posted on February 19, 2004 10:41:38 AM new
Big money talks. It frequently talks Bush cronies right out of going to jail and into cushy seats on publicly funded boards. There are so many outright crooks in Bush's pocket that I'm going to spotlight one a day 'til November. Enjoy!
'Rangers' are those who contribute $200,000 or more to Bush's 2004 campaign.
'Pioneers' are those who contribute $100,000 or more to Bush's 2004 campaign.
Tom & Nancy LoefflerRangers
Occupation: Founder & Lobbyist
Employer: Loeffler Jonas & Tuggey
Home: San Antonio, TX
Revolving-door lobbyist Tom Loeffler served in Congress from 1979 until 1987. He also was: A legislative counsel to Senator John Tower; A congressional lobbyist for President Ford; and Helped coordinate President Reagan’s Central American policies (see William Kilberg). Loeffler left Arter & Hadden (which the Center for Public Integrity ranked as George W. Bush’s No. 10 career patron in 1999) to form his own lobby shop in 2001. Loeffler surfaced in two Bush gubernatorial scandals. After then-Governor Bush reappointed Loeffler to the University or Texas System Board of Regents in 1995, Loeffler joined the board of the newly created University of Texas Investment Management Co. (UTIMCO), which oversees billions of dollars of endowment funds. The Houston Chronicle exposed that UTIMCO’s board doled out lucrative investment contracts to firms with close ties to both Bush (see Lee Bass, Robert Grady and Charles Wyly) and Pioneer UTIMCO Chair Tom Hicks (Hicks’ firm kept Loeffler on a lobby retainer in 1997 and 1998). Other Bush-appointed Pioneer regents who sat on UTIMCO’s board include Woody Hunt, A.W. Riter and Tony Sanchez. As a regent in 1994, Loeffler voted to exclusively license a promising UT-developed gene cancer therapy to start up Introgen Therapeutics. Three years later, Introgen appointed Loeffler to its board and granted him options on 10,000 shares of stock. After ethical complaints about this vested interest as Introgen went public in 2000, Loeffler pledged to give these proceeds to charity (Pioneer Regent Charles Miller also owned at least 10,000 Introgen shares). Loeffler was a big lobbyist for Metabolife International (see Ron Kaufman), which Michael Ellis founded after being busted for housing a speed lab in his home. A still-legal herbal stimulant used in weight-loss remedies, ephedra is linked to psychosis, strokes and heart attacks. After eight ephedra-linked deaths in the state, Texas Department of Health (TDH) staff drafted tough new ephedra marketing rules in the late 1990s, triggering an industry lobbying blitz and an influx of contributions to then-Governor Bush by this lobby and ephedra vendors such as Ellis and Pioneer Craig Keeland. Bush’s Board of Health appointees (see Bill Ceverha) trashed this staff proposal in 1999 and adopted a weak industry alternative. Next a Texas state senator hired by Loeffler and Metabolife, lobbied Bush Health Secretary Tommy Thompson in 2001 to oppose a pending TDH rule requiring ephedra products to carry a toll-free FDA number where users could report health problems. One month later, TDH postponed implementing the new rule, citing the “advice” of the U.S. Department of Health. After federal prosecutors announced a criminal probe in 2002 into an alleged Metabolife cover up of consumer health complaints, the company suddenly released 13,000 such complaints. The U.S. FDA belatedly announced in late 2003 that it would seek an ephedra ban. The San Antonio City Council questioned if it got its money’s worth from a $172,800 contract with Loeffler’s firm to secure federal aid for the city in 2003. After scoring poorly on eight “performance measures,” Loeffler’s firm was a no show at a late 2003 city meeting to review its performance. Loeffler seemed predestined for special-interest lobbying. A 1984 Public Citizen study found that he had the worst record in Congress when he voted with consumers in just one out of 40 key votes. Loeffler also topped a list of five members of Congress whose campaigns received illegal corporate money from Vernon Savings & Loan (which failed at a taxpayer cost of $1.3 billion). A Vernon officer told a 1989 grand jury that Loeffler offered to set up a meeting with then-Treasury Secretary James A. Baker III if Vernon helped pay Loeffler’s debt from a failed 1986 gubernatorial bid. The officer testified that four Vernon executives then moved $8,000 in laundered corporate money to Loeffler’s campaign--just before federal regulators forced them to resign. In a San Francisco hotel shower in 1986 Loeffler reportedly improvised a new prophylactic—wearing shower caps on his feet to prevent AIDS.
posted on February 19, 2004 10:55:43 AM new
I think a better comparison would be what ILLEGAL campaign contributions had to be returned, as was the case with clinton and now Kerry.
But for Kerry to run on a platform that he doesn't bow to special interests when even his own running mate [Edwards] says there's proof of it...is laughable.
posted on February 19, 2004 11:07:04 AM new
Linda, dear, I don't expect you to read at a level of comprehension that would enable you to appreciate the racket Bush & Co. operate.
I'm posting these pieces for those who can read entire paragraphs without editing the sentences they don't like.
posted on February 19, 2004 11:10:51 AM new
That's one of the things I've most admired in gravid's posts. He can clearly see BOTH sides do the same thing and are beholden to their contributors.
What I find laughable is that some here think it's ONLY the other party.
posted on February 20, 2004 11:24:28 AM new
Here's #2:
Lee BassPioneer
Occupation: President
Employer: Bass Family Enterprises
Home: Fort Worth, TX
Lee Bass manages the inherited oil assets of this now-diversified billionaire family, which the Center for Public Integrity ranked in 1999 as George W. Bush’s fifth largest career patron. When Bush’s ailing Harken Oil suspiciously won exclusive offshore drilling rights in Bahrain in 1990, the Basses bankrolled the venture. When Bush was governor in the late 1990s, several of his appointees to the University of Texas Board of Regents (including Pioneers Woody Hunt, Tom Loeffler, A.W. Riter and Tony Sanchez) sat on the board of the newly created University of Texas Investment Management Co. (UTIMCO), which oversees billions of dollars of endowment funds. The Houston Chronicle exposed that UTIMCO’s board doled out lucrative investment contracts to firms with close ties to Pioneer UTIMCO Chair Tom Hicks or George W. Bush, including firms tied to Pioneers Lee Bass, Robert Grady and Charles Wyly. When Bush was Governor in 1997, lobbyists of the Bass and Wyly families helped kill a bill that would have taxed investment partnerships, with the Basses threatening to move their operations out of state. Governor Bush fast-tracked an oil tax break in 1999 by declaring it a legislative emergency. Billed as relief for small producers, the law benefited energy giants as well as the oil companies of nine future Pioneers, including a $142,137 tax break for Bass Enterprises. Bush appointed Lee Bass chair of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD), which ignited controversy by selling alcohol and tobacco ads for brochures distributed to park visitors. In a controversial 1998 move, the agency privatized wildlife by granting permits that allow landowners to trap and breed “wild” deer that they can sell on the hoof to hunters who lease their land. Yale University returned the $20 million that Lee Bass donated in 1995 for a Western Civilization program. Bass wanted to control related faculty appointments; critics said he would use this power to discourage multiculturalism. Lee Bass’ wife, Ramona, is one of the Texas regional heads of Bush’s 2004 reelection campaign. Lee Bass ranked No. 162 on the 2003 “Forbes 400 Richest Americans” list, with an estimated net worth of $1.4 billion.
"It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of what he was never reasoned into." -Jonathan Swift
posted on February 21, 2004 02:00:10 PM newSaturday Night Special
Stephen M. LessingRanger
Occupation: Managing Director
Employer: Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.
Home: Cold Spring Harbor, NY
Stephen Lessing is managing director of Lehman Brothers investment bank, which he joined in 1980. American Express combined this and other investment banks under the Shearson Lehman name in the 1980s (see Stephen Schwarzman) but spun off Lehman into an independent firm in 1994. The Securities Industry Association elected Lessing chair of its political action committee in late 2002, shortly before Lehman and nine other Wall Street firms reached a record $1.4 billion settlement with regulators. The deal settled charges that bank researchers promoted stocks of companies that awarded them lucrative underwriting contracts. One Lehman analyst sought advice in 1999 from an institutional investor on how to rate the stock of Internet company Razorfish. The investor responded, “Unless you anticipate Lehman getting I[nvestment]-banking business from them, I would rate them a neutral” and price them well below the then-trading price. Noting that Razorfish was a banking client, the Lehman’s analyst said he would probably have to rate it “above the trading price.” A more sensational scandal followed Lehman’s 2000 acquisition of rival SG Cowen, after which Cowen broker Frank Gruttadauria became general manager of Lehman’s Cleveland office. Gruttadauria went on the lam throughout 2002 after defrauding dozens of wealthy clients out of $277 million over 15 years. Before fleeing, Gruttadauria gave $50,000 to a GOP fund controlled by Ohio Treasurer Joseph Deters, whose office had awarded $5.9 billion in trading business to Cowen and Lehman. Though regulators had flagged suspicious amounts of churning in Gruttadauria’s accounts, he snowed both them and his supervisors—whom he said were blinded by all the business he generated. The Securities and Exchange Commission and New York Stock Exchange fined Lehman and SG Cowen $7.5 million in 2003 for failing to detect and prevent one of the “most egregious examples of misconduct in the securities industry.”
posted on February 23, 2004 01:55:58 PM newNumber 4:
Sergio PinoRanger
Occupation: President & CEO
Employer: Century Partners Group
Home: Miami, FL
Cuban-born Sergio Pino ran a plumbing company before he founded the precursor to Century Builders in 1987. It is the largest homebuilder in the Miami-Dade area and the centerpiece of his larger Century Partners Group. The Miami Herald featured Pino in a 1999 expose on how local politicians used Miami International Airport “as a billion-dollar piggy bank to enrich their friends and campaign contributors.” Noting that Pino was a top donor to Mayor Alex Penelas and contributed to the campaigns of most local commissioners, the article said recipients of the airport’s dutry-free concessions cut Pino into the deal for his political connections and to meet bid specifications mandating the inclusion of “disadvantaged businessmen.” This particular “disadvantaged” businessman owned a waterfront home and a 54-foot yacht. A 2002 county Inspector General report accused Pino and other minority partners in the airport contracts of doing no work in exchange for their cut. Active in the anti-Castro movement, Pino has raised money from investors to build housing in Cuba after Castro’s downfall. “There won’t be enough flights, enough hotels, enough anything in Cuba to accommodate us all,” he told USA Today. Pino is a former board member of Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Florida’s Future. Governor Bush appointed him to the state Transportaiton Commission with Pioneers David Brown and Mark Guzzetta and to the board of Florida Atlantic University.
