DisGraceland update - Billaries arrange illegal gift for themselves from notorious influence peddler:
HILLARY'S NEW SUGAR DADDY
By DICK MORRIS
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WHY can't the Clintons just buy a home like anybody else? Why must everything they do have an angle, a gimmick, raise questions, look bad?
Desperate to make the carpetbagger issue go away, the Clintons announced late on Thursday that they're buying a $1.7-million house in the high-priced Westchester town of Chappaqua. But apparently their income, assets and debts don't qualify them for the necessary $1.3-million mortgage. Lesser mortals would have simply looked for a cheaper house, or maybe even rented for awhile. Not the Clintons.
No, in their view, there is always someone out there willing to pay for what they want, what they believe they're entitled to. And they truly believe that they are entitled to this house.
So, with breath-taking audacity, Hillary turned to Terry McAuliffe, the top fund-raiser for the Democratic Party, the man who masterminded the concept of renting out the Lincoln bedroom and holding non-fund-raising "coffee" fund-raisers in the White House. With just one call, McAuliffe agreed to deposit $1.3 million of his own securities as collateral for the Clinton's mortgage. No problem.
As usual, Hillary has outsmarted herself. Federal ethics laws prohibit gifts to a president above a certain level. $1.3 million is somewhere in the stratosphere above the allowable amount.
The White House counsel's office piously declared that loan collateral is not a gift. But there's a problem. The interest rate on the mortgage is 6.5 percent, below the market rate of 7.5 percent. The only reason for the below-market rate is the McAuliffe collateral. How else would a couple that can't get a mortgage on their own get a prime rate?
That makes the 1-percent interest-rate difference, which comes to $65,000 over the five-year length of the mortgage, a gift. An illegal gift. (And the gift's actual size is even bigger: Jumbo mortgages usually command a higher interest rate, not a lower one.)
The White House counsel's office ruling that a gift is not a gift must be taken with some skepticism. These are the same folks who said oral sex isn't sex. To figure out this word game, consider who must have made that decision. Was it Cheryl Mills, whose testimony before Congress triggered a referral to the Justice Department for perjury and obstruction of justice? Or outgoing counsel Charles Ruff, who recommended the FALN commutations and himself lied repeatedly in his arguments during the Senate impeachment trial? When these folks say everything is OK, you know there's a problem.
In turning to McAuliffe, Hillary is displaying the same ethical obtuseness that made the Rose Law Firm world famous. The intent of the ethics law is to stop anyone from buying influence - and Terry McAuliffe has just bought himself a whole bunch of influence.
McAuliffe made a bundle in telecommunications, title insurance and home building. He raises money by delivering access to the Clintons. He had to turn down the chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee after his role in orchestrating access-for-cash deals for the president brought him under fire.
Now, the relationship between Terry, Bill and Hillary will draw intensive journalistic scrutiny. What does Bill do for Terry? What does Terry ask Bill to do for the men and women whose money he solicits? Has Terry ever asked Bill or Hillary for a favor? Now the GOP will probe every nook and cranny of the McAuliffe connection. What do you think they will find? Who knows?
The giveaway that the Clintons knew the deal was less than kosher (despite Hillary's newfound Jewish heritage), was the timing of the announcement - right before the long Labor Day weekend. This is vintage Hillary. As any good spin doctor knows, the press sets its stories for the entire weekend on the Thursday before. So they slip out the word about their deal right after the close of business on, you got it, Thursday.
Now Hillary has yet another ethical issue with which to contend. And for what? To buy a home they can't afford? If they found a cheaper house confining, couldn't they always stretch their legs at Camp David or at the White House?
Anyone who has worked for the Clintons knows that one of the joys of the job is having constantly to intervene to save them from themselves. They always walk near the line and often have to be warned of the ethical, legal and political consequences of their best-laid plans. But all the people who could function at that level are gone. The current White House staff are all basically strangers to the Clintons, none with the courage to stand up to them when they do something stupid.
Hillary starts her race with one big strike against her - that she chose to run in New York by throwing darts at a map of the country. Now she has two more strikes, the FALN and the McAuliffe arrangement. Where has she left her political sense? Meet the lady who brought us health-care reform.
nypostonline.com
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