Another Friday night news dump and interesting timing.
Posted on 05/08/2010 12:23:18 AM PDT by STARWISE
When Bob Bauer replaced Greg Craig last year as White House counsel, it seemed inevitable that he’d be working on some of the same issues he had in his previous job as President Barack Obama’s personal and campaign lawyer.
So late Friday afternoon, in recognition of that reality, the White House issued Bauer a waiver to ethics rules established by Obama that prohibit officials in his administration from working on issues affecting their former clients for two years.
Those rules would have prevented Bauer “from performing roles that someone in the Counsel’s position ordinarily performs” and, therefore, neither “make sense” nor are they “in the public interest,” wrote White House ethics lawyer Norm Eisen in a post on the White House blog.
Eisen, who works under Bauer and wrote the waiver, stressed that it is limited, applying only to Bauer’s work at the powerhouse Democratic firm Perkins Coie as a private lawyer for the Obama family, and for the Democratic National Committee.
(((AND his defense of 0 for eligibility cases.)
Bauer also served as the top lawyer for Obama’s presidential campaign and his confluence of positions made him a powerful member of Obama’s inner circle as well as the most influential Democratic election lawyer in town until he replaced Craig in November.
Perkins Coie – which paid Bauer $959,000 in 2009 and still owes him $216,000 – continues to represent Obama’s presidential campaign, as well as the Obama family and the DNC. In the latter two capacities, the firm is involved in helping Obama fill out his personal financial disclosure statement, which is due next week, and in fighting a lawsuit filed by the Republican National Committee seeking to overturn laws prohibiting huge “soft money” donations to political parties.
Bauer is expected to advise the White House on those matters, and a White House official pointed out that in both cases Bauer’s private work is consistent with Obama’s stances in favor of disclosure and reducing the influence of special interest money in politics.
But until a few years ago, Bauer had been a vocal critic of some efforts to restrict political spending. In fact, a case he brought in 2005 on behalf of EMILY’s List recently resulted in a sweeping federal court ruling that experts predict could pave the way for a flood of new 527 spending that could target Obama in his 2012 reelection campaign.
The waiver notes that Bauer is “a leading national authority on campaign finance and related matters and the government will benefit greatly from his expertise,” but the White House official said Bauer hadn’t advised Obama on campaign finance litigation prior to the waiver.
Obama touted his ethics rules as the toughest ever, but his administration has been criticized by Republicans and independent government watchdog groups for issuing waivers to it.
But there wasn’t any immediate criticism Friday evening over the Bauer waiver.
“This is precisely the type of situation in which an ethics waiver is appropriate,” said Craig Holman, an ethics and campaign finance lobbyist for the non-profit watchdog group Public Citizen.
“The conflict of interest requirements are intended to prevent business interests from capturing the regulatory agencies that oversee them,” said Holman, adding that “is not an issue here, and so a waiver for Bauer is appropriate.”
Added Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and an occasional White House critic: “I don't see a problem. Basically, I think the president is entitled to have the counsel he wants.”
Another Friday night news dump and interesting timing.
~~Ping!
Gotta love it:
“Hey, that’s against the law!”
“You’re right. Okay, here’s a waiver of the law.”
“Okay, then it’s legal.”
Leftist scumbag criminals - is there anything they can’t do, that the MSM won’t ignore?
NO! There are no depths to which they won’t sink.
And we thought the Clintons were bad.
Surprising amount of flak from Politico posters
in the comments section at the bottom of the page.
Lord, save us .. end this madness.
Outstanding post!
Thank you!
Obama has apparently learned well from Chicago mobsters to use the attorney-client privilege to his benefit. Don’t miss the bigger issue that this allows the new White House Counsel to now act in an official capacity for the Bamster without having to be told about personal crimes BHO has committed and without ever having to be compelled to reveal them to anyone. How obvious. And devious. A personal attorney doing govt business.
Ethics “waivers” ARE the essence of the Obama Administration.
We are going to have these really tough ethics rules, but, of course, we reserve the right to ignore them if we so choose.
Hey, could I get a waiver from paying income taxes since that is really inconvenient for me?
Incredible.
The rules never make sense to anyone in this administration.
Just another part of the most ethical and open administration to ever ccupy the White House.
STARWISE, please put up the old links on this guy.
BTW, Perkins used to represent Pelosi, I don’t know about now.
Anita’s hubby, he’s a @#*!. He was Tommy Daschle’s rep during BJs impeachment, worked for Kerry and fought around McCain-Feingold back in 2004 (he was also on some DNC Voter Protection committee or something, ha). He fought Bush’s DOJ re: voter fraud during the run. Note he brought him on right after the ACORN La raid and charges... let’s say he was well positioned at the right time.
More on Bob:
As many threat letters we received from Bauer re: Auchi, Alsammarae and other individuals re: Obama, Oil for Food, Iraq power deals during the run (on another blog, which was shut down and moved four times btw); YouTube vids and accounts deleted; MSM changing past articles for this clown; threatening radio hosts re: guests and scrubbing the web (thanks for the help Google)?
re: Iraq deals, back when O screamed the loudest against the war
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&gl=us&q=iraq+power+deal+auchi+rezko&btnG=Search
On his writing letters (outside our district as well, btw), for Rez to build and dump slums and his lie on not representing Rezmar in court cases (notice the source, how things change):
Figures. Just think, like Blago and others before him, Obama ran on ethics.
Would he be able to testify against Obama, should any case come up, as personal attorney or counsel?
...wait for it...
from Chicago.
Fox News should consider scheduling a special Friday Night or Saturday Morning program, just dealing with news dump items that Obama is trying to hide
...as AOV plops down on the couch, rips open another bag of cheetos, in preparation of the admin doing the dance on yet another "YOU LIE" moment)
Why doen’t obamination just come to full “transparency” and come out and say that any kind of ethics simply have no place in hius administration? It’s not like the msm would ever publish his words on that issue.
Later
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