The Republican Jewish Coalition Meeting took place last week in Vegas. Sheldon Adelson was holding court as the right wing contenders flocked to kneel at his throne and beg for funds. No one seems to be bothered by all our GOP candidates rushing to pay homage to a man who obviously holds the fortunes of Israel higher than those of the U.S., but the media is getting all bent out of shape by the story that the Clinton Foundation, an organization that actually does good for people all over the world is receiving funds from foreign countries. So what?
The money goes to charity; the foundation has been proven to be one of the most important care-givers in the world. It’s not like those funds are being given to elect Hillary, as the Adelson funds will be given to elect Republicans, all of whom must swear fealty to a man who favors Israel over the United States.
E.J. Dionne has been quick to point out that this race has become about raising money and not about getting voters to back you. It seems pretty clear that Citizen’s United has polluted the American electoral system to such an extent that no one cares what the voters want or like. The candidates and their election teams all understand that if they can get enough money from the big spenders, all in exchange for their promises to toe the big spender line, then they will be in a position to sell the voters a bill of goods that they and their donor’s want those voters to believe.
Michael Steele points out that for all the billionaire chasing, at the end of the day, the candidates must appeal to the voter. Yes the money will help them do that but the bottom line is, that the voter must like you if he is going to vote for you. Steele says that the candidates should be out connecting to voters and laying out their platforms and that’s the stopper.
The problem is that the GOP doesn’t have any viable platform on which to base a race. All the major problems that this country faces on either a fiscal, governmental or foreign policy level are the result of Republican policies gone wrong.
They’re against a higher minimum wage because their corporate masters want to pocket all the money. They are against immigration reform because their base doesn’t want to have to compete for low wage jobs. They are against proper education because they just don’t think it will help create the kind of low wage jobs that their base wants; and it won’t, mainly because most of them no longer exist. They deny the environmental problems because they are controlled by corporation greed that creates the environmental problems instead of solving them.
The bottom line seems to be that while the GOP is raising money from a man whose allegiance to the US over Israel is iffy. The Clintons are raising money for charity from anyone in the world who is able to support the giving of help to the rest of the world. It really seems like a no-brainer, but then there are a lot of voices out there that aren’t controlled by brains.
Remember, none of this money, that came from all these sources that the media is shouting about, was earmarked for Hillary’s political campaign. It was all for charity; staving kids, destroyed economies, disease research, education, all things that the right doesn’t believe exists. So maybe the media, before it gets its balls in an uproar about the Clinton Initiative, should, maybe, get just a bit pissed about what Adelson and the Koch’s and people like them are doing to our democracy.
Of course the GOP got its cue on all this from Peter Schweizer, the author of the Book, Clinton’s Cash that accuses the Clinton’s of everything but proves nothing. He may be a good reporter or a bad one, but he is for sure a Republican shill. He worked as a Bush speechwriter, writes for the scurrilous Brietbart cabal of liars and he has been funded by the Koch’s. In interview’s almost across the board he vehemently defended his book and accused Hillary of everything but child molestation, but he never comes up with any proof about anything he is saying. His pathetic excuse seems to be that it isn’t an author’s job to provide proof of his accusations. Since when? You accuse me of something that isn’t true you better have real proof or the very least you’re going to get is a punch in the mouth.
This is very obviously further attempt to create another Benghazi, a situation where nothing can be proved but every time the accusers fail, it just breeds another investigation, because there is no competence on the accusers part and there is no evidence of any wrong doing anywhere else and go ahead – try to prove a negative.
The big question as it is emerging from both the precincts of the right and the left seems to be did Bill or Hillary offer or deliver any political or financial reciprocity for the donations that the Clinton Foundation received from foreign or domestic entities. Of course it’s going to be damn hard to prove that they did, but there’s more at stake here than proving a crime or lack of one. Hillary is running for President and perception is very important.
So let’s look at the reality. People and organizations gave huge sums of money to the Initiative. Why did they do that? First and foremost we have to consider that it is a great charity and does an enormous amount of good around the world. But it would be naïve to think that everyone who gives it money does so on strictly altruistic grounds. Sure some of the money comes into the Initiative attached to hopes of influence over or entrance to the circle of power that controls it, but that’s the way the world does business, that’s why Bill Clinton an ex-president has a monster charitable organization and Urban Curmudgeon an insignificant blog doesn’t. That’s how business is done all over the world and there is no negative price attached to that. There is, so far, absolutely no evidence that the hopes, brought to the table by the donors, were fulfilled. More likely is that, as in many other circumstances, the money was given for a combination of altruistic, business and social reasons.
Look, people love to hang out with celebrities, that’s why they shell out huge sums to go to the Academy Awards parties. No one is more a celebrity or has more charisma than Bill Clinton and if the truth be known, that’s why people give him money; to get close to him, to know him, to brag to their buddies that they were at dinner last night with Bill & Hillary. If you don’t believe that, you know nothing about human nature. Sheldon Adelson on the other hand – all his charm is in his wallet.
Remember, neither the Clinton’s, nor anyone else, can be held responsible for the motives of those with whom they deal. They can only be held responsible for their own motives and to this point, despite Mr. Sweitzer’s accusatory book, those motives have not been proved anything but pure and charitable.
So why has he bruhaha continued to persist. Well first of all for the same reasons the Initiative is successful. The Clinton’s are news. All you have to do is look at the various news sources. In the Internet news programs not controlled by the right, the noise is already fading due to the recognition of its lack of content. But on network news, governed by interested sponsors and lazy news teams it is still white hot. This is entirely to be expected. Network news exists on the advertising dollars rolled out by the likes of BP, Koch Industries and General Electric. Who do you think they want to see elected?