BLACK BERETS...RED CHINA
A high-stakes game of Chinese Checkers!
Sightings from The Catbird Seat
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INOUYE ANNOUNCES SENATE CONFIRMATION
OF GENERAL ERIC SHINSEKI AS NEW
U.S. ARMY CHIEF OF STAFF
Wednesday, June 16, 1999
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- United States Senator Daniel K. Inouye is pleased to announce that General Eric K. Shinseki, by unanimous consent, was confirmed by the United States Senate to serve as the Department of the Army's 34th Chief of Staff.
In his new capacity, General Shinseki will perform the diverse duties of Chief of Staff as set forth in Title 10 of the U.S. Code, including ensuring the Army provides trained and ready forces to the nine U.S. combatant commands, presiding over the Army Staff, and serving as a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He has served as the Army Vice Chief of Staff since 1998.
"I wish to extend my congratulations and best wishes to General Shinseki in his new capacity as the U.S. Army Chief of Staff. In February of 1942, the United States Selective Service System, because of the hysteria of that time, declared that all Japanese, citizens or other wise, be designated 4C -- enemy alien. At the time of General Shinseki's birth, he was an enemy alien, and today, to the great glory of the United States, I have the privilege of congratulating him on his appointment as the Army's 34th Chief of Staff. This can happen only in the United States," said Senator Inouye.
"General Shinseki is an outstanding leader with an impressive 34-year career with the Department of the Army. His commitment to his duties, and outstanding service to preserve and defend our nation's democratic principles have prepared him well. Our nation can only be as strong as the people who are willing to meet the challenge. I am certain that General Shinseki will represent the State of Hawaii and our nation with much integrity and distinction," continued Inouye....
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From reform-ohio: posted by Virginia Brooks, 9 Mar 2001 -
Dear Reformers,
This is an outrage, a complete outrage. Should our soldiers be wearing stuff made in Communist China and the Third World? Somebody should be passing a resolution against this!
ARMY GIVES CHINA THE ORDER FOR BERETS
By Rowan Scarborough
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The Pentagon bypassed a "buy America" law to meet the Army's rush demand for 3 million black berets and awarded contracts to firms manufacturing the headgear in communist China and other Third World countries.
The beret purchase has become a contentious topic inside the Army special operations forces.
Former Army Rangers, whose elite units exclusively wear the black beret, are lobbying members of Congress to overturn a decision by Gen. Eric Shinseki, the Army chief of staff, last October to issue the black headgear to all soldiers.
The Rangers are hot because China, in the midst of a huge military buildup, is regarded by U.S. military planners as a potential adversary as it broadens its influence in the Pacific, and threatens Taiwan, an old American ally.
"I think it's embarrassing for our country for our soldiers to wear uniforms made in communist China," says a Senate defense aide. "We've got to help Gen. Shinseki find a way out of this."
Protests have grown so fierce that President Bush asked the Defense Department to reconsider. But it's not clear whether the Pentagon will.
An Army spokesman says the department has not asked the Army to supply any information. Asked yesterday by a reporter about the commander in chief's review, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said: "I have not asked the Army to do anything particular about that."
Three ex-Rangers yesterday completed a 700-mile protest march from Fort Benning, Ga., the Rangers' headquarters, to Washington. They will hold a rally tomorrow at the Lincoln Memorial.
Gen. Shinseki says unearned berets for everyone represent the Army's transformation into a lighter, more agile force for the 21st century.
As it turns out, his urgent deadline to have every soldier in the Army wearing a black beret by June 14 spurred the Pentagon's Defense Logistics Agency to waive the so-called "Berry Amendment," a federal law that for years has required the Pentagon to buy clothing made in U.S. factories of 100 percent American components.
The agency then awarded contracts totaling $23 million for 1.3 million black berets to seven companies, five of which are producing the headgear in low-wage Third World plants.
The Army eventually plans to buy 3 million black berets.
The decision is not a happy one with American apparel makers, either. They say Gen. Shinseki's "arbitrary deadline" prevented them from tooling up to meet the Army's huge order. The four-star general wants each of the 474,000 soldiers wearing the black beret by June 14, the Army's 225th birthday.
"It's a disgrace," says Marc Lamer, a Philadelphia lawyer who represents a U.S. manufacturer. "This had to be done this way because this guy decided on a quick deadline."
Mr. Lamer, who represents a firm that protested the contract awards, says only one American manufacturer currently has the machines to make a one-piece wool beret, as the Army demanded. Such tooling is no longer in production and what is left is scattered around the world, he says.
But Mr. Lamer says that if the Army pursued a "normal type of procurement" with sufficient notice instead of one month, U.S. manufacturers would have had time to purchase the needed equipment and submit bids.
"Their justification for doing all this was the urgency, because they had to have berets arriving by April," he says. "There was no time for an American manufacturer. The deadline was simply the chief of staff of the Army deciding he wanted them when he wanted them."
A Defense Logistics Agency spokeswoman said yesterday, "In this case, since the total capacity of the only known domestic producer of a specified beret could not meet the required delivery, the waiver was granted to allow for foreign acquisition."
The spokeswoman confirmed that thousands of U.S. Army berets are being made in China as well as Romania, Sri Lanka and other countries.
An Army spokeswoman had no immediate comment yesterday.
Under the "Berry Amendment," virtually every piece of military clothing is made in America with American components.
Mr. Lamer's client is Michele Goodman, president of Atlas Headwear Inc. in Phoenix. She originally protested the Pentagon's decision to bypass the Berry Amendment. But she withdrew the case because her firm makes a two-piece sewn beret, while the Army wants a one-piece beret.
Ms. Goodman says that, with more time, her company and other apparel makers could have persuaded the Army to accept a different type of beret.
"The machines they use now to make the one-piece are antiquated. They are no longer made," she says. "Eventually, the Army is going to have to go to something different. This was a very good option."
She says her beret would cost about $4.75. She says the ones made in China cost $7.
Steven Lamar, director of government relations for the American Apparel and Footwear Association, says the Pentagon rarely waives the Berry Amendment. Usually, it's done when no U.S. company makes the item.
"Our concern was they shouldn't be waiving the Berry Amendment to fill this item," he says. "The urgency for this item is arbitrary. It's not like, 'we all need berets because of this military action we're going to do.' "
The Army previously has purchased all its berets for airborne, Special Forces and Rangers from one manufacturer able to handle the relatively small orders.
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By now, you might be scratching your head and saying,
"Wait a minute! What's going on here?"
Perhaps the following excerpts will give you a clue ...
~ ~ ~
Al Gore - Vice President of the United States of America (1993-2001). Loser Democratic candidate for President - 2000.
From Year of the Rat : . . . In 1988 Huang, Riady, Democratic activist Maria Hsia, and others formed the Pacific Leadership Council in an effort to attract Asian-Americans to the Democratic Party. Huang and Hsia are credited with organizing the April 1988 Democratic fund-raiser at James Riady's home in Los Angeles.
They were also tour guides for a January 1989 trip to Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Indonesia by Senator Al Gore and California Lieutenant Governor Leo McCarthy. The later-famous Hsi Lai Buddhist Temple paid for Gore's trip. . .
On April 29, 1996, Vice President Al Gore attended a luncheon at the Hsi Lai Temple, which describes itself as the largest Buddhist monastery in the United States. When the media first questioned Gore about the luncheon, the vice president claimed that it had simply been a "community outreach event," not a fund-raiser...
In the two years since the press discovered the temple luncheon, Vice President Gore has been between a rock and a hard place: If he and his supporters admit that he was aware it was a fund-raiser, then he opens himself to having knowingly participated in something illegal. If Gore denies that he was aware it was a fund-raiser (when everyone else around him knew), people will wonder if anyone this incompetent is fit to be president....
Today, it is much harder for Gore and his associates to claim ignorance because everyone knows that Gore's 1996 visit to the temple was not a one-time happening. Gore's relationship with the temple, and the illegal fund-raising, went back eight years. This is just one of the reasons that the temple fund-raiser was far worse than "inappropriate."
The Hsi Lai Temple has been used to launder campaign funds for the DNC.
Moreover, the April 1996 luncheon Gore attended was awash with Chinese Communist agents...
CAMPAIGN FINANCE: The Clinton-Gore record of campaign finance abuses is staggering:
● Chinese agents ensured victory for the Clinton-Gore team in the 1992 general election with a massive cascade of illegally laundered foreign funds into key states.
● More than one hundred potential witnesses of illegal foreign campaign contributions to the Clinton-Gore team have fled the country, taken the Fifth Amendment, or refused to be interviewed by investigative bodies.
● Chinese agents helped secure the 1992 Democratic presidential nomination for Clinton with a multimillion-dollar loan from an Arkansas bank under their influence.
● Chinese agents became the number one donors to Clinton and Gore in 1992.
● The Clinton Justice Department allowed the statute of limitations to run out so that illegal donations from Chinese agents could escape prosecution.
● Leading donors to the DNC are business associates of a major Tiananmen massacre war criminal that even the Chinese have jailed.
● Chinese agents tried to use their donations to Democratic senators to pressure Taiwan's banking authorities.
● Chinese agents gave $100,000 to convicted felon Webster Hubbel at the very moment the independent counsel's office was seeking his cooperation in its investigations of the Clintons.
● Chinese agents helped fund Dick Morris's brilliant stealth advertising campaign against the Republicans in 1995-1996.
● A Macau criminal syndicate figure who exploits women for prostitution laundered more than $1,000,000 in illegal donations to the DNC; he met Clinton on a number of occasions, including on visits to the White House; and he may also have funneled more than $300,000 in illegal cash donations to the Democrats and/or hush money for Hubbell.
● A Chinese agent who is also in the business of exploiting women for prostitution donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Bill Clinton and Al Gore, and he sat beside both the president and vice president at intimate fund-raisers.
● A Chinese agent/DNC donor with personal connections to Clinton and Gore is a business associate of Cambodia's largest narcotics trafficker.
● A Chinese agent who raises funds for Gore may be assisting Chinese spies to gain entrance into the United States.
● Leaders of a Thai conglomerate that is in business with Middle Eastern terrorists and with China's biggest arms smugglers had a White House meeting with Clinton at which they were illegally solicited for campaign donations.
● A Chinese PLA spy laundered illegal campaign funds through Johnny Chung and met Clinton twice at fund-raisers.
● A Macau gambling figure and a Hong Kong billionaire in business with the PLA donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Clinton's favorite charities.
● A Chinese gangster dumped hundreds of thousands of dollars in foreign funds on the Clinton Legal Defense Trust on the same day he delivered a letter demanding that Clinton abandon Taiwan.
● A PLA partner sat next to Clinton at a DNC fund-raiser contributed tens of thousands of dollars in illegal campaign funds to the Democrats.
● The officers of an American defense contractor in business with China's missile builders became the number one contributors to the Clinton-Gore reelection campaign in 1995-1996.
● After illegal campaign funds began to flow to the DNC from a PLA spy, the Clinton White House and his navy secretary helped the PLA's arms delivery boys secure the port at Long Beach, California.
. . . The bottom line: CLINTON AND GORE GOT AWAY WITH IT!
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AL GORE'S SILENCE: Special attention needs to be given to the role of V. P. Al Gore and the issue of Chinese cruise missile sales to Iran...
The Chinese have a particularly deadly anti-shipping cruise missile designated the C-802 ... in 1992 then-Senator Al Gore (D-TN) joined with Senator John McCain (R-AZ) to pass the Iran-Iraq Arms Non-Proliferation Act.
The legislation placed severe sanctions on foreign countries that exported advanced conventional weapons, including cruise missiles, to Iran or Iraq. At the time of passage in 1992, Senator Gore addressed the president of the Senate as follows: "It is abundantly clear that we need to raise the stakes high, and we need to act without compunction if we catch violators." . . .
Although the State Department has admitted to Congress that there is "evidence" of the Chinese shipments of C-802s to Iraq, and fifteen thousand American servicemen and women are within range of these weapons, the administration has refused repeated congressional demands to enforce American sanctions.
The vice president has been totally silent on the issue and has made no effort to enforce or defend his own legislation....
* * *
From If the Gods Had Meant Us To Vote They Would Have Given Us Candidates:
Al Gore has a PAC, too ... renamed Leadership 98, apparently oblivious to the fact that the name had a built-in Y2K problem. What the hell, said one of Gore's political operatives in the New York Times, "We're more concerned with the purpose than the name."
Fair enough. The purpose is to bag as much special interest cash as quickly as possible, and Leadership 98 has bagged $4 million, including $5,000 each from the top executives of Netscape, 3Com, Bell Atlantic, Lucent Technologies, Lazard Freres, SunAmerica, AT&T, Disney, Goldman Sachs, AIG, Dow Jones, Travelers, Cablevision, Prudential, Dreamworks, Rite Aid, Playboy, Merrill Lynch, Northwest Airlines, Bear Stearns, Qualcomm, America Online, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, Genetech, Bankers Trust (now Deutsche Bank), Fleet Bank, Morgan Stanley, Long Term Capital Management, BankAmerica, Solomon Smith Barney, Smith Kline Beecham, Enron, Pfizer, Lockheed Martin, Miramax, Lehman Brothers, and BellSouth....
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Consider the lineup:
Tony Coelho . . . resigned in disgrace from the House of Representatives amid charges that he was involved in a sweetheart deal with Michael Milken, the notorious junk-bond dealer.
Nathan Landow . . . investigated for trying to influence the testimony of Kathleen Willey, the White House volunteer who alleged that President Clinton groped her in a corridor outside the Oval Office.
Franklin Haney . . . indicted on 42 counts of making illegal contributions to Tennessee politicians and investigated by Congress for financial irregularities in the lease of a Washington office building that is now home to the FCC.
Maria Hsia . . . indicted for making improper campaign contributions.
Howard Glicken . . . convicted of persuading a foreign national to contribute to a campaign.
Mark Jimenez . . . indicted for making illegal campaign contributions, and currently a fugitive from justice living in the Philippines.
What do they all have in common?
Albert Gore, Jr.
Some are currently employed by, or otherwise involved in, Gore's presidential campaign. Others are past associates that Gore would like the public and the press to forget as he pursues the highest office in the land. . . .
Albert Gore, Jr.'s Top 10 Career Patrons
1. Ernst & Young International
2. BellSouth Corp.
4. D.E. Shaw & Co./Kohliner families
5. Citigroup, Inc.
6. Viacom, Inc.
7. Mattel, Inc./The Learning Co.
8. Eskind family
10. Olan Mills family
Dan Inouye - U.S. Senator (D) from Hawaii, called by some Hawaii's "Political Godfather".
From Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 10/28/96, by Ian Y. Lind:
Isle Woman Part of Campaign Probe
Former resident Nora Lum figures in congressional investigation into '92 finances
Congressional investigators have renewed a probe of former Hawaii resident Nora T. Lum, and a 1992 campaign project which she headed, because of their links to Democratic National Committee fund-raiser John Huang and former DNC official Melinda Yee.
David Bossie, staff investigator for Rep. Dan Burton, said last week that investigators are "extremely interested" in Lum's association with Huang and Yee in the Asian Pacific Advisory Council (APAC-Vote), a DNC project that operated out of offices in Torrance, Calif, during the fall of 1992.
Bossie said APAC-Vote is drawing new scrutiny because its "cast of characters" included Huang, then an officer of the Indonesian-owned Lippo Bank in Los Angeles; the late Secretary of Commerce, Ron Brown, then chairman of the DNC; and Melinda Yee, an assistant to Brown at the DNC and national director of Asian Pacific American affairs for the 1992 Clinton-Gore campaign.
Following the 1992 elections, Brown was appointed secretary of commerce and named Huang and Yee to key positions in the department. . . .
Huang and Yee have been ordered to testify in a lawsuit by the conservative organization, Judicial Watch, which wants to know whether Commerce Dept trade missions were used to raise funds for the Democratic Party. . . .
APAC-Vote officially opened its office on Sept 9, 1992, the same day then-candidate Bill Clinton announced the formation of the Asian Pacific American Committee for Clinton-Gore, whose roster included Sen. DAN INOUYE, Sen. DAN AKAKA, Rep. PATSY MINK, and then-Gov. JOHN WAIHEE. . . .
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Portland Free Press, Jan 1997, by Ace R. Hayes:
New York Mob at Mena
Yet another CIA-Mafia drug connection: Richard Brenneke puts mob boss John Gotti and CIA boss Donald Gregg in the middle of contra drug operations at Mena Airport.
In Dec 1996, the Portland Free Press secured a copy of Richard Brenneke's 21 June 1991 sworn-deposition before Congressman William Alexander, Jr, and Chad Farris, chief deputy attorney general of Arkansas. . . .
We secured former congressman William Alexander's fax number and sent him a request for confirmation.
We got more than we hoped for -
Jan 1997: "... the Brenneke transcript, along with other evidence of money laundering by Barry Seal at Mena, Arkansas, was delivered to Judge Walsh for action. Nothing followed. I agree that the American people deserve to know the truth about our government. Thank you for providing it. Good luck." (signed Bill Alexander) . . .
The American people, since World War II, or World War I, or the Spanish American War- take your choice- have witnessed the tip of many criminal icebergs. The official investigations of the criminal icebergs almost always stopped at the waterline. The other 90 percent of the criminal icebergs were never hauled onto the beach for complete examination, prosecution and correction.
The criminal cases of 1980 to the present are in perfect harmony with this honored tradition. This is, of course, why Americans are the most profoundly ignorant people on planet earth. The illusion of knowledge is far worse than knowing you don't know.
The Iran-Contra-cocaine criminal iceberg was subjected to a series of bogus investigations and damage control "exposes."
The Tower Commission and Select Committee of the House and Senate on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition in 1987, began the damage control operation for the Imperial state.
But the Hall of Shame did not stop with John Tower, Ed Muskie and Brent Scowcroft or Dan Inouye and Lee Hamilton. It included Senator John Kerry and his Special Counsel Jack Blum and Staff Aid Dick McCall. It reached to the Special Counsel, Judge Lawrence E. Walsh ...
Gene and Nora Lum - From freerepublic: - Tulsa, Okla (AP) 8/13/98 -
Lum Pleads Guilty to Tax Fraud
Democratic fund-raiser Gene K.H. Lum changed his plea in a tax fraud case to guilty Thursday as part of an agreement that seeks his cooperation in other investigations.
Lum, who pleaded guilty in 1997 to making illegal donations to Democratic campaigns, admitted he filed tax returns that claimed more than $7.1 million in false deductions for him and his wife.
Lum, 59, faces up to six years in prison and $500,000 in fines at a Nov 23 sentencing. . . .
Under the pleas agreement, the government agreed not to seek indictments against his wife, Nora, or their corporations. . . .
The Lums, who operated a Tulsa-based gas pipeline company at the time of the violations, pleaded guilty last year to a charge of felony conspiracy for laundering $50,000 in illegal donations to 1994 congressional campaigns.
Their daughter, Trisha C. Lum, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor violation in a separate campaign finance incident.
Gene and Norn Lum each received 10 months in prison and $30,000 fines in that case.
The tax charges stemmed from information uncovered by independent counsel Daniel S. Pearson during his investigation of Commerce Secretary Ronald H. Brown. Pearson closed his inquiry when Brown was killed in an airplane crash. He transferred his findings about other people to the Justice Dept for continued investigation and prosecution.
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Comments in the freerepublic forum: . . .
Of some interest to me was the fact that the golf course Michael Brown (son of Ron Brown) was given a membership to (and which Bill Clinton often uses ...) in suburban Virginia was owned by the Bishop Estate of Hawaii. . . . Bishop put close to 100 million into a company called McKenzie Methane Gas a few years before Dynamic. Bishop also bought into a Red Chip bank with Mochtar Riady'sbrother in law. Bishop hired as its Washington law firm Verner Liipert whose lobbyist is ex Gov. John Waihee. Waihee appointed 4 of the 5 Bishop Trustees. Waihee attends Clinton coffees. Waihee appointed Sen. Akaka. Verneer Liipert has another big name partner ex Sen. George Mitchell. Mitchell's son in law was president of Lum's company Dynamic Energy. Bishop owns 11% of Goldman Sachs. Sec of Treasury Robert Rubin's blind trust managed by Bishop, etc, etc. (abwehr, 8/13/98)
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From PBS Frontline: Interview with Charles Chidiac -
Charles Chidiac is a financier-developer who knew the Lums in Hawaii. He was also involved in Asian Pacific Advisory Council-Vote, a Los Angeles Democratic fund-raising group once headed by Nora Lum. He has a checkered past. He was an unindicted co-conspirator in the BNL financial scandal.
Q: Give me an example of corruption in Hawaii in the 1980s.
Chidiac: Well, if you want to do business in Hawaii, you go and you apply for a zoning. You get a call from an attorney. And he says, "I want to see you." "About what?" "Oh, I want to talk about your application."...
"But I already have an attorney." "It's necessary to see you anyway." So he comes over and he says, "Listen, you applied. This attorney of yours is no good. If you don't hire me, you'll never get your zoning...."
So, that's how they do it. It's called in Hawaii, "law firming," instead of laundering. "Law firming" is laundering money through law firms.
Q: In other words, bribery?
Chidiac: Pure, pure bribery, under the cover of being legal work.
Q: Describe Nora Lum.
Chidiac: Well, she is a Japanese woman ... And she's very smart. ... Her husband is an attorney. ... She knew all the tricks of raising money ...
Q: You had a very close relationship with them for awhile.
Chidiac: . . . I had everything ready and this thing was dragging on and on and on. And I didn't realize that the state of Hawaii, to extort half a million or a million dollars from a developer, would go to the extent of destroying a project that would create 3,000 to 4,000 jobs for the poorest part in the islands, where you have 30% unemployment. The sugar cane industry is collapsing, and they just didn't care. . . . We were planning to build three hotels ...
Q: Big money?
Chidiac: The project was going to cost somewhere around $800 million.
Q: Did Nora and Gene have access to Governor John Waihee?
Chidiac: All the time, any time. Any time. . . .
Q: What was her stock in trade?
Chidiac: Power pimping ... and greed. She pays for power; she buys power.
Q: Did she ever have big success in Hawaii?
Chidiac: I think I was her biggest success. . . . She introduced me to late Commerce Secretary Ron H. Brown in Honolulu. ... and she only boasted about her power ...
Q: Did she have many businesses?
Chidiac: She had no business. She was just acting as a power peddler. And raised money for different councilmen and politicians. . . .
Q: What motivated them?
Chidiac: They told me that ... their only interest was to make money.
Q: How did the Lums and Ron Brown meet?
Chidiac: I think she met him through John Waihee because ... as the governor, he met Bill Clinton. . . .
Q: Was she talking to big wigs on the phone all the time?
Chidiac: Yeah, -- We had calls from Hillary Clinton. . . . I heard her talking to Ron Brown. ...
Q: Does it surprise you that a woman who owns a souvenir shop and her part-time lawyer-husband can go in and out of the White House 13 times and accompany the president to Jakarta . . . Does it surprise you that their daughter ends up working for Ron Brown? That Gene almost gets on Amtrak's Board of Directors? That Nora can come and go with Bruce Lindsey, who helps them do an oil deal in Oklahoma? . . .
Chidiac: Well, I mean, if the President is corrupt, everything's possible....
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The Reagan Information Interchange , 10/17/97, by Mike Reagan:
Reno Blocks Couple from Testifying
about Foreign Money to Clinton
I was going through one of my papers today and saw an article. It was the tiniest of articles. . . .
It says, "The Justice Department opposes giving convicted Democratic Fund Raisers Nora and Gene Lum immunity from further prosecution in exchange for their congressional testimony about a scheme to funnel foreign money to Democrats in 1992. The Dept said immunity would cause irreparable harm to its investigation."
Well, I saw that and I thought I better go back because I've got a couple of stories I just haven't had time to get to. Because, there is probably a very good reason these people are not able to get immunity. So, let me share with you a story by Bob Novak. . . . What he said in his article ... is: "Two former high level Democratic Fund Raisers are ready to swear that the foreign leader ... [to whom] Bill Clinton's 1992 Campaign for President returned $50,000 was South Korea's President Kim Young-sam.
"The alleged $50,000 payment is the most shocking of many eyebrow lifters in the offing that is proposing to sing like canaries to win immunity from further prosecution for Democrat insiders Gene and Nora Lum...."
"The Lums say DNC Ron Brown who met the Hawaii-based Lums in 1991 asked them at the 1992 National Convention to go to California to help promote the Democratic party to Asian Americans there. They created a PAC. The Lums would testify to this . Working with the DNC in fund-raising they would testify they used conduit contributions - money disguised from its real illegal donors with the knowledge of the DNC personnel."
They also offer to tell about John Huang's links with the Indonesian billionaire Moshtar Rhiady and his son James, and Clinton friend and fund-raiser Charlie Trie's influence with the Chinese government.
Now that you have all that information ... who is it that is stepping in the middle and not allowing these people to have immunity to testify? And if you guessed Justice Dept Janet Reno you are 100% on target!
Janet Reno is a joke! She is a joke to the office.
But the problem is, no one, except the Clintons, are laughing....
* * *
From GreaterThings by Greg Wongham:
FBI Investigates Hawaii Democratic Party.
According to news reports, Nora and Eugene Lum were dispatched by the Hawaii Democratic Party to meet with Bill Clinton. The purpose of the visit was to seek the Presidential candidate's help in pulling the plug on an FBI investigation of Hawaii's (D) Governor John Waihee.
The Lums admitted to FBI investigators looking into allegations that arose during the "Chinagate" investigation that after Clinton was elected, Webster Hubbell (3rd man in the Justice Dept during the early days of the Clinton administration) pulled the plug....
* * *
May 24, 1998:
FBI Documents Suggest Help for
Clinton Donors in '92 Inquiry
New York Times (AP)
The FBI gathered evidence as early as 1992 that a Democratic couple who helped start Asian-American fund-raising efforts for President Clinton were engaged in wrongdoing, Justice Dept documents show.
The fund-raisers, Nora and Gene Lum, were not prosecuted for making illegal donations to Democrats until 1997, well after the controversy over the party's campaign financing efforts broke open.
Now investigators have gathered testimony that accuses the Lums of getting help during the earlier investigation from Ronald H. Brown, who was the chairman of the Democratic Party at the time, and Webster L. Hubbell, a longtime Clinton friend who became an official at the Justice Dept in Clinton's first term, according to documents and interviews.
Brown was killed in a plane crash in Croatia on April 3, 1996.
Among FBI memorandums obtained by The Associated Press, a 1993 document relying on information from a cooperating witness says that "Nora Lum once stated to him that she transported $150,000 in cash in a travel bag to the mainland to be delivered as campaign contributions on the national level."
Two years later, a former business associate of the Lums, Stuart Price, told investigators that Lum "brought the two suitcases of money back to the United States and turned the money over to the DNC," documents say. In 1997, Lum denied that such an incident had occurred....
The advisory council was the start of what would become a much larger Asian-American fund-raising effort for Clinton. It brought the Lums together with John Huang, who later emerged as a central figure in the 1996 fund-raising controversy.
According to documents released recently by Congressional investigators, bank statements and canceled checks showed that the Lums had transferred $159,000 raised by the advisory council, some at an Oct 1992 fund-raiser in Clinton's name, to their own accounts.
The emergence of FBI files on the Lums comes as pressure is mounting on Atty Gen Janet Reno to name an independent counsel to take over the fund-raising investigation.
In a public statement, the Justice Dept said the decision to shut down the inquiry was made by career prosecutors and there was "not a scrap of evidence or inference that Hubbell ever attempted to inquire about or influence any matter concerning the Lums."
Hubbell was the No. 3 official at the Justice Dept in the first 15 months of Clinton's Presidency.
Hubbell was indicted on tax charges this month and remains under investigation by Whitewater prosecutors....
After their 1997 conviction, the Lums admitted to other infractions that the FBI had been investigating in 1992, including bringing in $10,000 in donations to Hawaii's governor from "Japanese clients" and laundering thousands of dollars in contributions to another candidate.
Industrial and Commercial Bank of China - From The Straits Times-Asia, 10/31/00:
Anti-graft Audits to Include Top Leaders
China's chief auditor plans to take his fight against corruption to almost the top of the country's political system, according to state media.
This follows the discovery of US$11 billion in mismanaged funds at Chinese government offices and businesses.
The astounding sum, reported by Mr. Li Jinhua, Auditor-General of China's National Audit Office, is one of the strongest indications of how mismanagement is in China....
"Corruption thrives under a lack of efficient supervision," the paper said...
According to earlier official reports, the auditing led to the discovery of misuse of funds at the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, and the Construction Bank of China, causing losses worth more than 10 billion yuan (S$2 billion)...
Mr. Li's auditors found that individual officials and managers had misappropriated 590 million yuan. But this marked only a fraction of the 96.17 billion yuan mismanaged, if not embezzled, by offices and firms, the China Daily said.
The reports did not give details of how the funds were misused . . . But in previous reports over the past 18 months, Mr. Li has criticised officials for diverting government subsidies and spending lavishly on offices. There has also been talk of speculation in stocks....
* * *
Asia 2000, 11/8/00, by Jeremy Page:
CHINA SENTENCES 14 TO DEATH
IN SMUGGLING CASE
China sentenced 14 people to death on Wednesday, including senior police and customs officials, in the first verdicts of a multi-billion dollar smuggling scandal, the biggest corruption case of the Communist era.
Those sentenced to death included the former customs chief and deputy mayor of the southern port of Xiamen, and the former deputy police chief of southern Fujian province...
But state media said the mastermind of the smuggling scam, businessman Lai Changxing had fled overseas after being tipped off by police....
Lai's Yuanhua Group smuggled more than $6 billion worth of cars, luxury goods, oil and raw materials in the early 1990s, paying off city and provincial officials to facilitate and cover up duty evasion, Xinhua said.
"The group also used money and women to seduce a number of government officials for the convenience of their smuggling activities," Xinhua said.
The smuggling "caused serious damage to the normal economic order, brought huge financial losses to the state, led to rampant corruption, and impaired the social, political and economic life in China," it said....
The death sentences included Xiamen's former customs chief Yang Qianxian and former vice mayor Lan Pu, and former Fujian deputy police chief Zhuang Rushun, Xinhua said.
Ye Jichen, head of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China in Xiamen, was also given a death sentence...
James Riady - Indonesian billionaire who was a key figure in the Democratic campaign finance scandal.
Jan 12, 2001
Billionaire agrees to record plea bargain
for Clinton donations
In a record-setting plea bargain, Indonesian billionaire James Riady agreed to pay an $8.6 million fine and plead guilty to using foreign corporate funds to back Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign, the Justice Dept announced.
RIADY, A KEY FIGURE in the Democratic campaign finance scandal, is set to plead guilty to a felony charge of conspiring to defraud the United States, prosecutors said....
Riady pledged $1 million in 1992 to support the then-Arkansas governor's campaign, the Justice Dept said Thursday.
Riady used John Huang, an officer of his Lippo Group, to reimburse foreign contributors to Clinton and other Democrats, according to 70 pages of government documents filed with the plea bargain in U.S. District Court.
Foreign campaign contributions are illegal under U.S. law. The money was funneled through Hong Kong bank accounts and Lippo entities overseas, the government papers said.
Huang, who pleaded guilty earlier to campaign finance violations, has been cooperating with the government since Aug, 1999. Many of the allegations appeared to be based on his information.
Riady also has been talking. The government said he has met a half-dozen times with U.S. prosecutors and FBI agents to outline the information he could provide as part of a plea bargain.
Asst U.S. Attorney Dan O'Brien, who negotiated the deal, said the lack of an extradition treaty was the biggest hurdle, because Riady, an Indonesian citizen, could not have been forced to surrender if he had been indicted.
In addition, LippoBank California, a California state-chartered bank affiliated with Lippo Group, agreed to plead guilty to 86 misdemeanor counts charging that its agents, Riady and Huang, made illegal foreign campaign contributions from 1988 through 1994.
Government documents said that the Lippo Group hoped to influence American foreign policy for its own advantage.
AMONG ITS GOALS WAS TO GAIN MOST FAVORED NATION TRADE STATUS FOR CHINA; NORMALIZATION OF U.S. RELATIONS WITH VIETNAM; OPEN TRADE POLICIES WITH INDONESIA; COMMUNITY REINVESTMENT ACT EXEMPTIONS FOR LIPPO BANK AND A REPEAL OF THE GLASS-STEAGALL ACT WHICH LIMITED BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES FOR LIPPO BANK....
Government papers also said Lippo wished to gain access, meetings and time with elected officials and top government officials.
An FBI summary released last year said Huang alleged that Riady had told Clinton, while he was Arkansas governor, during a limousine ride that he wanted to raise $1 million for his campaign....
Last April, Clinton told federal investigators that he did not have "a specific recollection of what the conversation was, or this fact of the car ride." He said he only remembered seeing Riady "sometime in '92 after I became the nominee," and that Riady pledged to help his campaign....
[Apparently William J. Clinton DIDN'T FORGET, however, to deliver to the Lippo Group what they paid for ! ! ! ]
Riady is one of 26 people and two corporations so far charged by the Justice Dept's campaign finance task force since it was established four years ago. ...
Ray's office has prosecuted former Justice official and Clinton friend, Webster Hubbell, and has investigated whether payments to him, including $100,000 from Lippo Group, after he resigned, were designed to keep him from testifying against Clinton or his wife....
Riady also agreed to perform 400 hours of community service and forfeit to the U.S. Treasury any refunds that might be issued to him by any political campaign committees because of Thursday's announcement....
For more, GO TO > > > Sukamto Sia: The Indonesian Connection
John Waihee - former Governor of Hawaii and big FOB (Friend of Bill).
A Fiscal Policy Report Card on America's Governors - 1994
by The Cato Institute
Hawaii: John Waihee, Democrat - Took Office 12/86 - Grade F.
Waihee has helped to create and prolong the recession in Hawaii by his spendthrift budget policies. In his first five years, he allowed the state budget to mushroom from $3.2 billion to $5.3 billion- an average annual increase of 10 percent. That amounts to about $1,200 per family every year....
Despite ... "pro-growth" spending initiatives, the unemployment rate in Hawaii has increased by 2 percentage points since 1989, and property values are in a depression. The spending path charted under Waihee is clearly unsustainable- both fiscally and economically.
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GreaterThings by Greg Wongham: FBI Investigates Hawaii Democratic Party... According to news reports, Nora and Eugene Lum were dispatched by the Hawaii Democratic Party to meet with Bill Clinton. The purpose of the visit was to seek the Presidential candidate's help in pulling the plug on an FBI investigation of Hawaii's (D) Governor John Waihee. The Lums admitted to FBI investigators looking into allegations that arose during the "Chinagate" investigation that after Clinton was elected, Webster Hubbell (3rd man in the Justice Dept during the early days of the Clinton administration) pulled the plug.
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Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 10/28/96, by Ian Y. Lind: Isle Woman Part of Campaign Probe - Former resident Nora Lum figures in congressional investigation into '92 finances. ... Congressional investigators have renewed a probe of former Hawaii resident Nora T. Lum, and a 1992 campaign project which she headed, because of their links to Democratic National Committee fund-raiser John Huang and former DNC official Melinda Yee.
David Bossie, staff investigator for Rep. Dan Burton, said last week that investigators are "extremely interested" in Lum's association with Huang and Yee in the Asian Pacific Advisory Council (APAC-Vote), a DNC project that operated out of offices in Torrance, Calif, during the fall of 1992.
Bossie said APAC-Vote is drawing new scrutiny because its "cast of characters" included Huang, then an officer of the Indonesian-owned Lippo Bank in Los Angeles; the late Secretary of Commerce, Ron Brown, then chairman of the DNC; and Melinda Yee, an assistant to Brown at the DNC and national director of Asian Pacific American affairs for the 1992 Clinton-Gore campaign.
Following the 1992 elections, Brown was appointed secretary of commerce and named Huang and Yee to key positions in the department....
Huang and Yee have been ordered to testify in a lawsuit by the conservative organization, Judicial Watch, which wants to know whether Commerce Dept trade missions were used to raise funds for the Democratic Party....
APAC-Vote officially opened its office on Sept 9, 1992, the same day then-candidate Bill Clinton announced the formation of the Asian Pacific American Committee for Clinton-Gore, whose roster included Sen. Dan Inouye, Sen. Dan Akaka, Rep. Patsy Mink, and then-Gov. John Waihee....
Mochtar Riady - A senior executive for the Riady family's Indonesian enterprise, Lippo Group.
A billionaire, Mochtar Riady was an invited guest at Clinton's inauguration and his son, James was on the "economic summit" convened after Clinton's election.
Riady has close ties with the military junta that has killed hundreds of thousands in East Timor.
When Clinton visited Indonesia in November 1994, he met with Mochtar Riady and John Huang. A point at issue here is not only the illegal foreign contributions to a presidential election, but also the close economic and social ties to an enterprise vying to market East Timor goods in America by a group that uses genocide and slave labor to compete in the global market.
The Bishop Estate reportedly has tenuous connections to the Riadys through the Panin Group, Sino Finance, and Xiamen International Bank.
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greaterthings.com , by Greg Wongham: HAWAIIAN BANKS LINK: China-US Campaign Scandal and Illicit Capital Flow - The Link Between Mochtar Riady and the Clinton Administration.
The problems with the FDIC/Donna Tanoue and the two big Hawaii banks will undoubtedly effect people throughout the country. I believe that the Hawaii links to Mochtar Riady are attempting to gain access to the American capital market through Riady's brother-in-law, Mumin Ala Gundawun.
Riady was too hot (BCCI, Chinagate), so they wisely chose to approach their plan via the Hawaii connection.
Sec. Treas., Robert Rubin played a major role in setting up this new bank scandal by lobbying for repeal of the Bank Holding Company Act. The purpose for this action is to allow Bank Holding companies (Hawaii's Pacific Century Financial Corp and BancWest) to expand their financial services, thus allowing them to become full service securities brokerages. This seems like an ideal front to legitimize their deals to the American capital markets....
Overview. I am the producer/host of a public access TV show called "Corruption in Hawaii." I have spent 6 years exposing different aspects of the Hawaii machine....
During the month of August ... a segment of my show (was) titled, "What does Hawaii's Bank Losses Mean to You?" The show featured a guest who described the losses he experienced in his family trust which was handled by Pacific Century Financial Corp (formerly Bank of Hawaii). He lost $1 million, plus $300 thousand in legal fees.
Numerous people called and said that they too, had experienced significant losses. Last week the public access station pulled the segment of the show. The next day the CEO of Pacific Century resigned. Two of the board of directors for the public access station are with the two big banks....
The important points in this story revolve around the fact that Hawaii's Democratic machine played a major role in the Chinagate scenario that grew out of the investigation into illegal foreign campaign fundraising.
The machine headed by Hawaii's political godfather, Senator Dan Inouye was being investigated by the FBI during former (R) President George Bush's tenure. The basis of the investigation stemmed from allegations of extortion and bribery aimed at the administration of former (D) Gov. John Waihee. The investigation was killed by Clinton's friend Webster Hubbell, the number three man in the Justice Dept under Janet Reno. (AP story by J. Solomon: FBI failed to act of fund-raising of ex-Hawaii couple.)...
Eventually the investigation focused on Indonesian banking tycoon, Mochtar Riady and his Lippo Group. The basis of the story I am trying to relay to you is that Hawaii's Democratic Machine used the billions of dollars of the Kamehameha Schools / Bishop Estate assets to undertake the task of underwriting and orchestrating the initial public offering of the Xiamen International Bank on the Hang Seng and the NY Stock Exchange. This would have the effect of legitimizing a Communist Chinese banking entity on the biggest stock exchange in the U.S. and opening the doors allowing American money to capitalize a communist regime...
Panin Group - From The Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 10/29/97, by Rick Daysog: Bishop, partners alter Chinese bank plan. . . . The turmoil in Hong Kong's stock market may hamper plans by Bishop Estate and its partners to take a mainland Chinese bank public. . . . With the benchmark Hang Seng index losing more than a fifth of its value during the past weeks, analysts said that a proposal to list shares of Xiamen International Bank on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange could be put on hold.
The development underscores Bishop Estate's growing exposure to global economic trends. It also calls attention to the $10 billion trust's high-risk, high-reward investment strategy....
Bishop Estate, the state's largest private landholder, owns nearly 5 percent of Xiamen, which last year applied with the People's Bank of China to list its shares on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
Henry Peters, a Bishop Estate trustee and a member of Xiamen's board of directors, conceded that the volatile Hong Kong market may delay Xiamen's initial public offering. But he said the bank's partners are committed to taking it public, which would greatly enhance the estate's investment....
Critics say the trust should not be investing in exotic companies such as Xiamen. They argue that the nonprofit foundation -- which finances Kamehameha Schools -- should avoid high-risk ventures in emerging markets such as China....
The list of Xiamen International Bank's investors reads like a who's who of Wall Street and Pacific Rim finance. They include former U.S. Treasury Secretary William Simon, Manila-based Asian Development Bank and Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan Ltd...
The largest shareholder is Min Xin Holdings Ltd., formerly the Panin Group, which owns 36.75 percent of the bank. An affiliated company, Panin Bank, formed Xiamen in 1985.
Panin was founded by Indonesian businessman Mu'min Ali Gunawan, a brother-in-law of Indonesian banking tycoon Moshtar Riady...
Riady, who heads the Lippo Group, is at the center of the campaign finance scandal plaguing the Clinton administration....
Peters said he was unaware of the relationship between Panin Bank and the Riady family. ...but investments of Simon, Panin and the estate have been linked for years. The estate was a big shareholder in First Interstate Bank of Hawaii Inc. when Simon sold the local bank to First Hawaiian Inc. in 1991. Simon, in turn acquired much of his stake in First Interstate in the mid-1980s from Panin Bank executives...
Peters was a director of the local affiliate Panin North America Inc. in 1983 when he was a legislator, according to filings with the state Ethics Commission. ...
Xiamen International Bank - On Sept 28, 1974, Luso International Bank was incorporated in Macau. In 1975, it was acquired by Panin Group (renamed Min Xin Group in 1988), Hong Kong.
In Nov 1985, Panin Group, with three PRC-based institutions, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China; Fujian Investment and Enterprise Corp (renamed Fujian International Trust & Investment Corp); and Construction and Development Corp of Xiamen Special Economic Zone (renamed Xiamen Construction and Development Corp, Ltd.) jointly founded Xiamen International Bank, the first joint venture bank in the People's Republic of China.
Luso International Bank was injected as part of the capital to the bank, thus becoming a wholly-owned subsidiary of Xiamen International Bank.
In Nov 1991, XIB was joined by three more shareholders: Asian Development Bank; The Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan, Ltd.; and Sino Finance Group, Ltd. (owned by Hawaii's Bishop Estate and former U.S. Treasury Secretary, William Simon).
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From GreaterThings, by Greg Wongham: The Ripple Effect is one way we, the people of Hawaii, can attempt to tell the rest of the country about the way the Asian-influenced financial world of Hawaii could cost you and your children every penny in your bank.
Hawaii's political powerbrokers, led by Hawaii (D) Senator Dan Inouye, have been very busy manipulating the financial world from Wall Street to the White House.
Inouye knew Wall Street could be had if he were able to get a big powerhouse brokerage firm like Goldman Sachs to make a market for one or two of his big Asian banker friends, like Mochtar Riady's Lippo Group (who was the center of the "Chinagate" investigation) and his brother-in-law, Mumin Ala Gundawun, who controls Xiamen International Bank.
Other Chinese-Indonesians like Atang Latief and his former son-in-law Sukarman Sukamto (now named Sukamto Sia), played a big role in the "high finance" world that has dominated Hawaii and Hawaii politics for decades. Latief, for example, was credited with controlling 10 offshore banks in Hong Kong.
The $6 billion Kamehameha Schools Trust provided the financial "brick and mortar" used to build the bridge that would span the gap between Asia and U.S. capital markets. The Democratic Party-controlled Kamehameha Schools Trust spent $500 million to purchase 10% of Goldman Sachs stock....
Kamehameha Schools' lead investment trustee, Henry Peters, stated that they were going to put Xiamen International Bank on the N.Y. stock exchange. This was a plan to create a conduit allowing the American public's capital to flow through to their business partners in Asia, in some cases subsidizing a communist regime.
The Clinton appointment of Rubin as Secretary Treasurer was the other link to Hawaii's financial and banking world....
For more, GO TO > > > Dirty Money, Dirty Politics and Bishop Estate
William J. Clinton - 42nd President of the United States of America; Commander-In-Chief of the U. S. Armed Services; Highest Law-Enforcement Officer of the Land.
* * *
From Year of the Rat : . . . Our thesis is simple: The Clinton administration has made a series of Faustian bargains and policy blunders that allowed a hostile power to further its aims in Washington.
In the main, Bill Clinton and Al Gore did it for money.
In these pages, we will show that, in order to gain and hold onto power, the Clinton administration has acted recklessly, allowing the wrong people to gain access to our most important political and economic secrets. Any number of Chinese arms dealers, spies, narcotics traffickers, gangsters, pimps, accomplices to mass murder, communist agents, and other undesirables will appear in these pages, all associated in one way or another with the White House and money.
~ ~ ~
Did the Clinton administration sell out America's national security to one of this country's leading and most dangerous adversaries merely to raise campaign cash?
In the pages that follow, we will prove our answer, which is: YES !
~ ~ ~
The Clinton-Gore inauguration in mid-January 1993 was another opportunity for the Riadys to open their wallets. James Riady and John Huang each gave $100,000 to cover the cost of inaugural parties. The Riadys brought a number of friends from Indonesia to Washington for the swearing in ceremony...
Their generosity continued. At the direction of Mochtar Riady, Joe Giroir -- a Lippo partner and Arkansas "Friend of Bill" (FOB) -- bestowed a life-sized bust of Clinton upon the National Portrait Gallery. Giroir has personally contributed $200,000 to the DNC since 1993, something made easier by his $500,000-a-year compensation from Lippo....
In return for such generosity, the Riadys and their friends were given unparalleled access to the White House. In Jakarta, James Riady likes to brag about where he was on the afternoon of April 19, 1993.
On that day eighty members of the Branch Davidian religious cult were holed up in their compound outside of Waco, Texas, when it was shattered by a tank-led assault. By the time the FBI and Treasury's Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents had completed their work, seventeen American children had burned to death....
As might be expected, the White House was a busy place that afternoon, and the president was preoccupied. Clinton was not too distracted, however, to chat with his leading contributors -- James Riady, John Huang, and Mark Grobmyer -- in his little study off the Oval Office. Riady later told Indonesian diplomats that, during their chat, a television in the corner showed the Waco compound burning over and over as CNN repeated its coverage.
Clinton even took time to show his visitors the White House Situation Room, then on full alert. White House entry logs confirm that Riady and his companions were in the presidential offices (West Wing) of the White House that day.
They apparently also dropped in on Robert Rubin, now secretary of the treasury, who was then a White House economics official....
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From Colonel David H. Hackworth's DEFENDING AMERICA column dated March 1, 1994:
GOING ALONG TO GET ALONG. . . . Today's top brass are masters of the go-along-to-get-along mentality that oozed into practice during the Vietnam War, a war where everyone from buck private to general -- less the brain dead -- knew Westmoreland's strategy and objective were criminally flawed.
Yet in eight blood-splattered years, not one senior officer had the moral courage to tell the American people the truth. They closed their eyes and went about grabbing their medals and promotions while repeating Westy's false chant that victory was near.
In the end, almost 60,000 body bags were filled and hundreds of thousands of men and women had their bodies and minds rearranged and forever diminished....
Clinton, who wouldn't know a bomber from a ballerina, and his civilian advisers -- none of whom have served in the trenches in combat -- need to know the truth.
The only way to stop this shortage of moral courage is to replace almost all of the top layer of the U.S. Military's leadership with younger soldiers from the lower ranks, those still close with the troops who haven't yet been corrupted by the system...
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From: The Progressive Review : Clinton Scandal Clips Part 15:
PENSION FUND INVESTS IN CHINA
The Clinton crowd, which almost caused a disaster in the Arkansas state pension fund in the mid-1980s by its risky investments, is at it again according to Investor's Business Daily and the American Spectator.
The Arkansas State Teachers' Fund has put large sums into four companies with strong links to Chinese intelligence and the People's Liberation Army, including the China Ocean Shipping Co., China North Industries, China Resources Enterprises and China Travel.
Some of these firms are also linked to Indonesian Clinton crony Mochtar Riady. The system owns nearly $2 million worth of stock in a COSCO subsidiary.
Says Charles Altmon of the highly rated Growth Stock Outlook newsletter ... the pension fund investments are "downright foolish."...
For more, GO TO > > > A Flock of Donkeys
And for all US Taxpayers and men and women in uniform,
YOU'LL WANT TO TAKE A LOOK AT
Last update July 20, 2008, by The Catbird