PrintSeptember 20, 2007
Bundle Up: The Torch is back
It's like old times. OJ's cuffed and Greta and the crowd are back in Vegas. And in D.C. many of the old Clinton campaign funding scandals are revisited as news seeps out about Hsu and other Hillary Hillraisers. The Washington Post reports:
Clinton includes on her list of "Hillraisers" -- those who have committed to raising more than $100,000 for her White House bid -- several financiers linked to past troubles. They include Marvin Rosen, the former Democratic National Committee finance chairman whose efforts to reward six-figure party donors with attendance at White House coffees and overnight stays in the Lincoln Bedroom became the focal point of Senate hearings into fundraising abuses. Rosen did not return messages left at his offices in Florida and New York.
William Stuart Price, the Oklahoma oilman also on the "Hillraiser" list, stunned a courtroom in 1995 when he detailed how his former gas company had tried to "gain influence" with the Clinton administration by providing $160,000 in money and membership in a ritzy Washington golf club to the son of a Cabinet secretary. Price, who was never accused of wrongdoing, did not return calls seeking comment.Price's testimony became the focal point of a criminal investigation of Ron Brown, then commerce secretary and a former chairman of the Democratic Party. The inquiry ended with the conviction of Price's former bosses, Nora and Gene Lum, for making illegal donations.Also on the list is former senator Robert G. Torricelli (D-N.J.), who withdrew from a 2002 reelection campaign after being "severely admonished" by the Senate for taking lavish gifts from a businessman and contributor, David Chang. Torricelli did not return messages left at his office yesterday.
And the Wall Street Journal notes strange doings around Mr. Danielczyk, another of her bundlers.
But it's not just the bundlers and suspect donors who create the deja vu feeling. Bill Clinton's old defenders are reading once again from the old scripts in defense this time of his wife. From the WaPo again:
"The most important thing I learned about this issue is that all campaigns have the same problem, regardless of party or candidate: How do you know who has skeletons and who does not?" said Lanny Davis, who as special counsel to Bill Clinton handled campaign finance issues for him from 1996 to 1998. "Let's face it: Campaign organizations are not 'CSI' -- not even close -- even if they'd like to be."
