Posted on 08/02/2002 11:38:55 PM PDT by Libloather
From Newsmax -
Senate Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joseph Lieberman said Friday that he couldn't remember the exact amount of campaign cash he'd accepted over the years from Citigroup, whose chairman Robert Rubin he has yet to call to testify before his Enrongate probe.
During an interview with radio host Don Imus, the Connecticut Democrat acknowledged accepting $2,000 in contributions from Enron, prompting this exchange:
IMUS: Well, what did you get from Citigroup?
LIEBERMAN: More, but I couldn't tell you the amount.
IMUS: Was it, like, $10,000?
LIEBERMAN: Ah - I honestly don't know. I'd say it was....
IMUS: How about a million?
LIEBERMAN: Oh, no. It was definitely somewhere between $10,000 and.....
IMUS: Was it a million and a babe?
LIEBERMAN: (Laughing) A million and naming rights for some building here on my compound. (End of Excerpt)
In fact, over the past six years, Citigroup gave Lieberman $59,256, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
The hefty sum makes Robert Rubin's firm by far the single largest contributor to the Connecticut Democrat's campaign coffers since 1996.
"Kickback Convicts for Clinton"
November 30, 1999 The Washington Times Editorial Board
"In 1996 the Teamsters Union did something a little unusual for an organization that was nearly bankrupt - it gave away more than $1 million. The money went not to the organization's dues-paying members but to liberal activist groups, the Democratic Party and, it turned out, the re-election campaign of former Teamsters President Ron Carey.
In return for the contributions, you see, the lucky recipients were supposed to return the favor by making contributions to the Carey campaign. Several did. The idea was to circumvent federal labor laws that bar unions from spending funds on individual candidates in union elections. Earlier this month a federal district court jury in New York convicted the Teamsters' former political director, William Hamilton, of embezzlement and fraud for his part in the kickback scheme. The question now is how many others were involved in it.
On Monday, this newspaper's Jerry Seper reported that law-enforcement officials are pressing U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White to seek indictments against high-ranking union and political officials, including some close to President Clinton. Possible targets include former Teamsters head Ron Carey, AFL-CIO official Richard Trumka, former White House deputy Chief of Staff Harold Ickes and top Clinton fund-raiser Terry McAuliffe.
Mr. McAuliffe, readers may recall, was the man who just happened to have $1.35 million on hand when President and Mrs. Clinton initially came up a little short on the down payment for their new house in Chappaqua, N.Y. In the ensuing uproar over his part in the purchase, Mr. McAuliffe had to withdraw his generous assistance. Mr. McAuliffe is also the man identified in the trial of William Hamilton who tried to get the Democratic Party in on the Teamsters kickback scheme. Former Carey fund-raiser Martin Davis, who had already pleaded guilty for his own part in the scheme, testified that he told Mr. McAuliffe the union could be very good to the Democrats if they could find someone to contribute to the Carey campaign. Mr. McAuliffe appears to have gotten the message.
Former Democratic National Committee (DNC) finance director Richard Sullivan testified that the Clinton fund-raiser urged the party to find a big donor for the Carey campaign. "Terry would generally say, `By the way, I still think we can get a large amount of contributions from the Teamsters if you can help find the donor," Mr. Sullivan testified.
The Clinton-Gore campaign subsequently sent over a list of state Democratic parties to which the Teamsters should contribute, and the union actually made as much as $236,000 in donations as requested, for which Mr. McAuliffe received credit from the DNC. The deal collapsed and the Teamsters contributions ended when Democrats were unable to find a big donor for the Carey campaign. It wasn't for lack of trying.
The DNC found a woman willing to give $100,000 to Mr. Carey, but, alas, she was foreign, and U.S. law prohibited her from making the donation. McAuliffe attorney Richard Ben-Veniste denies any wrongdoing on his client's part, saying that he never encouraged anyone to make such a deal, nor did the fund-raiser do so himself. Evidently Mr. McAuliffe's old friends at the DNC and the Teamsters don't agree.
If it takes a court case to resolve the differences here, U.S. Attorney White should be ready to pursue it."
FReegards...MUD
"I don't recall"
"I did not accept donations from that corporation." (wave finger)
"(laugh)...(chuckle)...(cough)... ummm... (laugh)...(chuckle)..ummm"
"It depends on what your definition of "is" is".
And, these people claim that GW doesn't know how to speak English?
Isn't it amazing how the same old names keep popping up-- and how incurious the "watchdog" press is?
"Apart from the questionable propriety of a former Treasury secretary trying to solicit financial favors from former colleagues at a department he once led, I would ask that you investigate all (Enron stock) trades submitted by Citigroup and/or its subsidiaries and their clients in the two weeks preceding Mr. Rubin's call to Mr. Fisher as well as the two weeks following the call," Foley told Pitt in the letter. "Credit reports are viewed by investors in order to determine the financial soundness of a company before investing capital in that company's equity stock," Foley wrote. "It is imperative that we know what the consequences were on stock actions by Mr. Rubin's apparent attempt at interfering on behalf of Enron - a company that Citigroup had, and has, a financial interest in."
Well, lookee here...MUD
Well, hot damn. He's got my vote - and I don't even live in Floriduh...
FReegards...MUD
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