Posted on 01/17/2002 3:42:03 AM PST by LoneGOPinCT
January 17, 2002
By DAVID LIGHTMAN, Washington Bureau Chief
SAN ANTONIO -- Three top advisers to Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman met with Enron officials last summer at the request of a former Lieberman chief of staff - but the Connecticut senator insisted Wednesday that he had no knowledge the meetings took place.
"I don't recall my staff telling me about the meetings," he said at a news conference, just before speaking to the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.
The revelation is a painful distraction for Lieberman, who as chairman of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee will convene Washington's first hearings on the Enron collapse.
Thus far, Lieberman has been all over the media expressing outrage and promising a full, fair investigation. Wednesday, he suddenly had to defend himself before an aggressive press corps in Enron's home state.
The three staffers who held the meetings are all top-level advisers to Lieberman.
Michael Lewan, his chief of staff from 1989 to 1992, lobbied for Enron last year and has remained close to the senator.
The situation has its irony, since House Democrats have been asking why President Bush was not told of contacts between Enron Chairman Kenneth L. Lay and Cabinet secretaries last summer.
In fact, Lieberman was in a somewhat similar position, since the staffers who met with Enron officials are part of the senator's de facto cabinet. They did not, however, have any hint of Enron's financial situation, according to Lieberman spokesman Dan Gerstein.
Lieberman was aware of Lewan's interest in Enron. Lewan, who, according to records, was paid $40,000 to lobby for the firm last year, tried to arrange a meeting between Lieberman and Lay last year.
Lieberman refused, according to Gerstein, saying his committee was looking into the relationship between Lay and federal energy regulator Curtis Hebert.
In San Antonio, Lieberman suggested that his political enemies were trying to embarrass him with the revelations. "This stuff is sort of old politics," he said.
In fact, Republicans have been trying hard to discredit Democrats, pointing out how Enron contributed millions to Democratic candidates, and how former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin called a Treasury official about the company.
But there is no public evidence the GOP is behind the Lieberman news. Whether it was or not, this is a terse lesson in what he faces as he gears up for a 2004 presidential run.
His speech about diversity and foreign policy drew little interest among the press corps in a state that will be important to his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. Instead, almost all the questions at a news conference before the speech concerned Lewan and Enron.
Lieberman was asked if he had any inkling of the Enron collapse because of the meetings. "Oh God, no," Lieberman said.
"I was as surprised as everybody was when the company was beginning to collapse. I didn't know anything about it."
He then was asked about the $2,000 contribution he got from the company seven years ago. "I got one contribution from Enron," Lieberman said. "I raised over $5 million in my Senate campaign.
"I call it as I see it," he said. "I've got a job to do and I do it."
Still, the news will force Lieberman to be a bit more defensive as the committee hearing, scheduled for a week from today, approaches. It takes him off his message that he simply is a concerned senator - and a man of integrity - who wants to know the facts. It is a message his aides had hoped would play particularly well in Enron's home state.
The facts about the staff are that Lewan, who could not be reached Wednesday for comment, arranged three Enron meetings.
One was with Joyce Rechtschaffen, staff director for Lieberman's committee. Gerstein described it as a "courtesy call" from Enron's Washington staff.
The second was with Chuck Ludlam, the senator's economic and budget adviser, to talk about Enron's broadband business.
The third involved David Berick, energy policy staff member for the committee, to discuss energy pricing.
Gerstein said the meetings were short and "fairly routine." Lewan was needed to arrange them, Gerstein said, because "that's what lobbyists do. No one did anything wrong."
Enron has a virtual Washington all-star team of lobbyists from both parties, including Jack Quinn, former Clinton White House counsel, former Louisiana Democratic Sen. J. Bennett Johnston and Republican political consultant Ed Gillespie.
Three top advisers to Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman met with Enron officials last summer at the request of a former Lieberman chief of staff - but the Connecticut senator insisted Wednesday that he had no knowledge the meetings took place.
So, given the current standards set forth by the democRATs, by LIEberman refusing to meet with Enron execs., he is essentially responsible for his collapse as he did nothing to help bail them out.
Show us the integrity that the democRATs and presstitutes claim you possess. Recuse yourself from this investigation as Attorney General Ashcroft has. But, I suspect you will not.
Folks this Enron story dies quietly ..........soon
That sounds mildly familiar.
I was thinking the same thing. I had a letter to the editor just about done when I saw this mornings headlines. But, I hope they keep digging. The further they go, the more RATs they'll unearth.
I was kind of hoping he would. ;-)
On Sunday I gave this story two weeks to disappear. This is one more nail in the coffin. Nine days and counting.
So others can see this later today..
Of course, Rush will report it - thank God for RUSH!
And one would hope FOX will report it! They had better!
But what about ABCNBCCBSCNN??????
I don't watch those news programs so please report here anybody who sees this reported on those nightly "news" programs.
Better yet - who can be sure this information GETS TO those news desks so they can have no excuse to "forget" to report it!
What concerns me is both sides are more worried about blaming this on the other side for political advantage, no one gives a damn if these crooks get nailed or not.
By LARRY MARGASAK, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - Sen. Joseph Lieberman's former top aide, working as an Enron lobbyist, met three times with the senator's staff and tried unsuccessfully to arrange a meeting between Enron's chairman and Lieberman - now leading an investigation of the oil giant.
Lobbyist Michael Lewan served three years as Lieberman's chief of staff and remains a political adviser, but the relationship won't affect the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee inquiry, Lieberman spokesman Dan Gerstein said Wednesday.
The lobbyist and Lieberman talked from time to time ``but not about Enron,'' Gerstein said. ``The senator was aware that Enron added him (Lewan) as a client.''
The revelation adds to a growing list of Washington politicians whose ties to Enron have come under scrutiny in the aftermath of the jolting financial collapse of one of America's largest companies.
Lieberman, the unsuccessful vice presidential candidate in 2000, was one of the first lawmakers to announce an investigation of Enron after its December bankruptcy.
Earlier, the senator had asked for a review of contacts between a federal official and Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay.
The Connecticut Democrat also has cautioned colleagues not to jump to conclusions about Enron's political connections with the Bush administration or Congress before having all the facts.
Enron executives were among the largest source of donations to President Bush's campaign, and just a week before filing for bankruptcy protection the company donated $100,000 to the Senate Democrats' fund-raising committee.
``We don`t know enough to know whether any of that influence in any way stopped the administration or agencies of our federal government from protecting average shareholders who lost their life savings when Enron collapsed,'' Lieberman said this week.
In addition to its political donations, Enron and its affiliates reported spending about $1 million in the first half of 2001 on a star-studded lobbying team in Washington.
That team included former Clinton White House counsel Jack Quinn, ex-Democratic Louisiana Sen. J. Bennett Johnston, former Al Gore adviser Greg Simon and Republican strategist Ed Gillespie.
Lewan said he worked as an Enron lobbyist from June through November, earning some $40,000.
Lewan, who worked as Lieberman's chief of staff from 1989 to 1992, said he tried to build relationships for the company with Democratic members of Congress who focused on energy issues, but not his former boss.
``I wasn't hired to lobby Joe Lieberman,'' Lewan said. ``We're still personal friends. The last thing I want to be is a political burden to him.''
But Gerstein acknowledged Lewan tried to arrange a meeting this summer between Lay and Lieberman.
Gerstein said he didn't know what Lay wanted. The meeting never took place because Lieberman had initiated a General Accounting Office investigation of Lay's contact with a federal energy official that was still ongoing at the time.
``We thought it was inappropriate to meet with Ken Lay while that investigation was going on,'' Gerstein said. The GAO is Congress' investigative agency.
Gerstein said Lewan did meet with Lieberman staff members three times in June and July.
Lewan met with the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee's energy expert, David Berick, on price gouging in California. He discussed the company's broadband business with Chuck Ludlam of Lieberman's personal staff. And he had an introductory, courtesy meeting with the committee staff director, Joyce Rechtschaffen.
I'm still waiting to hear this little tidbit make its way to the mainstream media, at least here at home. Granted, I'm not holding my breath but I'm almost giddy with anticipation. BTW, don't you know the WSJ is just another right-wing extremist paper? :-)
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