Another scandal Big Media can’t quite see: Dick Morris on Hillary’s Corrupt Finance Director
Austin Bay Blog
Filed under: General— site admin @ 2:07 pm
Perhaps every two weeks I’ll have a post that addresses a domestic political issue or politician– the last one was a link to a very low-key article on Rudy Guiliani. A couple of months ago I linked to a long article on Harry Reid–and what interested me about the article were its details on Reid’s personal, formative background .
A number of blogs and websites follow the scandal du jour and accusation du jour. That being said, here’s a Dick Morris’ column that examines the indictment and pending trial of Hillary Clinton’s senatorial campaign financial director. This is a huge scandal that –alas– is getting very little press attention. Scandal? It’s all Tom Delay, all the time– or it was, until Cardinal Ratzinger became Benedict XVI. It takes a pope the tv anchor can tar as “a former member of the Hitler Youth” to remove a Republican scandal from its prime place in the banner headlines.
Media bias?
Here’s the lede and Morris’ explanation of why this is a major campaign scandal with national resonance:
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David Rosen, the national finance Director for Hillary Clinton’s 2000 Senate campaign, goes on trial May 3 on charges of breaking federal campaign law. The senator’s spokespeople insist that she didn’t gain from the alleged crime — that the campaign realized no financial benefit from Rosen’s understating the costs of a gala Clinton Hollywood fund-raiser.
Not true. Hillary’s campaign realized not just a huge benefit, but one critical to her election chances.
Under the arcane rules of the Federal Election Commission at the time, campaigns could use soft money to pay for fund-raising events — provided the gathering’s costs came to 40 percent or less of the total of hard money raised. (Soft money was far easier to raise: Donors could give up to $25,000 of soft money, but only $1,000 of hard money).
Hillary’s Hollywood gala that raised $1 million in hard money that August. This meant that the campaign could use soft money to pay for all costs up to $400,000. David Rosen conveniently reported to the campaign treasurer that the event did, indeed, cost $400,000, avoiding the necessity of spending any hard money on the affair.
But the federal indictment of Rosen, FBI affidavits and the testimony of the event organizers — Peter Paul and Aaron Tonkin — all confirm that the extravaganza’s true cost was at least $1.2 million. Press leaks suggests that the feds may have Rosen on tape acknowledging that he understated the cost of the event on purpose.
Here’s why he would have done it: If the real cost of the event were $1.2 million instead of $400,000, the campaign would have had to use hard money to make up the difference. The Hillary Clinton campaign would have had $800,000 less of hard money to spend running TV ads and funding get-out-the-vote operations.
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Hard money and soft money– in 2000 the difference between them made, well, a huge difference.
Morris:
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And, at the time of that fund-raiser, Rick Lazio, the GOP candidate, had challenged Hillary to refuse to accept soft money. He found himself awash in hard money — small checks from Hillary haters across the country. But First Lady Hillary Clinton was heavily dependent on large checks from fat-cat donors whom she and the president wined, dined, photographed, and hosted at the White House. And these folks gave a lot more than $1,000 each.
Hillary temporized and delayed, but the handwriting was on the wall. On Sept. 24, the candidates agreed on a soft-money ban. Now she had to pay for it all with hard money. And she was hard up for hard money.
So if Rosen had owned up to the full cost of the fundraiser, the campaign would have had to cough up $800,000 of hard money at exactly the time that it needed the funds the most.
Did Hillary know? Paul and Tonken say she did, and it seems obvious that she must have: Hillary followed every dime in her campaign, personally calling donors for most of it. How could she possibly not have known of a decision that saved her $800,000?
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Morris believes that Rosen knows. ("What did she know and when did she know it” – the old chant from Watergate seems to have an ironic echo, given that Hillary worked on the Watergate investigation.) Rosen, according to Morris, faces 15 years in prison.
I know this is an old gripe, but imagine the size and color of headlines we’d have if a Republican senator’s national financial director were going to trial.
GO to the NY Times website and type in the search words “Hillary Clinton” and “campaign.” The last article that pops up is an op-ed by Bill Bradley that ran March 30. Type in “Hillary Clinton” and “Senate” and the latest article was April 13. Type in “Hillary Clinton” and “Rosen” and you get a puff piece from February 9, 2005 entitled “Clinton Benefit Has a Lesson: Double-Check That Donor List.” The essay is archived but you can read its lede.
Go to Google and type in “Hillary Clinton” and “David Rosen” and of the first ten responses, only WNBC tv is “a mainstream” media. There is a note on Google that says to go to Google News to read an April 24, 2005 story in The Boston Globe.
I did that. Here it is ( boston.com ).
The Globe story refers to a New Orleans Times-Picayune story that focuses on Senator Ted Kennedy’ latest brother-in-law, Raymond Reggie,s who became a government source in the investigation. Reggie is also a crook.
Key quote:
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Raymond Reggie, a brother of Kennedy’s wife, Victoria Reggie Kennedy, pleaded guilty Thursday on federal bank fraud charges in New Orleans.
Clinton aide for the FBI surfaced as a result of that plea, the reports said. The reports quoted unnamed sources as saying Reggie worked with the FBI in its investigation of former Clinton aide David Rosen.
Reggie cooperated with the FBI in an effort to reduce his sentence, according to reports Friday in The Times-Picayune of New Orleans, the New York Post, and The New York Sun.
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Oh yes– the NY Sun story appears on the Google news search, but it is subscription only.
Has either story –Rosen or Reggie– gotten buzz equivalent to Tom Delay? Answer: of course not. I’m not against investigating Delay–or for that matter, Nancy Pelosi, who seems to have travel money issues quite similar to Delay’s. BUT– here’s an investigation and a trial that involves two of the most powerful members of the US Senate. They are, however, liberal Democrats. And the LA Times et al wonder why they are losing readers? I notice on Jay Rosen’s Pressthink website that Minneapolis Star-Tribune columnist Nick Coleman complained that his newspaper hired a conservative. No kidding. Read the entire Nick Coleman tantrum and Jay’s brilliant retort.
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