One of the delicious absurdities of the 2016 election circus is the endless talk on the part of Hillary Clinton about her hostility and skepticism with regard to the 1% who own most things in the US these days.
Her daughter's husband, Marc Mezvinsky, is a man born to wealth who was educated at Stanford University who made over 10 million dollars while employed at Goldman Sachs. He now is a founding partner in a "small" hedge fund that seems to have a lot of dealings with Goldman Sachs.
I ask you, pilgrims, are we not in Coen Brothers territory when she who would be queen claims that she will, as president, discipline the financial world that feeds her daughter and grand-daughter?
Perhaps Mezvinsky can advise her on that project. BTW, I don't remember MM to have been on the platform when his mother-in-law declared victory in Iowa. pl
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Mezvinsky
http://www.celebritynetworth.com/richest-businessmen/wall-street/marc-mezvinsky-net-worth/
Ringling Brothers could not stage a better show. “My hands will never leave my wrists as I twirl a rainbow of BS for your delight!”
I want to know who to vote for. The so-called foreign policy of the United States is an immoral disaster. Who will lead us out of that horror? HC will not.
La Abuela de Muerte will unlimber her chancla at Wall Street? Not picturing it.
Double headed coins probably aren’t cheap. Someone’s got to keep making the money.
The real news is on the business page. Same as it ever was.
Hard to forget the kind of wealth MM was born to …..
Author: News correspondent
Date: April 9, 2008
Publication: Gazette, The (Cedar Rapids-Iowa City, IA)
Page: 1A
WASHINGTON — Edward Mezvinsky, who was an Iowa congressman in the 1970s, is scheduled to be released from prison Saturday after serving five years for bilking strangers, friends and family out of more than $10 million in get-rich-quick-schemes that sealed his ruin.
Mezvinsky, 71, pleaded guilty to 31 counts of fraud — bank, mail, wire — and other offenses involving financing bogus oil development and other trade deals in Africa.
Mezvinsky entered prison on Feb. 10, 2003,…
One person I would hope she would not consult is her daughter’s father-in-law, a former Congressman who did several years in prison for fraud.
If anyone wants to see who funds Hillary at the highest level, here’s some info at Open Secrets
Top Donors http://www.opensecrets.org/pres16/contrib.php?cycle=2016&id=N00000019&type=f
If you want to see donor information by Industry or other formats, there are tabs in the above link for that. btw, “Securities & Investments” is the largest donor group to Hillary.
Carter not afraid to say the US is now an oligarchy…
Jimmy Carter: Citizens United ‘Gives Legal Bribery a Chance to Prevail’ http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/02/03/jimmy-carter-citizens-united-gives-legal-bribery-chance-prevail/
Carter told interviewer John Humphrys that the ruling would have prevented a “relatively unknown farmer” like himself from emerging as a serious candidate. “Now,” he said, “there’s a massive infusion of hundreds of millions of dollars into campaigns for all the candidates.” … “In a way,” Carter said, “it gives legal bribery a chance to prevail because almost all the candidates, whether they are honest or not, and whether they are Democratic or Republican, depend on these massive infusions of money from very rich people in order to have money to campaign.”
Carter contrasted today’s elections from when he was running for office, saying, “In those days when I ran against Gerald Ford, who was incumbent president, or later Ronald Reagan, who challenged me, we didn’t raise a single penny to finance our campaign to run against each other. We just used the $1 per person checkoff that every taxpayer indicates at the end of his or her income tax return. But nowadays, you have to have many hundreds of millions of dollars to prevail.”
Humphrys said that another change that seems to have occurred over the decades is that “many members of the middle class and working class, white people, have been disaffected form the political process”—something that Carter attributed to the fact that “they have, in effect, been cheated out of a proper opportunity to improve their lot in life” because “rich people finance the campaigns,” and “then when candidates get in office they do what the rich people want.” … “We’ve become, now, an oligarchy instead of a democracy.”
————————–
“Political language — and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists — is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.” — George Orwell
I think there will be two separate threads developing out of HRC’s Wall Street Connections.
A lot of attention will be needlessly focused on the “speeches.” Corporations/rich folks inviting “celebrities” to give some bland pep talk (or be wedding guest props) for large sums of money is, like it or not, common, especially if such “celebrity” is already a “good friend” of the corporation/rich person in question. That such large sums should be paid for such trivialities is disgusting and that someone with presidential aspirations should do so is vile, but a smoke will be thrown up for the (likely) fact that she said nothing improper and that there was no explicit quid pro quo involved, ignoring the bigger questions.
I am hoping that people will dig through deeper, even if “journalists” do not, beyond the obvious “money” links (which will be plentiful enough). Corporations (and other moneyed interests) don’t give money to politicians to buy or rent them, either to do something specific or in general. They do so because the politicians being paid are already close friends (and in this case, family). These payoffs are reminders of how good friends they already are. No quid pro quo is needed, because the politicians already do what is in the interests of corporations.
Colonel,
Correct , he was not on the platform ( may be was babysitting Charlotte?)
This is interesting:
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/hillary-proposes-mother-in-law-tax-on-cayman-fund-run-by-chelseas-hubby/article/2580211
“Economic Royalists” on the hoof…
Oops. Dead wrong. SORRY.
Mom must have had the money. Dad was Iowa hometown lad whose irregular enterprises dated from the 90s when the kid was in his teens.
Sir
It’s even more absurd. She received $675,000 for 3 speeches from Goldman Sachs. And the Clinton Foundation receives tens of millions from Wall St. And she is arguing there is no patron-client relationship. In fact daring Sanders to prove the quid pro quo. But Pravda on the Hudson had this to say, “For Mrs. Clinton, the key question should not be whether she received generous checks from Wall Street, but whether she did their bidding in return.” Yeah!
Of course, Goldman Sachs is an equal opportunity employer. They also fund Mrs. Cruz who is an employee on leave of absence to campaign for her husband and “lent” her husband’s campaign funds. They also have sent their CEO to become Treasury Secretary under both parties. Rubin in the Clinton administration when Glass-Steagall was repealed and then he moved on to become Chairman of Citi. And Paulson in the GW Bush administration who threatened financial collapse to get taxpayers to bailout his net worth and Rubin’s Citi investment. It seems the Borg is working overtime to get the fix in. We’ll then get the faux competition of Hillary vs Rubio. And back to square one.
All
Our Borgist political system is paid for and run by the 0.01%. As George Carlin noted, the owners of America.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9dY4WlxO6i0
The Clinton System in NY Review.
http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2016/01/30/clinton-system-donor-machine-2016-election/
OT, but related:
The Ron Paul Institute interviews the filmmaker of a three-part series on the neocons. Antiwar.com announced it: “Breaking The Neocon Stranglehold On Washington.” http://antiwar.com/blog/2016/02/02/breaking-the-neocon-stranglehold-on-washington/
It’s short. 15 min. Worth your while to see if you want to watch Part 1, free for this week on a site they mention (filmsforaction.org).
I just watched Part 1, which is just over an hour. All told in the actual words of the Borg. It’s the juxtaposition of words and clips the filmmaker chose over the last 20 years that is enlightening and damaging. Pulls it together brilliantly for those you know who have been asleep, or lulled by Fox, CNN, and MSNBC’s pro-war and anti-Putin screeds. I thought it was pretty powerful stuff. Hillary does not come across well. Ditto those the Colonel calls The Children’s Crusade. I will be paying the few bucks required to watch Part 2.
Col. Lang
First, thank you for putting this on the board today. second, last night after the democratic debate a CNN pundit was saying that her (HRC) answer when asked, why Goldman Sachs would pay someone $675000 for three speeches was well said and well justified and she is great debater. FYI her answer was ( paraphrasing) “I don’t know that’s what they offered”. I wonder if she becomes president, what kind of “offers she can’t refuse”. Now days that’s what we are dealing with here our politicians get offers that they wouldn’t refuse.
Mezvinsky is clearly not the next Warren Buffett. He’s lost more money than he’s gained for investors at his hedge fund, and still managed to afford a $10 million Manhattan apartment that takes up an entire city block. He lost a fortune last year by betting on Greece. He had dinner with the prime minister of Greece and was persuaded to make a sizable investment. He apparently ignored the fact that the Greek economy is now based almost entirely on loans from the IMF and the EU.
Mezvinsky’s major benefactor has been Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs. This financial association could prove embarrassing for Hillary if she wins the presidency. Goldman’s credit default swap risk has been rising, indicating that Blankfein’s firm may have suffered massive losses from the bankruptcy of the fracking industry, the collapse of the high yield bond market and the escalating crisis in China and other emerging markets. Should Goldman demand another taxpayer-funded bailout, the influence of Mezinsky’s financial relationship with Blankfein should be raised, as well as the issue of the lucrative speaking fees Hillary received from Goldman.
I hope that Hillary will be questioned about the ethical issues associated with her son-in-law’s career (although I very much doubt she will be). The issue of whether she would grant favors to his investors should be examined. Two critical questions: First, did Hillary grant favors to his investors as Secretary of State ? And second, why did Mezvinsky continue to attract investors after he lost their money ? What was the payoff ?
Incidentally, Mezvinsky is the son of former Iowa Congressman Ed Mezvinsky. Ed Mezvinsky was convicted and jailed for defrauding investors of $10 million in a ponzi scheme. Investors whom he defrauded included his own mother-in-law, who was taken for $300,000.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-02-03/chelsea-clintons-husband-suffers-massive-hedge-fund-loss-greek-investment
rjj,
But sons do not inherit the sins of their fathers. Unless they are Sons of Confederate Veterans.
Or are from a country which fought on the Axis side in WWII.
“I don’t remember MM to have been on the platform when his mother-in-law declared victory in Iowa.”
Perhaps it’s because the moneyed class has a habit of leading from behind.
the media say Chelsea and Ivanka are close friends. Ivana converted to Judaism, but Chelsea has not.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivanka_Trump
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelsea_Clinton#Personal_life
this is interesting: “Mezvinsky is the son of former members of Congress Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky and Edward Mezvinsky.” His parents are divorced. If HRC succeeds, then Chelsea’s children will have two congress-peoples and two presidents as grandparents.
Indeed. The proprieties of political opportunism must be maintained.
Mr. Mezvinsky only makes a paltry $2,000,000 per year (unlike those investing in his fund). How can he maintain a middle class Manhattan lifestyle on a paltry income like that? I’ll be he’s second homeless too. The horror.
The Clintons are coining it.
beaver
these people have baby sitters. IMO they were hiding him. pl
I’m not sure I get your point, PL. Would you rather Clinton placed her daughter in an arranged marriage designed to achieve maximum benefit for Clinton’s political aspirations?
Had she done that, would you be writing about what a terrible mother she is?
You are all missing the point, that is that the return on investment in American politicians is incredibly good!
Will,
Thanks. I knew the family was connected but not this closely. The 2016 election cycle is flat out crazy. Donald Trump’s 757 gets star billing. But, no one, absolutely no one, mentions the new cold war with Russia, Hillary Clinton’s disaster in Libya that is about to get re-invaded by the West, or that Turkey and Saudi Arabia are threatening to send troops into Syria. We are starring into the abyss.
BH: Feel the Bern! Actually, Sanders is the “least dangerous” of the candidates. His socialism is a dead letter without a Congress that wants to cooperate. (They won’t.) And the area within is control (the Pentagon) will not be used by President Sanders to militarily remake the world in our image.
Sometimes gridlock is the least worst alternative.
Swami
“Arranged marriage?” What sort of strange little ethnic pocket do you live in in CA? We don’t do “arranged marriages” here, have not for a long time, if ever. I did not say HC was a bad mother. pl
Col.,
I was surprised to read this:
“This isn’t the first time that Margolies and Mezvinsky have been left out of the picture—when Chelsea Clinton married Marc in 2010, the groom’s parents were not in any of the selected wedding pictures.”
http://www.washingtonian.com/2014/09/30/meet-charlotte-clinton-mezvinskys-other-grandparents/
PL, you missed my point. One doesn’t need to point out Clinton’s family ties to someone who happens to be a hedge fund manager to make the point that she has ties to the 1%.
There’s enough out there in the public realm to make that case, without dragging in her son-in-law.
Swami
You don’t tell me what to write. If your sense of family is offended go elsewhere. pl
Valissa
Who’da thunk Slim Fast is a big donor to Hillary. It doesn’t show.
Bernie has backed many neocon military adventures and supports the arming of Syrian rebels. Sorry, when there is another candidate for office that sides with Russia in bombing ISIS and the jihadi rebels, than that guy gets my support and vote. As this candidate said on Wednesday at a rally in NH, “Russia should be our natural ally”. Bernie disagrees. This weekend I’ll be stumping for this candidate in NH, doing my part to “Make America Great Again!”
Trump has been very critical of the hedge fund guys and has said so in campaign rallies. I won’t hurt him since they’re all backing Hillary, Jeb!, and Marco.
From an article in the Jewish Telegraph Agency 10/29/15:
“Billionaire auto dealership magnate Norman Braman, a past president of the Greater Miami Jewish Federation, isn’t just the single-largest backer of Rubio’s presidential campaign. Braman also helped finance the young senator’s legislative agenda, employed Rubio as a lawyer, hired Rubio’s wife (a former Miami Dolphins cheerleader) as a philanthropic adviser, helped fund Rubio’s position as a college instructor and assisted Rubio with his personal finances. In 2010, Braman and Rubio went to Israel together shortly after Rubio’s election to the U.S. Senate.”
http://www.jta.org/2015/10/29/news-opinion/politics/marco-rubios-big-jewish-backer-and-7-other-things-to-know-about-him
BB
So Rubio is yet another zombie type. pl
I sorta thought Chelsea’s was an “arranged marriage,” not quite as dramatic as Lucretia Borgia but along those lines — Chelsea, Married to the Borg.
That the Borgister of choice was not so choice — if I recall correctly he had some difficulties getting his investing career off the ground, and he does carry a bit of baggage w/ his felon father — suggested that the Borg offered up damaged goods and HRC snapped it up for Chelsea. Sad. Demonstrates HRC’s neediness and the disdain with which her glitzy friends & financial backers regard her.
Walled off, Mezvinsky and Chelsea, respectively by Money and political influence, will just find each other as all young adults would do, thanks to natural hormones. The trick is to “arrange for the marriage” by making sure that the right mix within the “walls”. Nothing sinister but just human tribal behavior but at a richer level.
A repost from higher up: https://theintercept.com/2016/01/23/clinton-goldman-sachs-laugh/
Speaking of immorality: The clinical psychiatric diagnosis of Hillary-“type” of person https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fgcd1ghag5Y is a psychopath and I am not insulting her but being a neutral observer. This is said in a context, where Gaddafi was brutally sodomized with a metal bare and killed, after being taken as a prisoner. How brutal the latter might have been and how relieved Queen Clinton would have felt, should should have had the decency of hiding her true feelings and keeping up the decorum. At least, in my opinion, it is expected from a STATESMAN/WOMAN does not sink to the gutter level.
If people want to have more background documentation about the end of life of Gaddafi, just look it up in YouTube, I did not want to repost it.
Rubio hand puppet at amazon.
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/7169azTj0XL._SL1200_.jpg
Right before the 2000 elections a whole run of Curious George hand puppets were pulled off the market for “safety” reasons.
but enough of whimsy though continuing with fantastic conjecture ….
posting this link because it fits my guesses about some of the reasons for the home server plus the accuracy of the article can be at least partially confirmed.
http://observer.com/2016/02/it-wasnt-just-sid-torrent-of-anti-israel-advice-found-in-hillarys-emails/
Hillary has interceded for her son-in-law’s classmates while secretary of state. Yes, she gives favors. As for why would Goldmine Sachs invest their luckless customers’ money into loser Mezvinsky’s fund, it’s an easier way to channel the bribe.
Talking ’bout BS…
http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/9078106
“isn’t…the single-largest backer of Rubio’s presidential campaign” Adelson?
IMO neither HRC or Bernie will be the next President! DISCLOSURE: Fuzzy headed liberal here!
BTW, for those who might care, Max Blumenthal’s review of this three-part documentary “A Very Heavy Agenda” is :”Completely mind-blowing documentary about neocon ideologues and their bipartisan destructive influence.”
As of mid-day Saturday, the Drudge headline is “Dem Panic: Bring out Biden!” The media have been nice to Sanders and not to Hillary, and now they’re about tied. It seems the media have begun turning the dial against Trump (and maybe somebody turned the dial against him in the Iowa vote-count). At the moment we have four very unlikeable candidates and one (Sanders) with a built-in limit to his support. So by now they’re all about equally implausible, which sets the stage for a savior to be drafted. And I don’t think it will be Bloomberg…
Chelsea’s Husband provides a very convenient channel to financialise the inside information that Bill and Hillary are privy to.
By the way, in my experience, the entire “Merchant Bank” / Hedge Fund business model revolves around access to such inside information. The usual sources are junior regulators or employees of target firms. The likes of Goldman Sachs are expert at extracting this information at minimal cost to itself, the usual carrot being employment in the firm. A colleague of mine was interviewed Eight times by one of these banks in an effort to pillage his store of inside knowledge without hiring him. He was working as an agricultural economist for the Government at the time.
In regards to the author in the second link, He is good buddies with Kolomoyskyi the Ukrainian Oligarch in charge of civil aviation when MH-Seventeen was shot down and threw a party for Mommy Tsar Samantha Powers upon her confirmation to the UN.
Apparently there’s quite a flap about Carly Fiorina not being on the stage for a debate tonight.
Her canned talking points (prepared by Hay Initiative http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-08-14/republican-candidates-outsource-their-foreign-policy ) include this barn-burner: “On my first day in office I will make two phone calls, the first to my good friend Benjamin Netanyahu to tell him bond — unbreakable — eternal — blah blah blah, and the second to the Ayatollah. I will tell him, New Deal! I’ll tell him that if he does not permit anytime anywhere inspection of ALL Iran’s military facilities, by our inspectors not theirs, then we will make sure Iran is rendered unable to move money in the global financial system. We can do that, we don’t need anyone’s approval.”
Fortunately, the chances of Carly becoming the first female president are slim and none.
Unfortunately, her canned talking points are not proprietary: Kasich uses the same Hay Initiative talking points and holds the same attitudes toward Iran.
Don’t be too sure. If we hoi polloi don’t go for the confections the political merchandisers have on offer, Mrs. Clinton’s cavalier handling of classified materials have probably improved her standing with TPTB by guaranteeing her “reliability.” Remember Denny Hastert whose experience as a wrestling coach qualified him for advancement in spite of modest abilities and limited acievements?
“entire “Merchant Bank” / Hedge Fund business model revolves around access to such inside information.”
Raj Rajaratnam, billionaire CEO of Galleon in NY was convicted for exactly this. Using inside info for outsized financial gain via trading in securities markets.
Rajat Gupta former head of consulting company McKinsey and board member of Goldman Sachs was also convicted of insider trading. Lloyd Blankfien threw him under the bus.
The Clintons are one of the sleaziest politicians around. And that’s a strong statement considering the rest who also are incredibly corrupt.
PL, you are of course free to publish what you want, in the posts as well as in the comments. And of course, you are free to take umbrage at whatever slight you perceive in comments. That’s the power of a free discussion.
Unless of course you don’t really want a free discussion?
Swami
This is a seminar and I am the seminar leader. You can stay or you can go but I will continue to say and write what I please. pl
Sure thing, PL. It’s your game. And I will continue to push the boundaries, because that’s what I do.
Am I correct that daughter Chelsey is President and head of the CLINTON FOUNDATION?
vice chair.
https://www.clintonfoundation.org/about/board-directors#BruceLindsey
Question about WJC: in some still photographs he looks [alarmingly] like FDR in 1943, but media often select images that show people at their worst. Is that what they are doing with him?
WRC, she’s Vice Chair of the Clinton Foundation https://www.clintonfoundation.org/about/chelsea-clinton
Time for Chelsea Clinton’s Easy Ride to End
Why is the press treating a wealthy, 35-year-old political operative like she’s still a White House kid?
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/02/chelsea-clinton-press-213596
wrt the former first daughter, I don’t see that she has said or done anything worth that much “ink.” Do appreciate her locutions for “fuck off.”
All you will be doing is perpetuating the status quo, more of the same, even more money going to the 1%, even less going to the 99%, more Wall St puppetry, more Monsanto, more wars, more phony, empty lip service from someone who has amassed $110 MILLION since hubby became potus. Go right ahead, after all, cognitive dissonance is a basic ‘mericun right, and is your prerogative.