Put Up or Shut Up: Post Support for Accusations Against Kennedys and Clintons (cont.) - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

host · 02-21-2008, 11:40 AM

(continued from title), support rising to a level of credible evidence that, if it were posted as accusations of wrongdoing against a Bush family member or against, John McCain, for example, would seem equally convincing to you.

How do you "know what you Know"? Post what you got and where you got it!

Lately, there have been an increasing number of posts referring to "crimes" of "the Clintons" and the Kennedys, in response to actual news reports that I have posted about crimes, convictions, mob associations related to John McCain's father-in-law.

These posted Clinton and Kennedy references come up at other times, too, as a blanket, dismissive response to substantive allegations against republican politicians.

So, I'm wondering....does anybody actually have anything on the Clintons or on the Kennedys? I looked at the Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. wiki entry, and, considering that it is open sourced, why have none of you posted your evidence of "ole Joe's" criminality, there?

Are the Kennedys and Clintons just "too cunning" or too "well connected" to leave any trail of their crimes? My standard, when I cannot find strong support to post accusations about a political opponent, is to refrain from posting things that I cannot back up. What is your standard?

Sure....we know about the dubious circumstances of Ted Kennedy's accident in the summer of 1969 that claimed the life of Mary Joe Kopechne, but those circumstances and accusations against Ted Kennedy were not enough to prompt his arrest, or even the loss of his US senate seat. That incident was certainly not grounds for the accusations that the Kennedys are a "crime family".

The background of the Clintons are the most investigated details in modern times, so, in view of that, what can you post about them to help us to see your POV?

I want to stress that, whatever you post, it should rise to the level of the support I have posted to make my claim that McCain's father-in-law was "mobbed up", that the money that launched McCain's political career and composes almost his entire, current $50 million plus personal fortune, began with proceeds of organized crime activities of his father-in-law.

I think the McCain example is a good test....if the support I've posted for my opinion that McCain is severely ethically compromised because he took "mob money", is not convincing to you, you will probably have to do better than I did, to support your accusations against a Clinton or a Kennedy.

Consider also, that most of my sources of support came from mainstream daily newspapers, published in major newspapers for many years, and from the IRE investigative reporter task force of 36 reporters, in 1977.

I am hoping we can reach a better understanding of how and where we gather and react to details that shape our political opinions.

The_Jazz · 02-21-2008, 11:58 AM

Should we not mention Rosemary Kennedy's lobotomy?

Time Magazine published the bootlegging rumors as truth in 1999. The lobotomy is mentioned in the same article.

Also

this book by Ted Schwartz

confirms the bootlegging rumors as well as the lobotomy.

That said, who cares? The sins of the father...

host · 02-21-2008, 12:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The_Jazz

Should we not mention Rosemary Kennedy's lobotomy?

Time Magazine published the bootlegging rumors as truth in 1999. The lobotomy is mentioned in the same article.

Also this book by Ted Schwartz confirms the bootlegging rumors as well as the lobotomy.

That said, who cares? The sins of the father...

A number of people here care, apparently, or they wouldn't be posting referencing to Kennedy and Clinton crimes....

Is it your opinion, that a one sentence reference to Joe Kennedy bootlegging during prohibition, with no other details, competes with the support I have posted for opinions about the source of McCain's wealth and initial political career financing?

You wouldn't accept the in depth documentation I posted, a while back, supporting the pov that Fred Thompson was the Nixon admin. "watch dog" on the watergate senate investigative committee, and not an altruistic non-partisan, but you offer the info at the two links in your post, as peruasive, or just as examples that there is justification for accusations against the Kennedys?

Willravel · 02-21-2008, 12:35 PM

I've had plenty of accusations against the Kennedys (the REAL Kennedys, JFK and RFK) and the Clintons, just as I have against McCain.

Maybe a better way to put it is to address this directly to McCain supporters. A lot of people (like me) are supporting who I suspect you and I would agree is simply the best of the three likely candidates, Obama. I'd even venture a guess that maybe 60-80% of TFPolitics is behind Obama, and maybe 20-30% are behind Clinton.

In other words, this would be better placed in a forum that was less progressive liberal leaning.

The_Jazz · 02-21-2008, 12:42 PM

host, in the greater scheme of things, I think that any Clinton improprieties would be much more relevant than anything that Joe Kennedy did or didn't do as would any crimes committed by McCain's father-in-law. That's because the crimes would have been committed by the candidates (to lump them together) themselves, not by a family member. Did Jimmy Carter fashion himself a brewer? No, that was his ignomious brother Billy.

All I did with Joe Kennedy was look to see if anyone substantiated the bootlegging rumors that were out there for years. All the hearsay evidence I've ever seen stated it as a rumor, and I looked for anything to the contrary. That's what I found in my 5 minute search. And it was more than a 1 sentence reference - it had a LINK!

These are meant to be examples. I don't think that any argument about Joe Kennedy or McCain's FIL really hold that much water. The Clintons are different since they're the actual officeholders, but the other two are just about relatives. And I think that we can agree, host, that all families are fucked up on some level. I know mine is.

host · 02-28-2008, 10:51 AM

The_Jazz, John McCain was a 44 years old naval officer when he met James W. Hensley, and the stench of the following story was still playing out in the criminal trial for the murder of Don Bolles of a close associate of Kemper Marley, a man described as like an adopted son of Marley. That man was convicted twice of murdering Bolles and received a life sentence.

Quote:

azcentral.com | special report
Max Dunlap, who turned 76 last May, is still serving a life sentence for his role in the murder of Don Bolles. He insists to this day that he shouldn’t be ...
www.azcentral.com/specials/special01/

McCain had to know of Hensley's background, but he resigned his Naval officer's commission, and took a job as Hensley's VP of PR. Hensley was McCain's initial campaign financier, and all of McCain's wealth today can be traced to Hensley. All of Hensley's wealth and connections can be traced to his organized crime activity with Marley and his associates. Hensley's brother and business partner, Eugene, served 3 federal prison sentences, from 1948 to 1969, and I read in a 60s Albuquerque Journal newspaper article that he owed the IRS $1 million in interest and penalties.

McCain made his decisions, reaped fantastic benefits, and I'm saying that all it would take is an informed electorate, exposed to the info that I, as a "hobbyist", bring to the table here, to react to McCain's bid for the presidency as if he were applying for a license to operate a horse racing track in any state, or a casino in Las Vegas. McCain's application would be rejected, due to unsavory ties to organized crime figures and his possession of and personal gain from mob activity proceeds.

<h3>But, we're not talking about a license from state regulators to manage a gambling venue, we're talking about McCain's suitability, given what all of this evidence indicates about his judgment and his ethics, to serve in the office of president of the United States.

Still waiting....where are all of the folks who have post unsupported Clinton or Kennedys BS, in the past?</h3>

In 1976, Arizona Republic newspaper investigative reporter Don Bolles was killed when his car was rigged with explosives and detonated via a remote device as he attempted to drive it out of a Phoenix parking lot. Bolles, as he lay dying after the blast, said:

Quote:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Bolles
...."They finally got me. The Mafia. Emprise. Find John (Harvey Adamson).".....

In the aftermath of the murder of Don Bolles, 36 investigative reporters from newspapers across the country, descended on Phoenix and spent the next six months investigating the death of Bolles and Arizona official corruption and mob influence of business and government. The result was a 23 part expose, exceeding 80,000 words, called "The Arizona Project, that was published in newspapers nationwide. Here is one excerpt. Compare it to the second article, published in connection with this reporting. It details the organized crime associations and activities of John McCain's father in law, James W. Hensley. Hensley worked for Kemper Marley for at least 8 years, and was arrested twicwe, and convicted on federal liquor federal invoice fraud charges once, in 1948, receiving a suspended sentence.

The Hensleys, as the second article tells us, literally snuck into the horse race track business in New Mexico, with the former Capone bookie wire service operator of Kemper Marley, their undisclosed 1/3 race track partner, Clarence (Teak) Baldwin.

Today, McCain lives in Hensley's old residential complex in central Phoenix, and enjoys a net worth of $50 to $100 million of the now deceased Hensley's money. McCain's first post naval career job and his financing for his first politcal campaign, were given to him by James Hensley.

If you have anything as sensational as this to post about the Kennedy's or the Clintons, especially if it is this richly documented, please share it!

Quote:

Link to photo of this article <a href="http://home.comcast.net/~qvc/mob2.png">(page 1)</a>
Link to photo of this article <a href="http://home.comcast.net/~qvc/mob2.png">(page 2)</a>

From page 2:

March 22, 1977
Phoenix Millionaire Linked to Bolles Slaying

....When Prohibition was repealed in 1933, Marley organized the wholesale liquor business that eventually became the United Liquor Co., with branches all over Arizona.

There were hints honesty was not the watchword for Marley's liquor business. In 1948, two employees were fined and sentenced to terms of imprisonment for making false reports to the government on distilled liquor sales. <h3>One of those employes had his jail sentence suspended.</h3> (McCain's father in law, James W. Hensley was that employee....)

In 1953, Marley's Phoenix and Tucson distributorships were accused of falsifying records to avoid paying liquor taxes, but were found innocent.

As Marley's liquor business grew, he took part in other business ventures - a frozen food locker, a bottling plant, a sheep-raising business, and ranching operations. In 1946, according to police sources, Marley took up still another line of business, one that brought him into contact with organized crime.

In that year, he and several others, including Cosa Nostra mobster Peter Licavoli took over the racing wire service for bookies in Arizona, police said. The service was the original Transamerica Wire Service established by mobster Gus Greenbaum for the Al Capone mob prior to 1941.

At the time, Greenbaum was concentrating on establishing hotel-casinos for the mob in Las Vegas. Late in the 1940s, Marley and his associates were instructed by the Chicago Syndicate to move Greenbaum out of the Phoenix wire service, and they did so, police sources said.

But Greenbaum had problems. The following information was obtained by IRE from a confidential Phoenix Police Dept. report: "As Greenbaum grew bigger and stronger in Las Vegas, he began cheating his partners and was ordered to sell out or he would be carried out in a box. In early December, 1958, a meeting was held at the Grace Ranch of Peter Licavoli Sr. (Tucson). At this meeting were Joe Profaci, Joe Magliocco, Joseph Bonanno Sr., and Tony Accardo (all mob bosses)"...

The next day, on Dec. 3, 1958, Greenbaum and his wife were found dead in their Phoenix home with their throats slit. James (Jimmy) Aaron, a partner of Greenbaum who police said helped Marley run the wire service, shot himself a year later after leaving a note saying he feared he was going insane.

Others who managed the wire-service operation for Marley included confessed bookie Clarence E. (Mike) Newman, gambler Clarence E. (Teak) Baldwin, who was convicted of tax evasion in 1956, and Pete Abbey, police sources said.

Abbey, manager of the private, exclusive Cowman's Club in east Phoenix, was indicted last October on 60 counts of sports bookmaking for an operation at the club that police said was raking in $300,000 a month in bets....

.....A California man won a large civil judgment against Baldwin and a Baldwin associate in 1952 after accusing them of drugging and defrauding them....

Quote:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...54C0A967948260
Cattleman and Reporters End Their Four-Year Libel Dispute

AP
Published: July 18, 1981

...Mr. Marley named the reporters' group, the individuals who worked on the project and newspapers that published the stories. <h3>Last February, after a five-month trial, a jury in Maricopa, Ariz., found that the reporters had not libeled Mr. Marley or invaded his privacy.</h3> But he was awarded $15,000 in punitive damages.The dismissal came after both sides agreed not to pursue the case through appeals. No money was exchanged....

Compare the info above to this article in my post:
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...29#post2405229

Quote:

Albuquerque Journal - March 26, 1977
Riudoso Race Track Owners Tied to Arizona Gambling

By Robert V. Beier

Former associated of Phoenix wheeler dealers and gambling interests once controlled Riudoso

Downs race track and whiile in New Mexico they apparently kept their business operations to

themselves.

Eugene V. Hensley and his brother James W. Hensley who purchased controlling stock of Riudoso

Racing Assn in December 1952, once worked for and with Kemper Marley, Phoenix millionaire

rancher and wholesale liquor dealer.

<h3>And When the Hensley brothers purchased control of the Lincoln County track, Phoenix gambler

Clarence E. "Teak" Baldwin simultaneously bought one third of the race track stock-- something

the Hensleys denied in a State Racing Commission hearing in May, 1953.</h3>

Marley, 70 was named recently in a police affadavit as the man who requested the contract

killings of Arizona Republic reporter Don Bolles, slain in a bomb attack last June and Arizona

Atty Gen Bruce Babbitt.

No attempt was made on Babbitt's (continued on A-16)

(Continued from A-1)

Ex-Owners Knew Arizona Gamblers

life. Marley has not been criminally charged.

An Investigative Reporters and Editors "IRE" report in it's Phoenix Project revealed Marley also

ran an organized crime ???? wire service for bookies that was managed at one time by Baldwin who

was convicted of income tax evasion in 1956.

The IRE investigation showed the Hensleys were associates of Marley and Baldwin in the 1930s,

1940s and early 1950s in Phoenix.

A search of commission records in Albuquerque by the Journal showed the racing body in the early

1950s was aware of the associations and leary of Mr. Baldwin connected with the Hensleys in

their purchase and operation of the track.

At a May 1953 commission hearing in Albuquerque records show the Hensley brothers readily told

of their connections with the Arizona wholesale liquor business and Marley in the 1930s and

1940s and the federal convictions in 1948 for making false entires on government records

regarding ???? liquor sales.

However, the Henleys denied at the same hearing that Baldwin their old croney in Phoenix, had

any stock interest in Ruidoso Downs.

But two years later, at another hearing records reflect Baldwin did have stock interest in the

track.

And the records show a federal lawsuit against Eugene Hensley in Albuquerque filed by trustees

for Baldwin to recover 362 shares of Ruidoso Racing Assn stock was settled for $40,000 and the stock was released to the Hensleys. This was in November, 1955.

Efforts by the Journal to contact the Hensley brothers were unsuccessful. Eugene, who now lives in El Paso, and James, a resident of Phoenix, were reported in Mazatlan, Mexico.

At the May, 1953 hearing, records show that the late Tom Closson, as chairman of the commission, told the Hensleys, "The namr of Teak Baldwin keeps creeping up as we go along in what the commission conveyed to you. The commission would not have Baldwin connected in any way, shape or form down there at Riuduso Downs."

The Hensleys, records show told the commissioner Baldwin had no money in the track, known as Hollywood Race Track prior to 1953.

It was brought out in the May 1953 hearing that Baldwin had been charged in Phoenix of doctoring drinks of patrons at his restaurant and then fleecing them in gambling games, according to IRE.

Baldwin later was acquitted of grand theft charges. Eugene Hensley revealed it was Baldwin who steered him to look at Ruidoso Downs which he and his brother purchased from the late OM "Hop" Lee Sr., a member of the commission and some Texas proncipals in December, 1952.

Eugene Hensley told the commission Baldwin was allowed to run the ???? men's kitchen at the track and had spent some of his own money for equipment.

In 1965, Baldwin also sued over a concession contract he allegedly had at the track. The suit in federal court in Albuquerue was dismissed.

As a result of reports concerning an alleged connection between the Hensleys and Baldwin, the commission in 1953 had the New Mexico State Police investigate the trio in Arizona.

The State Police investigation revealed Eugene Hensley had filed a suit against Baldwin in 1951 in an Arizona Court seeking $6,500 he allegedly had loaned to Baldwin. No disposition of the civil suit was mentioned in the records.

After his federal conviction and nine months in a Tucson federal prison camp Eugene Hensley told the commission he owned and operated a number of bars and cafes in Phoenix until ge purchased the Ruidoso Downs track.

James Hensley sold out his interest in the track in April, 1955. He was secretary-treasurer of the Ruidoso Racing Assn at the time and record do not reflect any further connection with the track.

Also testifying at the May 1953 hearing was RS "Stan" Snedigar, who was designated as secretary of racing at the track.

Formerly connected with Phoenix tracks as a racing official, Snedigar told the commission he was acquainted with the Hensleys and Baldwin in Arizona and detailed for the commission his knowledge of their business interests.

Snedigar later became a member of the Ruidoso Racing Assn board of directors and a minor stockholder in the track.

An IRE report lists RS Snedigar as a partner with Baldwin and others in three Phoenix restaurants and bars.

<h3>The 1953 State Police report in connection with it's Arizona investigation of the Hensleys and Baldwin noted Marley "owned a wire service formerly operated in connection with bookmaking of the Al Capone gang."

The same report listed Baldiwn as a "bookmaker for leading tracks" and said that Marley "is reputed to be the financial backer for bookies..."</h3>

The 1953 State Police report to the commission also included a transcript of a phone conversation between an officer in Sante Fe and a detective with the Phoenix Police Dpt. who said, "Our confidential files built upon Baldwin (and others) was loaned to some officials and never returned. We've never been able to locate them."

In November, 1966, Eugene Hensley was convicted of federal income tax evasion and failure to file income tax returns. Later, Eugene Hensley was barred from Ruidoso Downs by the Commission.

After unsuccessful appeals of the federal income tax comnvictions and the serving a sentence at ?? ????, Tex. federal reformatory, Eugene Hensley and his former wife, Martha Hensley, sold their controlling stock in the track in 1969.

The_Jazz · 02-28-2008, 12:37 PM

host, I'm confused. Is this thread to talk about the Kennedys and Clintons or is it about McCain? Your last post doesn't seem to fit very will with your opener, and perhaps would better stand as a separate thread, but I'm honestly confused as to what we're supposed to be discussing here.

Then again, it may be that you and I are the only ones interested in the OP and you're trying to make the thread more attractive. If that's the case, set me straight.

reconmike · 02-28-2008, 06:45 PM

WoW! Bolles must have pissed someone off

ngdawg · 02-29-2008, 06:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The_Jazz

host, I'm confused. Is this thread to talk about the Kennedys and Clintons or is it about McCain? Your last post doesn't seem to fit very will with your opener, and perhaps would better stand as a separate thread, but I'm honestly confused as to what we're supposed to be discussing here.

Then again, it may be that you and I are the only ones interested in the OP and you're trying to make the thread more attractive. If that's the case, set me straight.

It's a one-note song he's been singing for weeks and it has a solitary reason-he can't stand John McCain.
We get it.
Next question.

roachboy · 02-29-2008, 06:36 PM

there is a curious turn in us politics toward substituting allegations of criminality for debate about politics questions and choices. i don't understand why this is the case, really--it's hard not to be really cynical about it--like maybe in the contemporary context there is a fear of a politically informed public in a position to perhaps act on the basis of that information, so it's better to feed them bizarre substitutes, which basically function to collapse political positions into questions of personal "essence" like a political figure is a thing that repeats its inward characteristics in every direction so that politics is not a matter of consideration at all but just a way for these essences to express themselves.

but that's royalist nonsense, the kind of crap you'd expect if you really thought that the unity of the state lay in the person of the king. then this kind of stuff would follow. but in what claims to be a democratic polity, you'd think that folk's political positions would matter and that information about those positions would be important and that getting and processing that information would be what one does when one acts politically. so that elections are about something.

i think the political process in the states is at this point largely fucked. everybody blames everybody else for it, but the strange thing is that so many repeat the problem themselves, enact it.

seems to me that there are an enormous number of political reasons to not vote for mccain. and i am sure that conservatives who do not bother with the game of substituting hallucinations based on essence for political viewpoints have a large number of political reasons not to vote for clinton or obama. you'd think we could talk about this sort of thing, not just here, but in general.

the history of the politics of personal vilification is an old one, but since world war 2 it has migrated in a pretty straight line from the american ultra-right whackjob region of the old john birch society straight into mainstream conservative politics---the narrative is easy peasy to reconstruct--hell you only have to do a tiny bit of research in an actual library to find a ton of information about it---but if there wasn't a symbiotic relation between the way the television in particular pre-chews infotainment, rejecting content in the interest of what best sells advertising time, that migration would have got no traction. so this seems to me a reflection of a fundamental ideological problem--ideological in the marxist sense of a type of politics that is about depoliticizing the world so that the social classes that are in power can more easily remain in power.

i keep saying this and while it's true, i get bored with it: american political culture reduces political choices to a type of consumer choice.

this kind of nonsense is characteristic.

host · 02-29-2008, 08:13 PM

My intent is not to single you out, reconmike, you're one of many who has posted "stuff" like this:

Quote:

Originally Posted by reconmike

....Come on DC, you can't admit that even a few of these names, high rankiing officals, dead with bullets in their heads doesnt seem a wee bit suspicious?

And then add that after Foster offs himself Clinton claims executive privilege
on Foster's files.

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showpos...6&postcount=28

Quote:

Originally Posted by reconmike

The reason Clinton got off unscathed was because everyone close to any of the investigations wound up dead, does Bush have a close allies dead list like this?

Funny that anyone close to any Slick Wllie wrong doing has a bullet in their head or are taking a dirt nap.

Coincidence? I am so glad I dont know the slick one thats for friggen sure.

Edit: opps somehow these Clinton bodyguards are all dead also.

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showpos...1&postcount=20

This thread offered you an opportunity to present "your evidence". You didn't take it.

The_Jazz and ngdawg, I am having trouble believing that neither of you "get it".

I operate with two repetitious themes on this forum. One is, "how do you know what you know?", and the other is that what comes to us from the "news" media is closer to the "Op" that was waged against Upton Sinclair in his 1934 California gubernatorial campaign, by the two major newspaper publishers, assisted by the "visuals" dutifully provided by the Hollywood studies, than "the liberal message" so often perceived and described by conservatives.

The evidence to support this is, THERE IS NO "LEFT" IN THE US. Upton Sinclair was the "leftist" candidate who made the furthest inroads towards election to a major office, and there is a glaring and detail rich record of what happened in response to his political rise.

Likewise, I've presented a compelling case, even without stooping to the extremely "loose" evidentiary standards that are routinely applied to the backgrounds of the Clintons and the Kennedys, that John McCain had to know that he was trading his Naval Officer's commission and career for a close realtionship with a "mobbed up" "soldier", once removed from the Arizona organized crime "king pin", Kemper Marley.

Consider that the revelations reported about McCain's father in law were published in 1977, they are not politically motivated in relation to McCain.
The revelations consist of two short articles, backed by photos of the newspaper pages where they originally appeared.

A "working" press would use them to make short work of McCain.

One more EFFING time....can someone who, in the past, has posted accusations of criminality against a Clinton or a Kennedy, post something that will compete, with the details of the origins of McCain's original political financial backing and the source of his extraordinarily great personal wealth.
McCain accepted a job with a major organized crime figure, and then accepted his political financing and ended up with an impressive chunk of the federal felon mob soldier's wealth.

Post the news reports of the criminal links and felony convictions of a Clinton or a Kennedy who is running for or has served as US president.

If you read the reporting, in your local paper, about James Hensley's mob activities, arrests and conviction, his documented effort to hide the fact from the NM Racing Commission that he had an equal partner in the Ruidoso Downs horse racing track who was reported to be an "operator" of the "Al Capone bookie wire service", and had himself worked for 8 years for the "boss" of the same wire service and the state liquor distribution monopoly, what would your opinion be of the man's son-in-law? Would your opinion be influenced if the son-in-law owed everything he had....his job and his wealth, to the mobster described in your local paper?

This should be simple to understand. Much evidence that McCain is too compromised, ethically, to be president, much less evidence that Clinton, or even Obama, is nearly as compromised.....UNLESS YOU POST WHAT YOU'VE GOT!

ngdawg · 03-01-2008, 06:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by host

My intent is not to single you out, reconmike, you're one of many who has posted "stuff" like this:

This thread offered you an opportunity to present "your evidence". You didn't take it.

The_Jazz and ngdawg, I am having trouble believing that neither of you "get it".

I operate with two repetitious themes on this forum. One is, "how do you know what you know?", and the other is that what comes to us from the "news" media is closer to the "Op" that was waged against Upton Sinclair in his 1934 California gubernatorial campaign, by the two major newspaper publishers, assisted by the "visuals" dutifully provided by the Hollywood studies, than "the liberal message" so often perceived and described by conservatives.

No, Host, you 'operate' with one theme: Your venomous hatred for McCain. You have, what? 4 different threads with the same "message".
Try showing one candidate in the last 12 years who DIDN'T take funds or get advice from a questionable source or place.
Let's see....didn't Hillary get a shitload of money from someone now facing major jail time?
Who cares about Sinclair, ferchrissakes?
Take all your passion and go out and campaign, raise funds, whatever, for your candidate, but for the love of liberals, stop wasting bandwidth on this stuff!!

Or at least send Halx a sizable donation.

Judith Exner.
Sam Giancana.
Gennifer Flowers.
"I did NOT have...sexual relations...with that woman."
Norman Hsu

Quote:

While no one ever deserted Momo without accepting the bloody consequences, even he could not prevent Death from stalking the lives of wife Ange nor father Antonio. Both died in 1954, only a couple months apart and both after long illnesses. Politicos, businessmen and mob leaders from across the country turned out for both services, noting Momo particularly solemn and well-behaved at both.

But, by 1955 the world he knew best, the Underworld, was occupying his every hour. Tony Accardo was being investigated by the FBI and, to steer them away from current gang activities, he stepped down to appoint Momo il capo di Chicago. The moniker was misleading, however, for Momo’s territory extended far beyond mere city limits. But, in one way, it brought leisure: he no longer had to travel to see anyone on business; everyone came to him.

Robert, John & Joseph Kennedy
(UPI/Corbis- Bettmann)
This included Joseph Kennedy, the wealthy financier and Wall Street jackal. Kennedy had been a partner of Diamond Joe Esposito during the days of Prohibition; together the two men had made a fortune smuggling sugar and mash into the East Coast and trans-continentally. Momo was never partial to the toothsome fellow, disliking the smiling hypocritical facade of the Irish Catholic businessman hiding a thieving pirate. "If there ever was a crook it was Joe Kennedy," he told his brother and confidante, Chuck. "Old man Kennedy made over a million bucks selling the market short before it fell. He manipulated the whole damn Depression."

Source

Quote:

John Kennedy, along with aide from his connected father and illegal bootlegger, Joseph Kennedy, the powerful and ambitious patriarch of the Kennedy clan, had made a deal through Giancana with the large mob families to guarantee that the presidential election would be rigged in the major U.S. cities as well as Illinois, a critical state for campaigning candidates. Joseph wanted to ensure that his son John would become president and was not shy about asking his connections for help.

Gianacana had also helped raise money for JFK’s crucial West Virginia primary campaign, or had arranged to pay off appropriate political figures. Judith Exner, one time girl friend of Giancana, admitted to Larry King on television in 1992 that she repeatedly acted as a courier, shipping satchels of money between the Chicago boss and John Kennedy. This money was used to help Kennedy the underdog defeat Hubert Humphrey, who was the favourite.

Source

Quote:

Business mogul Peter Franklin Paul, who claims he was Hillary Clinton's largest contributor to her 2000 campaign, had a demand-letter hand-delivered to the New York Democrat's Senate chambers yesterday, insisting she admit to voters acceptance of an illegal contribution of more than $1 million and the falsifying of statements to the Federal Election Commission.

Paul says he contributed to the senator's campaign in exchange for former President Clinton's personal promotion of a media company after leaving office. The businessman claims he was directed by the Clintons and Democratic operatives to foot the bill for a lavish Hollywood gala and fund-raiser prior to the 2000 election that eventually cost about $2 million.

But a warm, growing friendship with the Clintons suddenly went cold, Paul says, when just after the Aug. 12, 2000, event a Washington Post article mentioned Paul's felony convictions in the 1970s. In stories by the paper Aug. 15 and 17, Sen. Clinton distanced herself from Paul, claiming he made no contribution to the gala. The senator contended she returned Paul's only contribution ? a $2,000 check and vowed not to accept any money from him.

"The real objective of the letter," said Paul, "is to finally get her to admit to voters that she deceived them in 2000 and she continues to deceive them."

Paul also has delivered a letter to his former business partner, Spider Man creator Stan Lee, demanding he notify Sen. Clinton that she must correct a statement filed with the Federal Election Committee that falsely attributes a $225,000 donation to Lee instead of Paul.

In January, responding to a complaint by Paul, the FEC issued a $35,000 fine to a joint fund-raising committee that included Clinton's campaign, New York Senate 2000, for failing to accurately report $721,895 in contributions from Paul.

In May 2005, Clinton's former top fund-raising aide, David Rosen, was acquitted for filing false campaign reports that later were charged by the FEC to treasurer Andrew Grossman, who accepted responsibility in a conciliation agreement. Paul points out the trial established his contention that he personally gave more than $1.2 million to Sen. Clinton's campaign, and his contributions intentionally were hidden from the public and the FEC.

Paul wants Sen. Clinton to refund the contribution, claiming it was illegal under FEC regulations. The senator's direction of those funds, Paul asserts, violated section 441 of the FEC code, which says, "Expenditures made by any person in cooperation, consultation or concert with, or at the request or suggestion of a candidate or their agents shall be considered to be a contribution to such candidate," and, therefore, subject to limits.

Paul argues that while joint campaign committees, such as New York Senate 2000, have helped candidates get around the $2,000 limit on contributions directly to their campaigns, the FEC regulation considers any donation specifically requested by a candidate to be the same as a direct contribution.

FEC spokeswoman Michelle Ryan told WND the agency could not comment on the case.

Source

That wasn't as much fun as I thought it'd be....but interesting.

host · 03-02-2008, 03:05 AM

I'll give you credit for trying, ngdawg, but I am not persuaded, so far, because I found this stuff that kind of dilutes your evidence:

Hillary Clinton's accuser has made no progress in court and is known to be a man of very little reputation and reliability:

Quote:

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/n...isingsuit.html
By Greg Risling
ASSOCIATED PRESS

4:59 p.m. October 16, 2007

LOS ANGELES – An appellate court on Tuesday denied a motion to reinstate Sen. Hillary Clinton as a defendant in a lawsuit that claims she, former President Clinton and others induced a former supporter to finance a 2000 fundraising gala.
The 2nd District Court of Appeal upheld a lower court's decision to remove the New York senator and Democratic presidential candidate from a lawsuit filed by Peter Paul. The three-judge panel also said Clinton can recoup legal costs.

http://www.nysun.com/article/48250
Former Donor To Clinton Sues Judicial Watch
By JOSH GERSTEIN
Staff Reporter of the Sun
February 8, 2007

A donor who has dogged Senator Clinton over misreporting of contributions to her 2000 campaign, Peter Paul, filed a federal lawsuit yesterday accusing a conservative group that once backed his legal crusade of abandoning him and improperly seeking to raise funds off of his case.

Paul's suit alleges that Judicial Watch backed out of a 2001 agreement to defend him against criminal securities fraud charges and to pursue a civil case against President Clinton, Mrs. Clinton, and others for swindling him. Paul also accuses Judicial Watch's president, Thomas Fitton, who is not an attorney, of practicing law without a license.....

.....An attorney for Judicial Watch, Richard Driscoll, dismissed Paul's assertions. "Mr. Paul is an admitted felon, I think four times now, and we believe his claims are baseless," he said. "I can categorically state that Tom Fitton has never claimed to be a lawyer.".....

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/23/ny...erland&emc=rss
Kennedy Relative Tied to Fund-Raising Case
By RAYMOND HERNANDEZ

Published: April 23, 2005

....Mr. Reggie's sister, Victoria, is married to Senator Kennedy. And his father, Edmund, was an influential municipal judge in Crowley, La., who was a friend of former President John F. Kennedy, as well as a close adviser to former Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards, who served four terms in office before being sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for extortion in 2001.

News that Senator Kennedy's brother-in-law has been secretly working with federal authorities in the investigation of Mrs. Clinton's former fund-raising director provides a strange new twist in a case that already stands out for its unlikely cast of characters.

At the center of the fund-raising inquiry is Peter Paul, a well-connected figure with a criminal past who says he helped organize the fund-raiser for Mrs. Clinton's 2000 Senate campaign to win former President Clinton's support for a business venture.

The fund-raiser, a Hollywood gala held in August 2000, drew some of the biggest names in the entertainment industry and raised more than $1 million for Mrs. Clinton's Senate campaign in New York. But in the months after the event, Mr. Paul - whose record includes pleading guilty to possessing cocaine and attempting to defraud Fidel Castro's government out of millions of dollars in 1979 - turned bitterly on the Clintons.

He accused the Clinton campaign of falsely reporting that the August 2000 gala cost far less than the nearly $2 million he claims to have spent to organize the event. In January of this year, federal authorities produced an indictment charging that Mr. Rosen had underreported the cost of the affair.

The indictment was largely based on the claims of Mr. Paul, who has been cooperating with prosecutors, according to people involved in the case. The indictment accuses Mr. Rosen of falsely reporting that the August 2000 gala cost $401,419.

Prosecutors are apparently working under the theory that underreporting the cost of the affair would have freed up additional dollars to spend on the campaign itself, under a complicated series of campaign-finance formulas governing such expenditures.

But people involved in Mrs. Clinton's 2000 campaign say that underreporting would not have produced any financial benefit.

Federal prosecutors have turned over to Mr. Rosen's lawyers a transcript of the taped conversation between Mr. Reggie and Mr. Rosen, because Mr. Reggie apparently will be called as a prosecution witness at Mr. Rosen's coming trial, according to people involved in the case.

In the tapes, Mr. Reggie apparently manages to steer the conversation with Mr. Rosen in the direction of a discussion about the production costs of the 2000 fund-raising event, according to one person involved in the case.

Mr. Rosen, in turn, apparently told Mr. Reggie of his frustration at having had to deal with Mr. Paul and described Mr. Paul as an unreliable character, according to people involved in the case.

Paul Sandler, Mr. Rosen's lawyer, declined to comment for this article. Neither Mr. Reggie's lawyer nor a spokesman of the Justice Department responded to phone messages seeking comment.

Mr. Reggie has apparently been cooperating with federal authorities since 2002, when he taped the conversation he had with Mr. Rosen, according to one person involved in the case......

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/us...yt&oref=slogin
Fund-Raiser Reappears as Critic

By RAYMOND HERNANDEZ
Published: October 31, 2007

...THE HISTORY: Mr. Paul has a criminal past that includes a guilty plea for cocaine possession and trying to defraud the Cuban government of millions of dollars in 1979. He has been seeking attention for his claims against the Clintons, and he sued Mrs. Clinton in California.

He says he organized the fund-raiser to win Mr. Clinton’s support on a business venture that he was undertaking. But after disclosures of his criminal past surfaced, the Clintons disavowed their relationship with him and said they would not accept his contributions.

Shortly after, he began accusing Mrs. Clinton’s campaign staff of failing to disclose that he had spent nearly $2 million on the event, money that should have been reported as a campaign contribution, and that Mrs. Clinton knew all the details of the event.

In early 2005, based largely on Mr. Paul’s statements, federal prosecutors charged David Rosen, finance director of the Senate campaign, with lying about the cost of the event to the Federal Elections Commission.

Mr. Rosen was acquitted in 2005. Mrs. Clinton has not been accused of wrongdoing, though the campaign agreed to pay a $35,000 civil penalty for underreporting the cost.

This month, a California appeals court upheld a lower court order and refused to reinstate Mrs. Clinton as a defendant in Mr. Paul’s suit.

On Tuesday, a spokesman for the campaign, Phil Singer, said in a statement: “Peter Paul is a professional liar who has four separate criminal convictions, two for fraud. His video repackages a series of seven-year-old false claims about Senator Clinton that have already been rejected by the California state courts, the Justice Department, the Federal Election Commission and the Senate Ethics Committee.”

The video is circulating, nonetheless, in the midst of her campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination and taps into criticism over the years about the Clintons’ fund-raising associations.....

There is no evidence that the vote anywhere in November, 1960, was fixed in JFK's favor. There is nothing in Giancana or Sinatra's FBI files to support the claims in your posted excerpts:

http://foia.fbi.gov/giancana/giancana1.pdf

http://foia.fbi.gov/foiaindex/sinatra.htm

Quote:

http://chicagoist.com/2006/03/21/uic...jfk_theory.php
March 21, 2006
UIC Professor Debunks Chicago JFK Theory

....Why the history lesson? Well, Chicagoist loves a good JFK assassination theory, so we perked up when we saw the Sun-Times reporting that UIC finance professor John Binder recently analyzed vote totals from in the 1960 general election in city wards where Giancana supposedly had clout to see if the mob really did swing the election. And he found that the mob-controlled areas in the city, as well as Cicero and Chicago Heights, voted no differently than others. In fact, Democratic vote totals remained about the same in those wards for Kennedy in 1960 as they were for Adlai Stevenson in 1956. Binder also disputes the notion that Giancana helped Kennedy win the state of West Virginia, and that the mob influenced citywide votes via union support.

So if JFK didn't owe Giancana any favors for helping him win Illinois, would Bobby's crusade against the mob still have angered them enough to order a hit on the President? Maybe. But if not, conspiracy nuts always have a host of other favorite suspects, including anti-Castro Cubans, some guy named Lee Harvey Oswald, the Soviets, Texas oilmen, and Lyndon Johnson himself. The parlor game never ends no matter how bizarre the idea. But if Professor Binder is right, you can take some of the major Chicago ties out of the equation.

http://dir.salon.com/story/politics/...0/11/10/nixon/

The fallacy of Nixon's graceful exit
In 1960, the GOP candidate fought hard behind the scenes to make sure the election wasn't stolen from him -- just as Al Gore should do.

By Gerald Posner

Nov 10, 2000 | One of the most oft-repeated myths in the aftermath of the current presidential election disputes is the claim that Vice President Al Gore should behave more like Richard Nixon, who is cited frequently for having graciously decided not to pursue legal remedies in response to possible voter fraud that might have cost him the 1960 election with John Kennedy. But the notion that Nixon graciously exited is just false.

The 1960 race was unquestionably close. Some states -- like California -- initially fell into Kennedy's electoral count, but were reversed almost two weeks later after absentee ballots were counted. But the core questions about the election centered on rumors of fraud, primarily in Illinois, where Democratic Mayor Richard Daley's powerful political machine controlled voter-heavy Chicago, and Texas, where vice presidential candidate Lyndon Johnson was a senator. Rumors of impropriety existed before the election. After the election, when Illinois went for Kennedy by fewer than 9,000 votes, and Texas by just over 40,000, Republicans cried foul.....

.....A conservative journalist and close Nixon friend, Earl Mazo, of the New York Herald Tribune, launched a press frenzy over possible voter fraud. (He was later Nixon's official biographer.) And not only did Republican senators like Thruston Morton ask for recounts in 11 states just three days after the election, but Nixon aides Bob Finch and Len Hall personally did field checks of votes in almost a dozen states.

The Republicans obtained recounts, involved U.S. Attorneys and the FBI, and even impaneled grand juries in their quest to get a different election result. A slew of lawsuits were filed by Republicans, and unsuccessful appeals to state election commissions routinely followed. However, all their efforts failed to uncover any significant wrongdoing.

In Illinois, for instance, the final recount showed that Nixon's votes had been undercounted by 943 -- yet, in 40 percent of the rechecked precincts, it turned out that Nixon's vote had been overcounted. (Contrast this with Gore, whose vote total steadily climbed during the Florida recount.) Unhappy with those results, Republicans went to federal court, where their case was dismissed. They then appealed to the State Board of Elections, which also rejected their claims. It was not until Dec. 19 -- over a month after the election -- that the national Republican Party backed off its Illinois claims.

Similar results, and extended fights, took place in Texas and New Jersey among other states. In Hawaii, Republican efforts had the unintended result of reversing the state's electoral votes from Nixon to Kennedy.

Although Republicans continued to insist that Illinois and Texas had somehow figured out a way to cheat and still pass a recount, they never produced hard evidence of widespread impropriety. Yet, that was certainly not for lack of trying. For over a month, the Republican efforts were aggressive and widespread. That Nixon was clever enough to allow his aides and political friends to do the work on his behalf -- while officially seeming to remove himself from the fray -- should not let Americans have amnesia about what really happened in the wake of the 1960 vote.

If the current rallying cry of Republicans is that Al Gore should behave like Richard Nixon did in 1960, that is precisely what he is doing -- strongly making every effort to ensure that the final vote was fair and correct.

scout · 03-02-2008, 04:08 AM

I'm with ng, there isn't a candidate who hasn't done something or been part of something "shady" for years. Hell even the next coming of Christ Obama added property to his present family home in a shady fashion with dealings with his neighbor who supposedly has ties to the mob which to me is a lot worse than McBain's father-in-law evading taxes. I doubt anyone posting in this forum has always been 100% honest in their dealings with the IRS. It's kinda like the pot calling the kettle black.

host · 03-02-2008, 04:46 AM

'Kay, scout. Does your opinion come down to the idea that either everyone is too compromised ehtically to be suitable to be US president, or nobody is?

I agree that Obama's house purchase arrangement smells, it bears much more scrutiny, but it isn't the financial basis for the entire launching of his political career, and it hasn't netted him $50 to $100 million, as overwhelming evidence documents that McCain's ethical lapses have.

Why is it that Sam Giancana's description of his son-in-laws "lot", described on PDF page 128, here:
http://foia.fbi.gov/giancana/giancana1.pdf

....do not apply similarly to James W. Hensley's son-in-law, John McCain?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Giancana to a new reporter

..."An ex-convict can't get a job now, he explained. He has to get a gun and go out and hold up people to get something to eat. There's going to be a lot of crime if this keeps up. It will be worse than Capone.

<h3>'Look at that kid,' he added, pointing to his son-in-law. who was helping Antoinette cut a four foot high wedding cake.

'Now everybody is going to hook him up with me'. No one will hire him. I'll have to give him a .45 and put him to work for me.'.....</h3>

So..... why are any of you willing to "hire" John McCain as your president? Is it simply because McCain and his father-in-law have kept a lower profile about how they got what they got, than Sam Giancana and his son-in-law did?

If it isn't right out in front of you, it isn't there? I've tried to make you look. scout, McCain's father-in-law's background isn't about cheating on his IRS filing. It's about everything associated with what he was into, and the people he was into it with. On the gambling and book making end, it;s about sending people to make threats and break legs when the losers can't or don't pay gambling debts, it's about working for a mob king pin for at least 8 years, a guy who is a well documented unindicted murderer of an investigative reporter, and it's about intentionally hiding an equal partner from a New Mexico state racing commission application hearing inquiry, because the guy was an operator of the former Al Capone gang race wire, working for their mutual employer, the race wire owner and mob king pin, and also hiding the partner because, weeks before, he incurred a hefty civil judgment for drugging and rolling a wealthy Californian who he lured into his backroom gambling operation in a restaurant he operated.

It finally is about receiving the benevolence of the mob king pin in the form of the opportunity to own a primary top brand beer distributorship as a reward for taking two sets of arrests and a federal felony conviction while performing duties at the king pin's liquor distributorship monopoly, and ending up with a
nine figures net worth.

I'd love to read an explanation on how it's different in this instance.

I'd be surprised to see any challenge against the evidence I've presented about the origins of McCain's financing and poor judgment, similar to the challenges I have posted against ngdawg's evidence.

<h3>Isn't part of the deterence to the practice of openly accumulating an organized crime sourced fortune, and connections, the predictable shunning you receive from the community around you?</h3>

ngdawg · 03-02-2008, 10:12 AM

And Norman Hsu? Even having been found out and Hillary "returning" the money, it got her off the ground-"donations" begetting donations.
The woman has less than 8 years as a state senator and she's running for president...never held any other public office.

This entire election is the most pitiful display of favoritism, nepotism and every other ism I've ever seen.....

scout · 03-02-2008, 02:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by host

'Kay, scout. Does your opinion come down to the idea that either everyone is too compromised ehtically to be suitable to be US president, or nobody is?

</h3>

That's pretty much what I'm thinking. I don't think either party has or will provide us with a suitable presidential candidate to vote for this fall.

02-21-2008, 11:40 AM	#1 (permalink)
host Banned	Put Up or Shut Up: Post Support for Accusations Against Kennedys and Clintons (cont.) (continued from title), support rising to a level of credible evidence that, if it were posted as accusations of wrongdoing against a Bush family member or against, John McCain, for example, would seem equally convincing to you. How do you "know what you Know"? Post what you got and where you got it! Lately, there have been an increasing number of posts referring to "crimes" of "the Clintons" and the Kennedys, in response to actual news reports that I have posted about crimes, convictions, mob associations related to John McCain's father-in-law. These posted Clinton and Kennedy references come up at other times, too, as a blanket, dismissive response to substantive allegations against republican politicians. So, I'm wondering....does anybody actually have anything on the Clintons or on the Kennedys? I looked at the Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. wiki entry, and, considering that it is open sourced, why have none of you posted your evidence of "ole Joe's" criminality, there? Are the Kennedys and Clintons just "too cunning" or too "well connected" to leave any trail of their crimes? My standard, when I cannot find strong support to post accusations about a political opponent, is to refrain from posting things that I cannot back up. What is your standard? Sure....we know about the dubious circumstances of Ted Kennedy's accident in the summer of 1969 that claimed the life of Mary Joe Kopechne, but those circumstances and accusations against Ted Kennedy were not enough to prompt his arrest, or even the loss of his US senate seat. That incident was certainly not grounds for the accusations that the Kennedys are a "crime family". The background of the Clintons are the most investigated details in modern times, so, in view of that, what can you post about them to help us to see your POV? I want to stress that, whatever you post, it should rise to the level of the support I have posted to make my claim that McCain's father-in-law was "mobbed up", that the money that launched McCain's political career and composes almost his entire, current $50 million plus personal fortune, began with proceeds of organized crime activities of his father-in-law. I think the McCain example is a good test....if the support I've posted for my opinion that McCain is severely ethically compromised because he took "mob money", is not convincing to you, you will probably have to do better than I did, to support your accusations against a Clinton or a Kennedy. Consider also, that most of my sources of support came from mainstream daily newspapers, published in major newspapers for many years, and from the IRE investigative reporter task force of 36 reporters, in 1977. I am hoping we can reach a better understanding of how and where we gather and react to details that shape our political opinions. Last edited by host; 02-21-2008 at 11:43 AM..

02-21-2008, 11:58 AM	#2 (permalink)
The_Jazz Asshole Administrator Location: Chicago	Should we not mention Rosemary Kennedy's lobotomy? Time Magazine published the bootlegging rumors as truth in 1999. The lobotomy is mentioned in the same article. Also this book by Ted Schwartz this book by Ted Schwartz confirms the bootlegging rumors as well as the lobotomy. That said, who cares? The sins of the father... __________________ "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - B. Franklin "There ought to be limits to freedom." - George W. Bush "We have met the enemy and he is us." - Pogo

02-21-2008, 12:42 PM	#5 (permalink)
The_Jazz Asshole Administrator Location: Chicago	host, in the greater scheme of things, I think that any Clinton improprieties would be much more relevant than anything that Joe Kennedy did or didn't do as would any crimes committed by McCain's father-in-law. That's because the crimes would have been committed by the candidates (to lump them together) themselves, not by a family member. Did Jimmy Carter fashion himself a brewer? No, that was his ignomious brother Billy. All I did with Joe Kennedy was look to see if anyone substantiated the bootlegging rumors that were out there for years. All the hearsay evidence I've ever seen stated it as a rumor, and I looked for anything to the contrary. That's what I found in my 5 minute search. And it was more than a 1 sentence reference - it had a LINK! These are meant to be examples. I don't think that any argument about Joe Kennedy or McCain's FIL really hold that much water. The Clintons are different since they're the actual officeholders, but the other two are just about relatives. And I think that we can agree, host, that all families are fucked up on some level. I know mine is. __________________ "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - B. Franklin "There ought to be limits to freedom." - George W. Bush "We have met the enemy and he is us." - Pogo

02-28-2008, 12:37 PM	#7 (permalink)
The_Jazz Asshole Administrator Location: Chicago	host, I'm confused. Is this thread to talk about the Kennedys and Clintons or is it about McCain? Your last post doesn't seem to fit very will with your opener, and perhaps would better stand as a separate thread, but I'm honestly confused as to what we're supposed to be discussing here. Then again, it may be that you and I are the only ones interested in the OP and you're trying to make the thread more attractive. If that's the case, set me straight. __________________ "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - B. Franklin "There ought to be limits to freedom." - George W. Bush "We have met the enemy and he is us." - Pogo

02-28-2008, 06:45 PM	#8 (permalink)
reconmike Thank You Jesus Location: Twilight Zone	WoW! Bolles must have pissed someone off __________________ Where is Darwin when ya need him?

02-21-2008, 12:35 PM	#4 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	I've had plenty of accusations against the Kennedys (the REAL Kennedys, JFK and RFK) and the Clintons, just as I have against McCain. Maybe a better way to put it is to address this directly to McCain supporters. A lot of people (like me) are supporting who I suspect you and I would agree is simply the best of the three likely candidates, Obama. I'd even venture a guess that maybe 60-80% of TFPolitics is behind Obama, and maybe 20-30% are behind Clinton. In other words, this would be better placed in a forum that was less progressive liberal leaning.

02-29-2008, 06:36 PM	#10 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	there is a curious turn in us politics toward substituting allegations of criminality for debate about politics questions and choices. i don't understand why this is the case, really--it's hard not to be really cynical about it--like maybe in the contemporary context there is a fear of a politically informed public in a position to perhaps act on the basis of that information, so it's better to feed them bizarre substitutes, which basically function to collapse political positions into questions of personal "essence" like a political figure is a thing that repeats its inward characteristics in every direction so that politics is not a matter of consideration at all but just a way for these essences to express themselves. but that's royalist nonsense, the kind of crap you'd expect if you really thought that the unity of the state lay in the person of the king. then this kind of stuff would follow. but in what claims to be a democratic polity, you'd think that folk's political positions would matter and that information about those positions would be important and that getting and processing that information would be what one does when one acts politically. so that elections are about something. i think the political process in the states is at this point largely fucked. everybody blames everybody else for it, but the strange thing is that so many repeat the problem themselves, enact it. seems to me that there are an enormous number of political reasons to not vote for mccain. and i am sure that conservatives who do not bother with the game of substituting hallucinations based on essence for political viewpoints have a large number of political reasons not to vote for clinton or obama. you'd think we could talk about this sort of thing, not just here, but in general. the history of the politics of personal vilification is an old one, but since world war 2 it has migrated in a pretty straight line from the american ultra-right whackjob region of the old john birch society straight into mainstream conservative politics---the narrative is easy peasy to reconstruct--hell you only have to do a tiny bit of research in an actual library to find a ton of information about it---but if there wasn't a symbiotic relation between the way the television in particular pre-chews infotainment, rejecting content in the interest of what best sells advertising time, that migration would have got no traction. so this seems to me a reflection of a fundamental ideological problem--ideological in the marxist sense of a type of politics that is about depoliticizing the world so that the social classes that are in power can more easily remain in power. i keep saying this and while it's true, i get bored with it: american political culture reduces political choices to a type of consumer choice. this kind of nonsense is characteristic. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 02-29-2008 at 06:43 PM..

03-02-2008, 04:08 AM	#14 (permalink)
scout Psycho	I'm with ng, there isn't a candidate who hasn't done something or been part of something "shady" for years. Hell even the next coming of Christ Obama added property to his present family home in a shady fashion with dealings with his neighbor who supposedly has ties to the mob which to me is a lot worse than McBain's father-in-law evading taxes. I doubt anyone posting in this forum has always been 100% honest in their dealings with the IRS. It's kinda like the pot calling the kettle black. Last edited by scout; 03-02-2008 at 04:11 AM..

03-02-2008, 10:12 AM	#16 (permalink)
ngdawg peekaboo Location: on the back, bitch	And Norman Hsu? Even having been found out and Hillary "returning" the money, it got her off the ground-"donations" begetting donations. The woman has less than 8 years as a state senator and she's running for president...never held any other public office. This entire election is the most pitiful display of favoritism, nepotism and every other ism I've ever seen.....