What Fred Thompson knows about Hillary

Barring the calamitous, former United States senator from Tennessee Fred Thompson will be the next president of the United States.

Thompson's masterful use of the online interview – a vastly smarter and cheaper way of campaigning for those with something to say – has all but secured him the Republican nomination.

In the general election, in a fair fight, either Obama or Hillary – or Gore for that matter–will have a hard time winning any five states against Thompson.

But for Hillary at least, it is too late in the game to fight fair. Desperation will push her and her soulless minions to fight otherwise. No fool, Thompson knows what he is up against.

In 1997, then-Sen. Thompson chaired a committee that investigated what he rightly called "the most corrupt political campaign in modern history." Hillary's fingerprints were all over that campaign.

Beginning early in 1995, the Clintons launched an unprecedented series of expensive, untruthful, arguably illegal TV ads. For cover, they laundered the campaign through the Democratic National Committee.

According to Clinton adviser Dick Morris, Hillary signed off on everything. The media, true to form, chose not to notice the ads or their financing. Here, the Thompson Committee report proves instructive:

The president and his aides demeaned the offices of the president and vice president, took advantage of minority groups, pulled down all the barriers that would normally be in place to keep out illegal contributions, pressured policy-makers, and left themselves open to strong suspicion that they were selling not only access to high-ranking officials, but policy as well. Millions of dollars were raised in illegal contributions, much of it from foreign sources.

Johnny Chung, who admitted funneling $100,000 from the Chinese military to the DNC, would tell the Thompson Committee: "The White House is like a subway: You have to put in coins to open the gates."

No one understood this investment opportunity better than James and Moctar Riady, an ethnic Chinese father-and-son team who ran the powerful Indonesian firm the Lippo Group.

The Riadys had sensed Clinton's sleaze potential back in Arkansas and bailed out his 1992 primary campaign at it shakiest moment. As a quid pro quo, the Riadys sought a job for their "man in America," John Huang.

Aware of his many talents, the DNC put Huang on its "must consider" list. And what were Huang's talents? A letter sent by an Asian outreach advocate on the stationery of David Roberti, the president pro tem of the California state Senate, was frank to a fault.

"John is the Riady family's top priority for placement because he is like one of their own." The Riady family, in case anyone needed reminding, "invested heavily in the Clinton campaign."

Huang ended up in Ron Brown's Commerce Department as a deputy assistant secretary. Curiously, he got the job on the same day embattled Clinton aide Webster Hubbell got a $100,000 check from a Riady company, and Hubbell "rolled over" once more.

Brown confidante Nolanda Hill would tell ABC's "Prime Time Live," according to Brown, "the White House put [Huang] there," and in this instance, added Hill, "The White House meant Hillary Clinton."

Whoever was responsible, Huang went to Commerce not to advance America's interests but those of the Riadys and, by extension, those of China.

"Over the past five years," reads the Thompson report, "the Lippo Group has shifted its strategic center from Indonesia to the People's Republic of China." Those five years, by the way, backdated to 1992, the year of Clinton's election.

On one particularly revealing occasion, Huang left a CIA briefing at the Commerce Department and walked across the street where, according to the Thompson Committee, he had "a secret office."

This office was located within the larger offices of Stephens Inc., the Little Rock-based investment-banking firm with which the Riadys and the Clintons had a long relationship. There, in private, Huang proceeded to place a three-hour call to his former employer, the Lippo Group.

Lippo had a lot at stake. The CIA briefing concerned the development by an international consortium of a massive coal-fired power plant in Indonesia called the Paiton plant.

The Lippo Group just happened to control one of the only two commercially viable low-sulfur coal mines in the world, this one conveniently located near the Paiton plant.

At the Clintons' urging, Ron Brown helped put the Paiton deal together, and the various players thanked him profusely for his help. Among the players, as usual during these years, was the Enron Corporation.

What happens next on the American end of this saga raises a host of troubling questions. The CNN.com report on the day it happened, Sept. 18, 1996, well captures the general tenor of the reporting.

CNN's Wolf Blitzer reported that using the Grand Canyon as "his picture perfect backdrop," Clinton "unilaterally" declared a new 1.7 million-acre national monument 70 miles away in southern Utah.

"We're saying, very simply, our parents and grandparents saved the Grand Canyon for us," Clinton told the cheering crowd. "Today, we will save the Grand Escalante Canyons and the Kaiparowitz Plateaus of Utah for our children."

To his credit, Blitzer did not shy from the implicit controversy. He reported the people of Utah were "furious." They claimed it was "a land grab" by the federal government "at the economic expense of the state."

The rationale for the move puzzled Blitzer as Clinton already had the environmental vote, and there were many safer gestures he could have made with less than two months left in the campaign.

Blitzer raised the issue of coal, perhaps $1 trillion worth of clean, low-sulfur coal that would never be mined. Just the year before Utah had approved an environmental-friendly mining contract on the Kaiparowitz Plateau with Dutch-owned Andalex Resources.

Said Clinton of this grand environmental gesture, "We can't have mines everywhere, and we shouldn't have mines that threaten our national treasures."

No, not everywhere, just in Indonesia. In a stroke of the pen, Clinton had handed the Riadys a monopoly on the world's supply of low-sulfur coal.

One does not need to be a conspiracy theorist to connect the dots between Utah and Indonesia. The FBI had made the connection as well. Consider the following field notes from an FBI interview with Huang:

Huang laughed in response to questions concerning j. riady's interest in Utah coal restrictions. j. riady's coal interests were minimal. Indonesia had significant infrastructure problems which prohibited the development of its coal resources.

Huang was lying. The Riadys had a powerful interest, and they would exploit it for all it was worth. In fact, at the Paiton plant, the price of the coal exceeded the price of the electricity produced.

In 1999, PLN, the state Indonesian power company, sued the Clinton administration. Its attorneys charged U.S. officials knew the Paiton power plant contract to be awash in "corruption, collusion and nepotism" from the beginning.

By this time, though, James Riady had fled the country, and Huang had pled the fifth.

Worse, Huang's immediate boss, Charles Meissner, and Meissner's boss, Ron Brown, had died in the "inexplicable" crash of an Air Force CT-43A on a Croatian hillside.

Fred Thompson’s Anti-Gun Senate Record

The Conservatives Against Fred Thompson volunteers have compiled a list of proposals voted for by Fred Dalton Thompson in the senate that include Gun Bans, confiscations and limitations of free speech by Gun Rights Advocates. Dates and bill numbers are provided so this information can be easily verified. Summary:

1. Anti-gun terror bill (S. 735 )

On June 7, 1995, the Senate passed an anti-gun terror bill (S. 735) by a vote of 91-8. This version of the terror bill included: a BATF pay increase of $100 million; a provision authorizing “roving wiretaps” allowing government officials to wiretap one’s home if a person under investigation visits the home — even if one had no knowledge the person was a suspect; a weakening of the Posse Commitatus law to give the military more authority to get involved in law enforcement in certain circumstances; a grant of power to the FBI to conduct “fishing expeditions” and secure one’s financial and travel records in certain circumstances without any evidence one has committed a crime; and finally, the “Randy Weaver entrapment provision” which extends the statute of limitations for violations under the National Firearms Act of 1934 from three to five years. Thompson voted in favor of the bill.

2. Anti-gun terror bill — final passage

On April 17, 1996, the Senate passed the conference version of the anti-terrorism bill by a vote of 91-8. The final version of the bill (S. 735) contained several problems, including ones that will: order an “anti-hunter” rifle and ammo study; authorize a $40 million pay increase for the BATF (through the Treasury Department); potentially punish gun dealers (and individuals) for selling ammunition to someone they should have known would commit a violent crime; federalize many state crimes, thus tremendously increasing the scope and jurisdiction of the BATF; restrict the right of habeas corpus in such a way as to severely damage the ability of the courts to rescue honest gun owners who are unjustly incarcerated; allow the government to use “secret evidence” against certain individuals; remove protections against wiretapping wireless data; and require banks to freeze the assets of domestic groups in certain situations. Thompson once again voted in favor of the bill.

3. Taggants in gunpowder

On September 12, 1996, the Senate voted (57-42) to keep an anti-gun amendment off of the Treasury-Postal appropriations bill (H.R. 3756). The Kerry amendment — which Thompson voted for– would have made funds available for a study of tagging explosive materials, including black and smokeless powders (thus setting the stage for registering ammunition). The amendment also sought to further demonize firearms by selectively examining the misuse of firearms by criminals. The study would not examine the number of times firearms are used to save the lives of decent citizens.

4. Lautenberg Domestic Confiscation gun ban

On September 12, 1996, the Senate passed the Lautenberg gun ban as an amendment to the Treasury-Postal appropriations bill (H.R. 3756). The Lautenberg Domestic Confiscation Gun Ban disarms gun owners for small (misdemeanor) offenses in the home — “offenses” as slight as spanking a child or grabbing a spouse. This lifetime ban, in certain cases, can even be imposed without a trial by jury. It is also retroactive, so it does not matter if the offense occurred 20 years ago. Thompson voted in favor of the amendment.

5. Free Speech restrictions

On October 7, 1997, the Senate defeated an “Incumbent Protection Bill” (S. 25) which would have resulted in the government regulation of GOA’s newsletters and other communications with its members, while expanding the relative political power of the liberal media and other anti-gun forces. Senators failed in their effort, 53 to 47, to shut down a filibuster of the bill that was ostensibly aimed at reforming campaign finance laws.

6. Smith “Anti-Brady” Amendment

On July 21, 1998, pro-gun Senator Bob Smith (R-NH) introduced an “Anti-Brady” amendment that passed by a vote of 69-31. The Smith amendment would prohibit the FBI from using Brady background checks to tax or register gun owners. Further, the amendment requires the “immediate destruction of all [gun buyer] information, in any form whatsoever.” Finally, if the FBI disregards this latter provision, the Smith language will allow private citizens to sue the agency and collect monetary damages, including attorney’s fees. Thompson, in keeping with his tendency to usually vote for expanded federal police power, voted against this limitation of FBI registration of gun owners.

7. Anti-gun Clinton judge appointment

On February 11, 1998, the Senate voted 67-28 to confirm Margaret Morrow to the Federal bench. GOA vigorously opposed this Clinton-appointed judge, as she has not only taken strident anti-gun positions, she has showed herself to be a gun control activist.

8. Anti-gun Surgeon General

Having nominated anti-gun David Satcher for Surgeon General, President Bill Clinton was forced to wait several months as debate raged over his controversial pick. But on February 10, 1998, the President finally realized victory. By a vote of 75-23, anti-gun Republicans teamed up with the Democrats to kill the filibuster over the Satcher nomination. Mr. Satcher was later confirmed by a vote of 63-35. Since the key vote was to end the filibuster, that is the one that was rated by GOA.

9. Ending the filibuster of a major anti-gun crime bill

On July 28, 1999, the Senate ended a filibuster led by Senator Bob Smith (I-NH) — a filibuster intended to keep anti-gun crime legislation from progressing any further. After the 77-22 vote, the Senate moved to send the language of the anti-gun Senate crime bill (S. 254) to a House-Senate conference committee. Thompson voted to break the pro-gun filibuster.

10. Young adult gun ban

The young adult gun ban could severely punish parents who allow their kids to even touch a so-called semi-automatic “assault weapon.” While the amendment allows for certain exemptions, there are some imponderable questions which NO senator could answer, but which a parent would have to answer in order to avoid incarceration. For example: What is a “semiautomatic assault weapon”? The definition, plus exemptions, takes up six pages of fine print in the U.S. Code. Second, a child can handle a banned semi-auto if he is in the “immediate and supervisory presence” of a parent or if he possess a written permission slip from the parent. But what happens when, during a target practice session, the parent walks to the car to retrieve his lunch and the juvenile is no longer in the parents “immediate” presence and does not have a permission slip? A parent can receive jail time for this infraction. The provision passed the Senate on May 13, 1999, with Thompson voting in the majority.

11. Adopting the “Gun Control Lite” strategy

On May 13, 1999, a majority of Senators — including Thompson — defeated a motion to table (or kill) an anti-gun amendment introduced by Senators Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Larry Craig (R-WY). This amendment was offered as an alternative to gun control proposals being pushed by Sen. Frank Lautenberg.

12. McCain’s Incumbent Protection (2000 version)

By 59 to 41, the Senate passed S. 27, to amend the Federal Election Campaign Act to include Incumbent Protection provisions. The bill severely curtails the ability of outside groups such as GOA to communicate the actions of incumbent politicians to members and supporters prior to an election.

13. Incumbent Protection (2002 failed filibuster)

This was the key vote in the Senate regarding the odious Incumbent Protection bill in 2002 (H.R. 2356). The legislation finally became law that year. As he had on previous occasions, Thompson voted in favor of the bill.

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