Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks, and Cronies (40 page)

The timing of the frivolous ACORN suit was no coincidence, of course. GOP congressional investigators had been seeking to get to the bottom of ACORN’s tax law-undermining, campaign finance disclosure-evading ways. Their newfound energy was driven by MonCrief’s continued investigative research, reporting by the Capital Research Center’s Matthew Vadum, the
Washington Examiner
, and, most notably, a series of undercover videos at ACORN offices nationwide. The embarrassing stings were conducted by young conservatives James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles and published in September 2009 on the Big Government website of conservative Internet entrepreneur Andrew Breitbart. The first installment targeted the Baltimore office (yes, the same one featured at the beginning of this chapter), where staffers were shown offering to help O’Keefe and Giles (posing as a pimp and a prostitute); encouraging them to lie to the Internal Revenue Service in order to secure housing; and giving advice on how to claim underage girls from South America as dependents.
⁴⁹
More sting videos followed in Washington, D.C., New York City, San Diego, and Philadelphia.

Scooped by FOX News, conservative blogs, and talk radio on the exploding ACORN scandal, the
New York Times
whitewashed its own role in covering up the community organizing criminal racket’s financial shenanigans. Jill Abramson, the
Times
’s managing editor for news, acknowledged that her staff was “slow off the mark” and blamed “insufficient tuned-in-ness to the issues that are dominating Fox News and talk radio.”
⁵⁰
But it was not merely that the Fishwrap of Record was laggard and out-of-touch. Like most national media, the
Times
was willfully and ideologically blind to what constitutional law professor and Kansas Secretary of State candidate Kris Kobach called ACORN’s “criminal enterprise.”
⁵¹

The ensuing national uproar—long overdue—led the U.S. Census Bureau to cut all ties with ACORN, which had been designated a partner in Census data collection. Census Director Robert Groves wrote to ACORN leader Maude Hurd:

Over the last several months, through ongoing communication with our regional offices, it is clear that ACORN’s affiliation with 2010 Census promotion has caused sufficient concern in the general public, has indeed become a distraction from our mission, and may even become a discouragement to public cooperation, negatively impacting 2010 Census efforts. While not decisive factors in this decision, recent events concerning several local offices of ACORN have added to the worsening negative perceptions of ACORN and its affiliation with our partnership efforts.

. . . We no longer have confidence that our national partnership agreement is being effectively managed through your offices.
⁵²

The crisis of confidence spread to Capitol Hill. On September 14, 2009, the U.S. Senate approved an amendment banning transportation /Housing and Urban Development appropriations funding from going to ACORN in the wake of the sting videos by a vote of 83 to 7. The House followed three days later by passing an ACORN de-funding measure as part of a motion on a student loan bill. The vote was 345 to 75, with 172 Democrats joining the GOP minority. ACORN promptly filed suit over the ban and won an injunction in December 2009 after a federal judge ruled that the congressional measure amounted to a “bill of attainder” that unfairly singled out ACORN. The Obama Office of Management and Budget ordered federal agencies to turn the spigot back on. But in April 2010, the 2nd Court of Appeals issued a stay on that injunction—ensuring that ACORN would not receive a penny more in taxpayer subsidies while the court reviewed the case.

Meanwhile, the Washington, D.C.-based legal watchdog group Judicial Watch obtained FBI documents from a 2007 investigation of ACORN, in which employees admitted to voter fraud, and which confirmed Anita MonCrief’s similar accounts of explicit ACORN-Democratic Party collusion. “ACORN HQ is wkg [working] for the Democratic Party,” one handwritten note read.
⁵³

Though several state chapters split off, ACORN remains. A defiant Bertha Lewis, ACORN’s CEO, asserted in a March 2010 interview with National Public Radio that the organization hadn’t gone anywhere, but was merely “transforming” into a “leaner and meaner” operation.
⁵⁴
Indeed, as Matthew Vadum reported, the beleaguered organization sent out fund-raising solicitations in mid-April 2010 proclaiming: “ACORN is not dead!”
⁵⁵
In an obvious attempt to drum up donations and demonstrate its pulse, Lewis jumped on the Tea Party-bashing bandwagon and derided it as a “bowel movement” before an audience of Young Democratic Socialists.
⁵⁶
She begged them to help support and “build this institution.”
⁵⁷
Left-wing social justice lobbies never die. They just change their names—and hurl them.

For its part, the Obama White House has remained tight-lipped. Like the mafia, ACORN has its own golden rule of
omerta
—the code of silence among criminals.

It’s a language the Clinton mob is well-versed in, too.

CHAPTER 9

THE CLINTONS

TWO FOR THE PRICE OF ONE

C
ameras clicked and reporters scribbled as the wife of Bill Clinton picked up a dainty, mint-colored gift box and grinned from ear to ear. Standing next to her was Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Mrs. Clinton, on behalf of her bitter rival and now boss, Barack Obama, grandiosely presented her “little gift” to Lavrov. As she untied the matching bow, Secretary of State Clinton explained that the mysterious item symbolized what she and Obama wished for U.S.-Russian relations.

Lavrov watched as Clinton pulled out a big red button on a yellow and black base with a Russian word painted on it. “We want to reset our relationship,” she proudly declared. Clinton placed her hand over Lavrov’s, and they jointly pressed the button for the carefully planned photo op. “We worked hard to get the right Russian word,” she told Lavrov as camera bulbs continued to flash. “Do you think we got it?”

Nyet
. Hillary’s “little gift” turned out to be a big blunder. Lavrov politely broke the awkward news as Mrs. Clinton’s smile froze. “You got it wrong,” Lavrov said as he pointed to the button’s base. “This says
‘Peregruzka
,’ which means ‘overcharged.’” Forced laughter ensued as “Smart Power”—the name Mrs. Clinton humbly gave her diplomatic philosophy to restore America’s standing in the world—turned into an international bad joke.
¹

Too bad the American people can’t hit the reset button on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s appointment. It’s only a matter of time before her gaffe with the Russians is overshadowed by far more serious problems. Mrs. Clinton’s Democrat Senate colleague (and fellow failed presidential candidate) John Kerry praised her as “extraordinarily capable and smart, an individual with the global stature and influence to help shape events.”
²
Capable? Smart? Debatable at best. But there’s certainly no question she has used her considerable influence—derived largely from her hubby’s presidential prestige—to help shape favorable public policies for deep-pocketed donors at home and abroad.

“There is barely an oligarch, royal family, or special-interest group anywhere in the world that does not know how to get the former president’s attention,” journalist Christopher Hitchens joked.
³
With Mrs. Clinton in command of Foggy Bottom, the conflicts are no laughing matter. Pay-to-play is the Clinton way.

Republicans made token noises over the Clintons’ ethical morass, but ultimately only two GOP Senators voted against their colleague’s confirmation—Senators Jim DeMint of South Carolina and David Vitter of Louisiana. One of Mrs. Clinton’s most vocal Republican defenders? Ethics crusader John McCain, who used his first Senate floor speech since the end of his presidential campaign to push for his good friend’s speedy approval: “I think the message that the American people are sending us now is they want us to work together and get to work.... I think we ought to let Senator Clinton, who is obviously qualified and obviously will serve, get to work immediately.”
⁴
McCain, the Senate’s loudest critic of earmarks, saw no problem elevating his dear pal to the nation’s highest diplomatic post, despite her obvious penchant for influence peddling.

Never mind that Mrs. Clinton requested nearly $2.3 billion in porky federal earmarks for 2009, nearly triple the largest amount received by any other senator the previous year.
⁵

Never mind that since taking office in 2001, Clinton delivered half a billion dollars in earmarks to fifty-nine corporations—roughly 64 percent of which provided funds to her campaign through donations made by employees, executives, board members, or lobbyists, according to the
Los Angeles Times
.
⁶

Never mind that while she shoveled out taxpayer funds to campaign contributors, her hubby was raking in dough from foreign leaders and tycoons to the tune of at least $46 million.
⁷

How could Hillary’s Republican cheerleaders be so recklessly tolerant of business-as-usual at this level of government? Favor-trading at home jeopardizes Americans’ wallets; favor-trading abroad puts Americans’ sovereignty and security at risk. The stakes are high. Shouldn’t the standards be, too?

LIAR, LIAR, PANTSUIT ON FIRE

Mrs. Clinton promised not to let her husband’s financial dealings sway her decisions as Secretary of State. But those who take the Clintons at their word haven’t been paying attention to the last two decades. Whitewater. Travelgate. Chinagate. Pardongate. Lewinskygate. Healthcaretaskforcegate. Is there a pair of politicians any less deserving of the benefit of the doubt than Bill and Hillary Clinton?

Seeking to burnish her foreign policy leadership credentials during the 2008 presidential campaign, Senator Clinton repeatedly peddled a harrowing anecdote about dodging sniper fire during a trip to Tuzla, Bosnia, in 1996. “I remember landing under sniper fire,” she said gravely in a speech at George Washington University in March 2008. “There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base.”
⁸

Mrs. Clinton told the gripping story in her 2003 autobiography and resurrected it during 2008 campaign stops in Dubuque, Iowa; Waco, Texas; and Washington, D.C., to illustrate her bravery, fortitude, expertise, and massive foreign policy experience edge over Barack Obama. But she left a few details out.

Along with her on the dangerous mission: her then-teenage daughter Chelsea, entertainer Sinbad, and singer Sheryl Crow. And, oh yeah, there was eight-year-old Bosnian girl Emina Bikakcic, who calmly embraced the intrepid First Lady and read her a poem on the tarmac—while a huge contingent of children and parents and other onlookers surrounded them with not the least bit of concern about flying bullets.

After Sinbad,
⁹
the
Washington Post
,
¹⁰
the
Philadelphia Daily News
,
¹¹
and every fact-checker on the Internet
¹²
and under the sun had debunked her tall tale, Senator Clinton doubled down. Asked about how perilous the trip was, Sinbad cracked: “I think the only ‘red-phone’ moment was: ‘Do we eat here or at the next place.’”
¹³
A miffed Mrs. Clinton dismissed Sinbad as a mere comedian.
¹⁴
She asserted again that she and her compatriots ran for safety with “our heads down.”
¹⁵
She clung to her story that she “had to be moved inside because of sniper fire.”
¹⁶
And she embellished further: “There was no greeting ceremony, and we were basically told to run to our cars. Now, that is what happened.”
¹⁷

When a video of the cheery greeting ceremony surfaced in March 2008 showing no such thing, Hillary’s excuses poured forth. She “misspoke.” Besides, she pooh-poohed: “I say a lot of things—millions of words a day—so if I misspoke, that was just a misstatement.”
¹⁸
She sniffed that her Tuzla hustle was just a “minor blip.”
¹⁹
Finally, Hillary blamed her congenital dissembling on being “sleep-deprived.”
²⁰
If that is so, then Hillary has been a walking zombie for years.

This is the woman who insisted for more than a decade that she was named after the late, great mountain-climber Sir Edmund Hillary—never mind that she was born six years before he became famous for scaling Mount Everest in 1953. Her husband repeated the lie in his 2004 autobiography. Mrs. Clinton finally admitted it was untrue in 2006, when she blamed it on her mother .
²¹

This is the woman who claimed to have “helped to start” the federal Children’s Health Insurance Program—never mind that the program’s original sponsors noted that Senator Clinton fought the initial bill and had no role in writing the legislation.
²²

This is the woman (echoed by her husband and daughter) who bragged that she was the “first” to call the disaster in Darfur “genocide”—never mind that several other senators had done so in 2004, while her first press statement referring to Darfur as “genocide” wasn’t until March
2006
.
²³

This is the woman who claimed to have organized “instrumental”
²⁴
meetings in Belfast, Ireland, and baldly asserted that she “helped to bring peace to Northern Ireland”—never mind that key negotiators dismissed her as “totally invisible,” “cheerleading,” and “a wee bit silly.”
²⁵