The Associated Press has broken the story that Bill Clinton created and used a previously undisclosed LLC shell company to receive and pass along “consulting” income to the former commander in chief.  There is nothing inherently shady in an LLC structure (Mitt Romney was criticized during his 2012 campaign for using one), but the practice does enable the owner to escape payroll taxes and structure tax-deferred retirement income, among other potential benefits. 

In previous financial disclosures, Hillary Clinton avoided mention of the company, WJC LLC, because it held no assets of its own, but was used as a pass-through vehicle.  Perfectly legal, but hardly transparent.  Especially given the criticism Mitt Romney endured for his perfectly legal LLC in 2012.

There is a lot of bait for further investigation by a liberal media now hungry to replace Hillary with a less damaged and less overtly corrupt and unappealing standard-bearer (cough, Elizabeth Warren), as well as for conservatives cognizant of Hillary’s hypocrisies.  At the top of the list is the revelation that in addition to his speaking fees, Bill Clinton used consulting gigs as a means of generating income to pay those bills he and Hillary have worried about ever since they were “dead broke” upon leaving the White House.  And of course, by making the undisclosed LLC the source of income, the ultimate identity of the source of the money paid to the Clinton family can be kept secret.

The AP offers these tantalizing fragments on the “clients”:

In February 2009, Clinton's counselor, Douglas Band, asked State Department ethics officials to clear Bill Clinton's consulting work for three companies owned by influential Democratic party donors. Memos sent by Band proposed that Bill Clinton would provide "consulting services regarding geopolitical, economic and social trends affecting the entity and philanthropic opportunities" through the WJC, LLC entity. 

State Department officials approved Bill Clinton's consulting work for longtime friend Steve Bing's Shangri-La Industries and another with Wasserman Investments, GP, a firm run by entertainment executive and Democratic party donor Casey Wasserman. The ethics officials turned down Bill Clinton's proposed work with a firm run by entertainment magnate and Democratic donor Haim Saban because of Saban's active role in Mideast political affairs. 

WJC, LLC was also cited by Band in a June 2011 memo sent to State Department ethics officials asking for clearance to allow Bill Clinton to advise Band's international consulting company, Teneo Strategy LLC. Band's request said Teneo would use "consulting services provided by President Clinton through WJC, LLC." State Department officials approved the three-year contract between the two companies. 

None of the proposals detailed how much Bill Clinton would be paid. 

Since the company received money from Teneo, which had its own clients, the ultimate identity of those clients whose money passed through Teneo to WJC LLC to Clinton himself can be obscured.  This is sometimes called a “daisy chain” when it is used to conceal the identity of the ultimate source of money.

Teneo has previously come to public notice by the extremely unusual move of paying Hillary’s Clinton’s close aide Huma Abedin six figures for a “part-time” gig while she was also on the State Department payroll, something for which Hillary sought and received a blessing from the State Department, despite the potential for conflicts of interest inherent in a government official getting paid by private concerns while exercising the responsibilities of office.

Ms. Abedin is married to Anthony Weiner and comes from a family with prominent ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

There are no smoking guns yet.  But with the Clintons’ history of trickery and greed, and with a significant share of the MSM now anxious to reveal Hillary’s foibles before the Democrats tie their fate to her for 2016, there is a lot more to come.