bush Pioneer, said he's never asked for any favors from the Bush Administration.
Mr. Moncrief said being a Bush fund-raiser "obviously" could help someone gain access.
"That works whether you are a Republican or a Democrat," he said.
Mr. Moncrief's father, W.A. "Tex" Moncrief, the longtime owner of Moncrief Oil and a major Republican contributor, said he believes one of the "big reasons" Mr. Bush decided to invade Iraq was oil. And the decision, he said, will pay dividends for the U.S. oil market.
"The Iraq situation doesn't look good, but my honest opinion is that if we hadn't gone into Iraq, then we would be in worse shape with the oil situation," he said. "The Iraqis probably would have gone into Saudi Arabia and certainly gotten into a squabble with Iran or taken them over and have a lock on all of the oil, which they don't have now."
Money: a loud voice
Texas is "a prime example of money running things," said Fred Lewis, an Austin-based attorney and leader of Clean Up Texas Politics.
"Those that give money do well," he said. "Money speaks pretty loud down here on all sorts of issues, whether it's consumer rights, environmental issues."
The same is true in Florida, where the leading sugar companies have held on to their "enormous power" by contributing millions of dollars to federal and state candidates, said Nancy Watzman, senior analyst for Public Campaign, which advocates public financing of political races.
In 1992, Alfonso "Alfy" Fanjul, an executive with Florida Crystals Corp., was co-chairman of Mr. Clinton's presidential campaign in Florida.
Four years later, his brother, "Pepe," was national vice chairman of finance for Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole, the former Senate GOP leader from Kansas.
After Vice President Al Gore suggested that a tax on sugar producers could help pay for Everglades restoration, "Alfy" Fanjul called President Clinton on Feb. 19, 1996.
Monica Lewinsky, the White House intern who was having an affair with Mr. Clinton, was in the Oval Office at the time and later told investigators that someone named "Fanuli" had called while she was there. White House phone records showed that the caller was "Alfy" Fanjul.
Mr. Gore's sugar-tax proposal never moved forward.
Also that year, J. Nelson Fairbanks, the president and CEO of U.S. Sugar, led a successful effort to block a proposed state sugar tax.
In 2000, Mr. Fairbanks attained Bush Pioneer status, and when he retired in 2003, Robert Edward Coker, a senior vice president, took his place as a Bush fund-raiser.
"If you wanted to have a textbook example of a business interest that has learned how to work the system by giving campaign money, these folks would be near the top of the list,'' said Ms. Watzman of Public Campaign. "They know how to play the money and politics game to the max."
Michael M. Boone, a Bush Ranger and co-founder of the Dallas-based law firm Haynes and Boone, said contributors who expect paybacks from the White House for campaign contributions are not unique to Republicans.
"I'm sure a lot of people supported Clinton in hopes that they could get something in exchange ... and I'm sure there's somebody like that for George Bush," he said, adding that he's never asked for any favors.
"Knowing George Bush, I would never, ever trade on anything with him because I think he'd throw me out of his office. He is as clean as I can think of as a person on that kind of issue."
Contact Steve Eder at: seder@theblade.com or 614-221-0496.
The third and last in the series will be tomorrow.
[right][snapback]165166[/snapback][/right]
Article published December 19, 2005
Bush money network rooted in Florida, Texas
By STEVE EDER
AND JIM DREW
BLADE STAFF WRITERS
Second of three parts
DALLAS - Long before George W. Bush began campaigning for the White House, his family built a fund-raising network of wealthy supporters to bankroll his political ambitions and propel him to the presidency.
The network - including oilmen, lobbyists, developers, and agricultural executives - became accustomed to the Bush family's style of government, with George W. Bush as governor of Texas and brother Jeb Bush as governor of Florida.
The political financiers made an investment in the Bush family, an investment that paid off.
By 2004, President Bush's re-election campaign had assembled 66 elite fund-raisers in Texas and 55 in Florida. Some of the supporters, known as Pioneers and Rangers for raising at least $100,000 or $200,000, respectively, say they collected contributions for Mr. Bush because he was a trusted friend with common political ideas.
Some, though, acknowledge that being a prolific fund-raiser translates into access for those who want to influence government decisions.
"If you support someone, it's going to give you a leg up on getting an audience. There's nothing wrong with that," said Pioneer Charles Beggs Moncrief of Moncrief Oil in Fort Worth.
Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, the federal government has awarded more than $3 billion in contracts to the President's elite 2004 Texas fund-raisers, their businesses, and lobbying clients, a Blade investigation shows. In Florida, massive sugar companies and development firms led by Bush Pioneers and Rangers have reaped millions of dollars from government policies, which environmentalists say have sided with sprawl and development over the restoration of the Everglades.
The Bush strongholds of Texas and Florida became the roots of a fund-raising tree that by 2004 had enlisted 548 Pioneers and Rangers nationwide - including 30 in Ohio.
A Blade report in October showed that Mr. Bush's top Ohio fund-raisers collected more than $1.2 billion in taxpayers' dollars for their companies and lobbying clients.
One Ohio "Pioneer," former Toledo-area rare-coin dealer Tom Noe, was indicted in October on three felony charges that he illegally laundered money into the Bush re-election campaign. The Blade first reported on April 3 that the Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation gave Mr. Noe $50 million to invest in his rare-coin funds. State officials accuse him of stealing millions of dollars from the funds.
Supporting the 'cause'
Members of President Bush's prestigious fund-raising clubs in Texas and Florida - who raised at least $17.1 million of the $40 million collected for his re-election effort last year in the two states - stood to win millions of dollars through federal energy, environmental, or agricultural policies. Others had federal contracts to supply accounting services to government agencies or electricity to the Department of Defense, while some won high-ranking appointments and ambassadorships.
Bill Ceverha, a Bush Pioneer and political strategist who spent 12 years in the Texas Legislature, believes that most of Mr. Bush's key fund-raisers didn't expect anything from the President besides sound governance.
"These are people of a stature that they don't want any appointments. They don't need anything from the government," said Mr. Ceverha, who works as a political adviser to Louis Beecherl, an oilman and Bush Pioneer who declines to speak with the media. "They are just doing it because they believe in the cause."
In the early 1990s, Mr. Ceverha was among the Texans who helped persuade George W. Bush to run for governor. Today, there are photos of Mr. Bush on the wall of his Dallas office, and Mr. Ceverha says he and his wife are invited to White House Christmas parties.
He said being a Bush Pioneer or Ranger provides access but no guarantees from the President.
"I don't know any of them who are looking for anything in particular," Mr. Ceverha said. "They know they are going to get an audience when they go to Washington, not necessarily with the President, but with this senator or that senator, or this congressman."
As Texas's governor during the 1990s, Mr. Bush established a loyal following that included deep-pocketed political financiers by selling them on his straight-forward style of leadership and looking out for their interests in the statehouse, said Tom Smith of the Texas chapter of Public Citizen, a nonprofit public interest organization.
"The Texas Pioneers and Rangers learned through the Bush gubernatorial era that their investments would pay off, so they were more than willing to be leaders when Bush began to run for president," Mr. Smith said.
Pilgrim's poultry
Lonnie "Bo" Pilgrim, the chairman of Texas-based Pilgrim's Pride, is adamant that his fund-raising activities aren't done for "selfish reasons."
"I do it, first of all, for what I believe is right and people I contribute to have the same philosophy I have," said Mr. Pilgrim, a Bush Pioneer. "You know, I'm a conservative. I believe in integrity. I believe in a minimum of regulations. I don't believe in high taxes."
Mr. Pilgrim, who founded his company 60 years ago, has seen it grow into the nation's second-largest poultry producer. Last year, the company posted more than $5 billion in sales.
Since President Bush took office in 2001, Mr. Pilgrim's business collected nearly $60 million from the federal government for selling poultry to the Agricultural Marketing Service, a government agency that assists farmers and provides food for the poor.
Mr. Pilgrim said he didn't know that his company had received federal money, but he characterized the federal payments as a "small number," considering his business does "$20 million a day."
He said he's only asked President Bush once for a favor - that he speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin about stopping Russia's ban on the import of U.S. chickens. In May, 2002, President Bush spoke with Mr. Putin about the so-called "chicken war" - and the Russians eventually allowed the import of the U.S. products.
The discussions came after the two presidents signed a historic nuclear arms treaty at the Kremlin.
"President Putin and I also agree that we'll work to resolve disputed areas of trading, such as poultry or steel, in a spirit of mutual respect and trust," President Bush said at a news conference after the signing of the joint declaration.
Mr. Pilgrim, who said he requested Mr. Bush's intervention on behalf of the chicken industry, called the process "slow and even discouraging" at times.
"I think President Putin didn't have total control of many things down there in Russia, just like politicians here in America don't have total control," said Mr. Pilgrim, who added that Mr. Bush, his wife, Laura, and his two daughters, Jenna and Barbara, spent a night at his home while Mr. Bush was running for governor in Texas.
Defense and accounting
Of the more than $3 billion in federal contracts awarded to President Bush's key Texas fund-raisers and their lobbying clients, more than $1.7 billion went to the customers of Tom Loeffler, a lobbyist, former Texas congressman, and Bush Ranger.
Two of Mr. Loeffler's clients, American Management Systems and Motorola, collected the majority of the federal contract money. Motorola supplied security and communications products to the Department of Defense and other agencies, while American Management provided computer services to a number of agencies including the Coast Guard and Defense Department.
Mr. Loeffler's clients, in total, collected more than $960 million in Department of Defense contracts since Mr. Bush took office.
Julian Read, a spokesman for Mr. Loeffler, who is based in San Antonio, said the lobbying clients might have "gotten the contracts whether or not he was involved."
Adding that Mr. Loeffler has been a friend and supporter of the President for many years, Mr. Read said: "There are many, many factors involved in awarding contracts ... They probably don't have anything to do with lobbyists."
Besides chicken and defense contractors, the accounting giant PricewaterhouseCoopers also helped keep President Bush in the White House.
The firm last year lent two of its top executives, Carter Pate and Richard Kilgust, to the Bush campaign to raise money. The two men were so successful they were named Bush Rangers.
Pricewaterhouse has collected more than $353 million for accounting and auditing services from federal agencies since Mr. Bush took office in 2001.
To bolster its business with the government, the accounting firm in late October hired a business strategy firm, California-based SM&A, as an adviser.
Mr. Pate, a Texas resident and managing partner of Pricewaterhouse's Washington office, said in a statement: "SM&A's 22-year history of winning leadership in federal business capture made them the logical choice for moving forward with us."
A spokesman declined to comment on behalf of Mr. Pate and Mr. Kilgust, another senior partner with the accounting firm.
Kingdom of sugar
For miles and miles, the land along U.S. 27 through Florida's Broward and Palm Beach counties is barren, either under water, or black with a soil that locals call "muck."
But about six miles south of Lake Okeechobee, the smokestacks of the massive Florida Crystals refinery dominate the landscape, the smoke blending with the steel-gray sky.
And in the nearby town of Clewiston, which bills itself as "America's Sweetest Town,'' workers stream out of the U.S. Sugar Corp.'s refinery as rain falls on another humid, 75-degree day in December.
The federal and state governments call it the "Everglades Agricultural Area."
It is the kingdom of the sugar giants.
Two of President Bush's top Florida fund-raisers in 2004 were Jose "Pepe" Fanjul, president of Florida Crystals Corp., and Robert Edward Coker, senior vice president of U.S. Sugar.
The sugar industry and developers have profited under President Bush and his brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, in part by gutting the purpose of the federal Everglades Restoration Act, said Jonathan Ullman, Everglades field representative for the Sierra Club.
The law was signed in 2000 by President Bill Clinton.
Under the Bush Administration:
The Army Corps of Engineers has weakened the rules governing the proposed restoration of the Everglades, in part by restricting the Department of Interior's oversight power.
In 2002, the federal government gave the green light to rock-mining companies that want to destroy about 20,000 acres of wetlands. Environmental groups, saying the mining would contaminate groundwater, have sued.
Two years ago, at the request of Florida sugar companies and several lobbyists they hired, Governor Bush signed a bill into law to amend the state's Everglades Forever Act, which has set a 2006 deadline for the cleanup of phosphorus. Governor Bush signed legislation that delayed the planned cleanup of phosphorous pollution from the sugar industry by another 10 years.
The administrations of both President Bush and Governor Bush have allowed residential development on land environmentalists say is needed to restore the Everglades. Critics also say the administrations have not provided enough money for a proposal to replace a roadway in Miami-Dade County with an 11-mile elevated skyway that would allow for natural flow of water into Everglades National Park.
In 2000, Mr. Coker and Mr. Fanjul were at Governor Bush's side at Everglades National Park when he signed legislation into law implementing the federal Everglades Restoration Act.
"There are certain milestones in our careers and lives where everything comes together, and we recognize that we have actually done something of lasting importance,'' Governor Bush said at the time.
The Sierra Club had generally supported the $8 billion blueprint, but the group now only supports parts of it.
"We could see that both Bush administrations in Tallahassee and Washington were abandoning the plan and it was being turned into a water-supply project for the benefit of developers, specifically sprawl development," said Mr. Ullman, the group's Everglades field representative in Miami.
Russell Schweiss, Governor Bush's senior press secretary, rejected the charge and said environmental groups have distorted the governor's record.
"It is abundantly clear that Everglades restoration is one of his top priorities, based solely on the investment he has committed to the project. A lot of the governor's critics have argued that it is simply to get water for South Florida, but the fact is you can't restore the Everglades without providing a better water source to South Florida," said Mr. Schweiss, who added that phosphorous levels have declined in the Everglades during Governor Bush's tenure.
Three Florida Bush Rangers - Al Austin, Alfred Hoffman, Jr., and H. Gary Morse - served on Governor Bush's Council of 100, a business advisory group which in 2003 recommended that water from rural northern parts of the state be moved to urban areas in the south. Because of extensive opposition, Governor Bush has shelved the recommendation.
Mr. Hoffman, chairman of one of the state's largest development firms, was the council's chairman. In 2004, he was national co-chairman and Florida finance chairman for President Bush's re-election campaign. President Bush in July nominated him as ambassador to Portugal.
Mr. Austin, a Tampa-based developer, was a fund-raiser for Governor Bush's 1998 campaign.
Mr. Morse is a developer who gave more than $80,000 to the Florida Republican Party when Jeb Bush ran successfully for governor in 1998.
Another Florida Bush fund-raiser, attorney C. David Brown - a Pioneer in 2000 and a Ranger in 2004 - helped convince the Scripps Research Institute of California to locate a biotech research center on a 1,920-acre site in Palm Beach County near the Everglades.
Governor Bush has supported the project. It is on hold, in part, because a federal judge said the Army Corps of Engineers should have conducted a comprehensive environmental review of whether the institute could use the site.
Mr. Brown's law firm received about $200,000 from the state of Florida for working on the project.
Development of the land, now covered with orange groves, would damage the Everglades, the Sierra Club's Mr. Ullman said.
Energy industry
President Bush faced criticism when he was governor of Texas for aiding his financial supporters.
Critics charged that his hands-off approach to the state's booming energy industry was because he was beholden to oil and energy interests, which had provided millions of dollars for his campaigns.
Tom Smith of the Texas chapter of Public Citizen said recently that Mr. Bush had a record in Texas of deregulating utilities and allowing polluters to police themselves - policies which would foreshadow the actions he would take in the White House.
"His attempts to forgive utilities on every turn can only be figured out in the context of its payback for their help in his election," Mr. Smith said.
After his election in 2000, President Bush assembled an energy transition team that included a number of Bush fund-raisers, such as former Enron executive Ken Lay, a 2000 Pioneer, and Erle Nye, a 2004 Pioneer and the former chairman of TXU, a large Texas energy company.
Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, TXU has collected more than $147 million in federal contracts for supplying gas and electric services to several agencies, including the Department of Defense. On Dec. 5, 2001, the Defense Logistics Agency authorized a $71 million contract to TXU for fuel oils. TXU also received a $600 million tax refund in 2003, according to the company's official filings.
During President Clinton's eight years in office, TXU received $69 million in federal contracts.
Mr. Nye, who left TXU earlier this year, could not be reached for comment. Mr. Nye was appointed by Mr. Bush to serve on the Texas A&M University System Board of Regents.
Charles Beggs Moncrief of Moncrief Oil in Fort Worth, another Bush Pioneer, said he's never asked for any favors from the Bush Administration.
Mr. Moncrief said being a Bush fund-raiser "obviously" could help someone gain access.
"That works whether you are a Republican or a Democrat," he said.
Mr. Moncrief's father, W.A. "Tex" Moncrief, the longtime owner of Moncrief Oil and a major Republican contributor, said he believes one of the "big reasons" Mr. Bush decided to invade Iraq was oil. And the decision, he said, will pay dividends for the U.S. oil market.
"The Iraq situation doesn't look good, but my honest opinion is that if we hadn't gone into Iraq, then we would be in worse shape with the oil situation," he said. "The Iraqis probably would have gone into Saudi Arabia and certainly gotten into a squabble with Iran or taken them over and have a lock on all of the oil, which they don't have now."
Money: a loud voice
Texas is "a prime example of money running things," said Fred Lewis, an Austin-based attorney and leader of Clean Up Texas Politics.
"Those that give money do well," he said. "Money speaks pretty loud down here on all sorts of issues, whether it's consumer rights, environmental issues."
The same is true in Florida, where the leading sugar companies have held on to their "enormous power" by contributing millions of dollars to federal and state candidates, said Nancy Watzman, senior analyst for Public Campaign, which advocates public financing of political races.
In 1992, Alfonso "Alfy" Fanjul, an executive with Florida Crystals Corp., was co-chairman of Mr. Clinton's presidential campaign in Florida.
Four years later, his brother, "Pepe," was national vice chairman of finance for Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole, the former Senate GOP leader from Kansas.
After Vice President Al Gore suggested that a tax on sugar producers could help pay for Everglades restoration, "Alfy" Fanjul called President Clinton on Feb. 19, 1996.
Monica Lewinsky, the White House intern who was having an affair with Mr. Clinton, was in the Oval Office at the time and later told investigators that someone named "Fanuli" had called while she was there. White House phone records showed that the caller was "Alfy" Fanjul.
Mr. Gore's sugar-tax proposal never moved forward.
Also that year, J. Nelson Fairbanks, the president and CEO of U.S. Sugar, led a successful effort to block a proposed state sugar tax.
In 2000, Mr. Fairbanks attained Bush Pioneer status, and when he retired in 2003, Robert Edward Coker, a senior vice president, took his place as a Bush fund-raiser.
"If you wanted to have a textbook example of a business interest that has learned how to work the system by giving campaign money, these folks would be near the top of the list,'' said Ms. Watzman of Public Campaign. "They know how to play the money and politics game to the max."
Michael M. Boone, a Bush Ranger and co-founder of the Dallas-based law firm Haynes and Boone, said contributors who expect paybacks from the White House for campaign contributions are not unique to Republicans.
"I'm sure a lot of people supported Clinton in hopes that they could get something in exchange ... and I'm sure there's somebody like that for George Bush," he said, adding that he's never asked for any favors.
"Knowing George Bush, I would never, ever trade on anything with him because I think he'd throw me out of his office. He is as clean as I can think of as a person on that kind of issue."
Contact Steve Eder at: seder@theblade.com or 614-221-0496.
The third and last in the series will be tomorrow.
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This may be a record.
QUOTE(Nomarchy @ Dec 19 2005, 06:55 PM)
That's just a laugher. You know enough Economics to know that the above is weak, weak, weak.
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Theres no supply component in economics?
Nah. We can conserve ourselves into a stable market.
don't crap till the stench goes away?
QUOTE(Arturo_Vandelay @ Dec 19 2005, 11:07 PM)
Nah. We can conserve ourselves into a stable market.
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Probably no such thing as "he who owns the well sets the price for water" either.
QUOTE(Bart Katz @ Dec 19 2005, 10:11 PM)
Probably no such thing as "he who owns the well sets the price for water" either.
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From what I hear the public owns the well, so the lefties expect to set the price for water.
We don't count as the public because we want to drill for oil on our land when the only acceptable use is a catchall for moose doots.
QUOTE(inyerface @ Dec 19 2005, 11:09 PM)
don't crap till the stench goes away?
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I guess if you sleep in it then the fumes don't matter.
QUOTE(Arturo_Vandelay @ Dec 19 2005, 11:18 PM)
From what I hear the public owns the well, so the lefties expect to set the price for water.
We don't count as the public because we want to drill for oil on our land when the only acceptable use is a catchall for moose doots.
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We don't count as the public because we want to drill for oil on our land when the only acceptable use is a catchall for moose doots.
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Would moose turds turn into oil, given enough time?
QUOTE(Arturo_Vandelay @ Dec 19 2005, 09:07 PM)
Nah. We can conserve ourselves into a stable market.
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Ahem. I thought y'all didn't like command economies.
Think it through.
Plot a price-inelastic demand curve and a price-elastic supply curve. Find the equilibrim price-output combo.
Then play around with shifts in the demand curve and supply curve while keeping their 'slopes' constant, shift the slopes around only, and then do both.
See what you come up with in terms of changes in equilibrium price-output combos.
The 'foreign' vs 'domestic' oil is a political not an economic distinction. "Dependence on foreign oil" is the sort of expression that no mainstream economist will utter in the company of his/her colleagues.
Either you believe that the market can allocate goods or you don't. Mercantilism is a bit outdated.
These are the most unethical politicians to hit DC in my lifetime.
ANWR battle rages in Senate
By SAM BISHOP News-Miner Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON--House of Representatives approval of oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was less than five hours old Monday morning when senators took up the debate, but they aren't expected to vote on the issue until Wednesday.
The House passed the annual defense appropriations bill with ANWR drilling language attached at 5 a.m. Monday by a vote of 308-106, although the real test--an earlier vote on waiving procedural objections--was much closer, passing 214-201.
When the Senate opened its floor session at 9:30 a.m., Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., asked how his colleagues could even consider approving the same bill.
The conference committee that merged the House and Senate versions Sunday clearly violated a Senate rule by adding the ANWR rider, he said.
"Conferees shall not insert in their report matter not committed to them by either house," the Senate's Rule 28 states. The ANWR language was in neither the House nor Senate version of the defense spending bill for the current fiscal year.
The conference committee's addition of ANWR will thus make the entire bill subject to challenge by any senator. The challenge, called a point of order, will certainly be upheld by the Senate parliamentarian and, ultimately, the Senate's presiding officer, Feingold said.
A successful point of order would block the bill's passage. To avoid that result, Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens and other pro-drilling senators are expected to try to reject the parliamentarian's ruling, a move that would mock the Senate's own rules, Feingold said.
Stevens agreed that the Senate rule prohibits the addition of the ANWR language. However, he said, other rules also allow senators the flexibility to temporarily waive the restriction by rejecting the parliamentarian's decision.
"It's not destroying the rule. It's a disagreement," Stevens said. "We shouldn't have people saying we're breaking the rules."
Why then, Feingold asked, did Stevens also insert language that would reinstate the plain interpretation of Rule 28 upon the bill's passage. If Stevens is not destroying the rule, then such language should not be necessary, he said.
Stevens said he is just following past procedure. The language reinstating the rule ensures that the parliamentarian does not view the rejection of the specific point of order as a precedent that undermines the enforceability of the general rule in the future, Stevens said.
He noted that Sen. Harry Reid, the Democratic minority leader, helped overrule the parliamentarian and pass similar language protecting the rule's continued enforceability on another bill several years ago.
Reid said Stevens was playing "intellectual games" to justify his attempt to trample the rule.
"This has never been done before," Reid said. His earlier action to which Stevens referred was taken on a "bipartisan basis," he said.
Stevens himself, though, may need a little bipartisan help to overcome the rule. He has said he'll need at least a majority of senators, maybe more, to defeat the parliamentarian's decision.
In a vote on ANWR last month, 51 of 100 senators approved ANWR drilling. The vote on the point of order will test whether the same block will view ANWR development as worthy of a rule waiver.
Stevens said the rule has been ignored many times. In fact, it will need to be ignored this week if senators want to save other provisions added in conference to the defense bill, such as funding for avian flu preparation.
http://www.news-miner.com/Stories/0,1413,1...3173823,00.html
ANWR battle rages in Senate
By SAM BISHOP News-Miner Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON--House of Representatives approval of oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was less than five hours old Monday morning when senators took up the debate, but they aren't expected to vote on the issue until Wednesday.
The House passed the annual defense appropriations bill with ANWR drilling language attached at 5 a.m. Monday by a vote of 308-106, although the real test--an earlier vote on waiving procedural objections--was much closer, passing 214-201.
When the Senate opened its floor session at 9:30 a.m., Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., asked how his colleagues could even consider approving the same bill.
The conference committee that merged the House and Senate versions Sunday clearly violated a Senate rule by adding the ANWR rider, he said.
"Conferees shall not insert in their report matter not committed to them by either house," the Senate's Rule 28 states. The ANWR language was in neither the House nor Senate version of the defense spending bill for the current fiscal year.
The conference committee's addition of ANWR will thus make the entire bill subject to challenge by any senator. The challenge, called a point of order, will certainly be upheld by the Senate parliamentarian and, ultimately, the Senate's presiding officer, Feingold said.
A successful point of order would block the bill's passage. To avoid that result, Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens and other pro-drilling senators are expected to try to reject the parliamentarian's ruling, a move that would mock the Senate's own rules, Feingold said.
Stevens agreed that the Senate rule prohibits the addition of the ANWR language. However, he said, other rules also allow senators the flexibility to temporarily waive the restriction by rejecting the parliamentarian's decision.
"It's not destroying the rule. It's a disagreement," Stevens said. "We shouldn't have people saying we're breaking the rules."
Why then, Feingold asked, did Stevens also insert language that would reinstate the plain interpretation of Rule 28 upon the bill's passage. If Stevens is not destroying the rule, then such language should not be necessary, he said.
Stevens said he is just following past procedure. The language reinstating the rule ensures that the parliamentarian does not view the rejection of the specific point of order as a precedent that undermines the enforceability of the general rule in the future, Stevens said.
He noted that Sen. Harry Reid, the Democratic minority leader, helped overrule the parliamentarian and pass similar language protecting the rule's continued enforceability on another bill several years ago.
Reid said Stevens was playing "intellectual games" to justify his attempt to trample the rule.
"This has never been done before," Reid said. His earlier action to which Stevens referred was taken on a "bipartisan basis," he said.
Stevens himself, though, may need a little bipartisan help to overcome the rule. He has said he'll need at least a majority of senators, maybe more, to defeat the parliamentarian's decision.
In a vote on ANWR last month, 51 of 100 senators approved ANWR drilling. The vote on the point of order will test whether the same block will view ANWR development as worthy of a rule waiver.
Stevens said the rule has been ignored many times. In fact, it will need to be ignored this week if senators want to save other provisions added in conference to the defense bill, such as funding for avian flu preparation.
http://www.news-miner.com/Stories/0,1413,1...3173823,00.html
DeLay Officially Files for Re-Election
By MICHAEL GRACZYK
The Associated Press
Tuesday, December 20, 2005; 10:09 AM
HOUSTON -- Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, facing trial on charges of money laundering, officially filed Tuesday to run for a 12th term in his suburban Houston district.
The filing was not unexpected.
Republican DeLay, who has denied any wrongdoing and has accused Democrat Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle of conducting a political witch hunt, must deal with at least two GOP challengers in the March primary. He already has been campaigning against his likely general election opponent, former Rep. Nick Lampson.
DeLay filed by petition with the Republican Party of Texas, delivering almost 1,000 signatures collected by volunteers. Filing by petition, instead of paying a filing fee, requires 500 signatures from registered voters in his district.
"Our volunteers and supporters are energized to run an aggressive, neighbor-to-neighbor campaign spreading an optimistic message about the positive agenda the Republican Party is accomplishing to improve national security, defeat terrorism around the world, keep our economy strong and growing, and protect our borders," DeLay said in a statement.
Lawyer Michael Fjetland, defeated three times by DeLay, filed last week to enter the GOP primary. Pat Baig, a former teacher and political rookie, has said she will join them and already has been campaigning.
DeLay, the former House majority leader, usually campaigns quietly without much concern for his re-election in a solidly Republican district.
But with his legal troubles prominent, and with national Democrats backing Lampson, DeLay's ordinarily routine re-election has taken on a much higher profile, even drawing Vice President Dick Cheney to headline a recent fund-raiser in Houston.
DeLay was forced to step aside as majority leader this fall after he was indicted on state charges of conspiracy to violate Texas election laws. A second grand jury indicted him on charges of conspiracy to launder money and money laundering charges.
Earle alleges DeLay and two co-conspirators funneled $190,000 in corporate contributions through an arm of the National Republican Committee to seven GOP state legislative candidates. The prosecutor contends they were trying to circumvent Texas' law barring spending corporate money on campaigns except for administrative expenses.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...5122000493.html
By MICHAEL GRACZYK
The Associated Press
Tuesday, December 20, 2005; 10:09 AM
HOUSTON -- Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, facing trial on charges of money laundering, officially filed Tuesday to run for a 12th term in his suburban Houston district.
The filing was not unexpected.
Republican DeLay, who has denied any wrongdoing and has accused Democrat Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle of conducting a political witch hunt, must deal with at least two GOP challengers in the March primary. He already has been campaigning against his likely general election opponent, former Rep. Nick Lampson.
DeLay filed by petition with the Republican Party of Texas, delivering almost 1,000 signatures collected by volunteers. Filing by petition, instead of paying a filing fee, requires 500 signatures from registered voters in his district.
"Our volunteers and supporters are energized to run an aggressive, neighbor-to-neighbor campaign spreading an optimistic message about the positive agenda the Republican Party is accomplishing to improve national security, defeat terrorism around the world, keep our economy strong and growing, and protect our borders," DeLay said in a statement.
Lawyer Michael Fjetland, defeated three times by DeLay, filed last week to enter the GOP primary. Pat Baig, a former teacher and political rookie, has said she will join them and already has been campaigning.
DeLay, the former House majority leader, usually campaigns quietly without much concern for his re-election in a solidly Republican district.
But with his legal troubles prominent, and with national Democrats backing Lampson, DeLay's ordinarily routine re-election has taken on a much higher profile, even drawing Vice President Dick Cheney to headline a recent fund-raiser in Houston.
DeLay was forced to step aside as majority leader this fall after he was indicted on state charges of conspiracy to violate Texas election laws. A second grand jury indicted him on charges of conspiracy to launder money and money laundering charges.
Earle alleges DeLay and two co-conspirators funneled $190,000 in corporate contributions through an arm of the National Republican Committee to seven GOP state legislative candidates. The prosecutor contends they were trying to circumvent Texas' law barring spending corporate money on campaigns except for administrative expenses.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...5122000493.html
QUOTE(davisął @ Dec 19 2005, 07:03 AM)
What did you rightwingers think of Alaska's ® Stevens hooking the ANWAR drilling to the Defense bill? Was that a shitty thing to do or what? Playing politics with our military budget in a time of war. For shame.
Just another lowlife tactic from yet another morals and values kind of guy. How much will he stand to profit? Who can tell? Ask Duke Cunningham.
And then McCain gets on TV, says it's wrong, but he has to vote for the defense bill.
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Just another lowlife tactic from yet another morals and values kind of guy. How much will he stand to profit? Who can tell? Ask Duke Cunningham.
And then McCain gets on TV, says it's wrong, but he has to vote for the defense bill.
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Yeah, well, at least some possible connection between expanding domestic pertoleum production and the implicit assurance of a non-foreign supply that would support the military establishment could be made. Contrast that with funding the Olympics in Atlanta and Salt Lake City within the Defense Bill.
(See: http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/weekly/aa092400b.htm ). Things are always pushed into the DoD bills - it is the single largest discretionary account in the federal budget. The majority of the federal budget is non-discretionary, i.e., must fund by law under a set formula and cannot be "played with" by the Sufferors of Potomac Fever, aka, Congresscritters, without changing the law itself that set the programs up - a much harder proposition than simply attaching a rider to a "must pass" bill. Which is why I have always called for an amendment to the Constitution prohibiting riders not strictly germane to any bill's main subject, if not simply prohibiting them period. Make every appropriation it's own bill and no votes by acclamation - put 'em all on record.
When I was in Alaska very recently the big local concern was "What happens to Alaska when Senator Stevens is no longer in the Senate?" Guy has a rep for bringin home the pork - er - bacon, much like another Senator whose name is plastered all over the major works in West Virginia.
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