It seems that Haim Saban, a major Clinton donor and also the primary financial backer of Brookings' Middle East policy output, tried to bribe the Young Democrats of America into throwing their superdelegate support to Hillary Clinton. Sleazy, if true, and it certainly seems to be true.
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A Saban Bribe?
19 May 2008 05:22 pm
Comments (44)
Sad, but it's no surprise.
The Clintons are and always have been sleeze.
That's the Young Dems circa 1992 -- that we're hearing about it at all is a pretty significant sign of how much they've changed since the Clinton years.
This blog is like the Sopranos.
"Just when you thought you were out -- they pull you back in."
The Clintons are and always have been sleeze.
Clintons? Hell, America clearly has a Saban problem.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V258zRiCpzg
But at least she's not backed by GE!!!!
Bribes are needed to overcome all the sexism Hillary's faced in this campaign. It just levels the playing field.
Re Haim Saban " tried to bribe the Young Democrats of America into throwing their superdelegate support to Hillary Clinton "
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1) Hey. She will be "Good For Israel".
As will that B-52 carpetbombing in downtown Tehran.
2) Looks like Haim finally heard that dog whistle -- Hillary was getting real red in the face:
"Hillary Strangelove
AMERICANS have learned to take with a grain of salt much of the rhetoric in a campaign like the current Democratic donnybrook between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
Still, there are some red lines that should never be crossed. Clinton did so Tuesday morning, the day of the Pennsylvania primary, when she told ABC's "Good Morning America" that, if she were president, she would "totally obliterate" Iran if Iran attacked Israel.
This foolish and dangerous threat was muted in domestic media coverage. But it reverberated in headlines around the world."
C'mon, Yglesias. I assume Obama's doing much the same thing. The difference is that he can do it with a velvet glove because he's the prohibitive favorite. This seems like the business of politics. Ham-handed, but normal.
1) The cited article on the Young Democrats' reaction to Haim Saban's offer gives an interesting picture into the state of the Democratic Party nowdays:
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"Democratic officials and fundraisers were consulted about how to respond, and at times the discussions were "emotional," one participant said. "It is scary for them, Haim is very powerful, he has great influence over donors who give to them."
Another source said that Hardt and others were acutely aware of Saban's status within Democratic circles and were concerned that their organization would suffer long-term harm if they declined his offer or if news of the proposal became public."
2) The Young Democrats ultimately declined Haim's offer.
I rather doubt the 200 plus Members of Congress will.
After all, they did not hesitate in 2002 to send 4000 US kids to their deaths in order to obey Ariel Sharon's -- and Haim's puppet Kenneth Pollack's --urging that they take out Israel's enemy Saddam Hussein.
What's 4000 more?
3) According to the article, Haim Saban offered the Young Democrats $1 Million. He could offer the same to every superdelegate and it wouldn't dent his $billion plus fortune all that much.
4) Meanwhile, the NY Times --the paper of Judith Miller and William Kristol -- tells us today that we don't support Hillary because we are sexists. See http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/19/us/politics/19women.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
This seems like the business of politics. Ham-handed, but normal.
First, I don't attribute this to Clinton specifically. I doubt very much she knew anything about it and I am sure she would not want to know anything about it.
Second, I doubt very seriously that offering a bribe for votes is the sort of thing that goes on as regularly as you seem to think. I am not naive I don't think, but I certainly would be surprised if I found out that very many donors for any of the Democratic Presidential candidates had gone around offering this sort of direct quid pro quo. Maybe there have been dark suggestions concerning the proper value of loyalty but a direct bribe like this? I doubt it.
I imagine this is why Saban is so strongly denying it. Even in the context of the normal political wrangling, this reflects pretty badly upon him.
The sad thing is that Haim Saban himself admits that he is a "one note guy, and that note is Israel."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haim_Saban#Politics
Re Chris's comment "The sad thing is that Haim Saban himself admits that he is a "one note guy, and that note is Israel."
------------
Actually, Haim made a couple more observations in his Dec 2006 interview with Haaretz. See
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/798292.html
An excerpt:
[Haaretz] "Do you still feel, as you once did, that America's attitude toward Israel is liable to deteriorate? "
[Saban] "At the moment there is no sign of a crisis. But we must not be complacent. The two pillars of the state are the Israel Defense Forces and the U.S., Dimona [the site of Israel's nuclear reactor] and Washington. We must do all we can to maintain the alliance with America. A major crisis at the wrong time could be a disaster, a disaster."
[Haaretz] "Do you feel that as an Israeli-American of influence your mission is to prevent that crisis?"
[Saban] "You said it."
but I certainly would be surprised if I found out that very many donors for any of the Democratic Presidential candidates had gone around offering this sort of direct quid pro quo.
I don't think it was a direct quid pro quo. It was, "You should really support Clinton. And, by the way, could you use $1 million?" Ham-handed, but not explicit.
Saban? I think I've heard that name around here before somewhere.
It's almost as if some of the Israel-orientated donors are not as happy with Obama as some may suggest.
Re Don Williams
Once again, white trash fucktard Don Williams repeats his lies that Arial Sharon was responsible for the US Iraq adventure. I once again post the payoff parts of an article by former ambassador to Israel Kurtzer, an Obama supporter, who categorically denies Mr. Williams lies.
"Now, you've heard the nonsense which is out there which suggests that Israel or the Jewish community or the Israel lobby pushed this war on the administration. And I can tell you it is nonsense, because there was not one Israeli official and not one Israeli academic who suggested that this war was going to end well. They all warned against exactly the problems we have experienced since this war started, because Israel experienced many of those same problems.
The unknowns of occupation, the likelihood that occupation is going to yield resistance, you can call it insurgency, you can call it civil war - whatever the euphemism is - it is resistance to occupation, which takes on its own dynamic and becomes a self-justifying and self-perpetuating reason for being there in the first place.
And so Israel understood far better than the wise neocons who brought us this war, that this was going to be dangerous not only for the United States but also for Israeli security. And if you doubt those words, look at the nearly one million Iraqi refugees in Jordan and take a measure of Jordanian stability. Jordan, which is a bedrock of Israel's security on its eastern frontier. "
http://scienceblogs.com/mikethemadbiologist/2008/05/ambassador_kurtzer_a_jewish_vi.php#more
But of course, Mr. Williams will claim that Kurtzer, like Wilkerson and Feith is a liar. The only liar here is Mr. peckerwood Williams.
SLC, it isn't quite that simple. Many Jewish Americans were against the war, although the neoconservatives were for it. Also, Israel' Ariel Sharon isn't completely innocent as this old article from CBS News makes clear:
Israel To U.S.: Don't Delay Iraq Attack
Sharon Government Urges Prompt Action Against Saddam
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/08/18/world/main519037.shtml
I also suggest reading up on the Clean Break document authored by a number of neoconservative advisers to the pervious Likud PM:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clean_Break:_A_New_Strategy_for_Securing_the_Realm
The above document also suggests disposing Saddam and says that it would improve Israel's regional security.
SLC, it isn't quite that simple. Many Jewish Americans were against the war, although the neoconservatives were for it. Also, Israel' Ariel Sharon isn't completely innocent as this old article from CBS News makes clear:
Israel To U.S.: Don't Delay Iraq Attack
Sharon Government Urges Prompt Action Against Saddam
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/08/18/world/main519037.shtml
I also suggest reading up on the Clean Break document authored by a number of neoconservative advisers to the pervious Likud PM:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clean_Break:_A_New_Strategy_for_Securing_the_Realm
The above document also suggests disposing Saddam and says that it would improve Israel's regional security.
So is trying to bribe a super delegate illegal or not? Does the Democratic Party have rules about bribing super delegates? If these people will testify, the Democratic Party should ban future donations from Saban.
Re Kurtzer's comment "And I can tell you it is nonsense, because there was not one Israeli official and not one Israeli academic who suggested that this war was going to end well."
---------
1) I am sure there were some well-meaning Israelis who warned our Ambassador --IN PRIVATE --of risks.
2) But those Israelis were NOT the head of the Government of Israel. Likud's Ariel Sharon was.
Those Israelis were NOT over here addressing the American People.
3) Sharon's representatives were the ones addressing the American people. Bibi Nathanyahu. Sharon's Chief Spokeman Ranaan Gissin . Foreign Secretary Shimon Peres. Ariel Sharon himself.
And what Ariel Sharon and SHARON's Representatives PUBLICLY TOLD US --THE AMERICAN PEOPLE --was that we should invade Iraq and take out Saddam Hussein.
Before he used nukes. Before he used "WMDS".
3) As I've amply documented here time and time again with links to 2002 news reports that SLC evidently can't --or won't -- read.
http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2007/10/aipac_and_iraq.php#comment-654345
http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2007/10/aipac_and_iraq.php#comment-654354
http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2007/10/aipac_and_iraq.php#comment-654366
4) SLC also keeps trying to muddy the waters by putting up a misleading strawmen. I never said Bush and Cheney were coerced into invading Iraq by Israel -- I always noted they were happy to go after the OIL.
But the Democratic Party was supposed to be the check and balance on Republican imperialism on behalf of Big Oil's political donors. And that bulwark failed completely.
Because Bush and Cheney sold the war to the Israel Lobby as defense of Israel -- and the Israel Lobby kneecaped any Democratic opposition. People like Haim Saban ensured Democrats either voted for the invasion or at least remained silent while Bush lied to the country. Those who didn't stay silent -- Bob Graham, Cynthia McKinney, and Howard Dean -- were cut off at the knees.
5) Ranking Democrat on the House Intel Committee was Jane Harman. And instead of challenging Bush's Iraq WMD story, Jane laid down and spread her legs. More recently, Jane has noted that if she needs to know anything , she just has to check with Haim Saban's Brookings center on Middle East Policy.
Net result: 4000 plus Americans dead and thousands more crippled for life.
But that's evidently okay with SLC -- because it was "Good for Israel".
Sleazy, I guess, but this is politics, what do you expect?
This is the reason why I was so opposed to the notion that we should just let the super delegates do whatever their conscience told them. It is horribly, horribly naive. Since many SDs aren't elected officials, there is plenlty of room for bribery. The margin is probably too great now, but the odds of Bill and Hillary getting $50-75 million to change the votes of the eighty or so they'd need to win the nomination aren't that low; the only thing stopping them is their own sense of ethics--and this should go without saying, but when you let the fate of your party depend on whether or not the Clintons will do the right thing, you're in a bad place.
And what SCMT said: Obama is doing the same thing, just on a terrestrial scale. Edwards made him do the Poverty Tour, which is a good thing, but mainly this sort of thing is tawdry.
Haim Saban is still a citizen of Israel --subject to Israel's laws.
Is SLC trying to suggest that the Government of Israel can't keep one of its citizens from dumping $14 Million into US politics?
And that is Israel fails to do so, it should not be held accountable for Haim's actions?
The party might have rules, but I doubt there are any laws. In the eyes of most, but not all, law, political parties are voluntary associations, like the Elks, covered by their own internal rules.
Lawsuits, e.g., trying to force caucus states to hold primaries on one-man-one-vote, Constitutional grounds, face a near-insurmountable obstacles. The federal courts bounced one earlier this year seeking an injunction to force the DNC to recognize Florida delegates.
I'm pretty sure this would be a bona fide crime. A Democratic primary is very much a public election subject to election law (one thing the South tried before the Voting Rights Act was to say that primaries were internal party matters, like elections for a club officer)
Bribing electors is definitely a crime. Could we take Saban down with this?
Perhaps it's time for Don Williams and SLC to get their own blog, where they can play these games to their heart's content. I'm sure they'd get just as many readers as they do posting here.
Perhaps it's time for Don Williams and SLC to get their own blog, where they can play these games to their heart's content. I'm sure they'd get just as many readers as they do posting here.
Re Don Williams
It's Mr. Williams who doesn't know how to read. So I will repeat the money quote from former Ambassador Kurtzer.
Former ambassador Kurtzer says that, "And I can tell you it is nonsense, because there was not one Israeli official and not one Israeli academic who suggested that this war was going to end well."
Mr. Kurtzer was the Ambassador of the US to the State of Israel and Mr. Williams is now trying to claim that he never spoke to then Prime Minister Sharon or any member of his government on this matter. I have a nice bridge I would like to sell anybody who believes a cockamamie story like that. Mr. Williams has not offered a scintilla of proof that this is the case. The fact is that everybody who Mr. Williams points to as supporting the US adventure in Iraq did so only after it became obvious that the invasion was going to take place whether the Israeli Government supported it or not. They went along, according to former Ambassador Kurtzer, against their better judgment. At the least, they were more sanguine then Mr. Tony Blair who apparently was as optimistic as President Bush was.
I would also like to point out that Mr. Williams once again quote mines the interview given by Mr. Saban to the Haaretz newspaper. He doesn't tell us that, in the same interview, Mr. Saban also said that the US and Israel should negotiate with Hamas and Hizbollah and that President Bush was too pro-Israel. How long, oh how long, must we put up with Mr. Williams' quote mining?
As for Mr. Williams' complaint that the Government of Israel has neglected to prevent Mr. Saban from financing political campaigns in the US, it should be pointed out that apparently the US is also guilty of this neglect in that we are not preventing US citizens from bribing Israeli officials.
http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Politics/12857.htm
Re djv
I hadn't realized that Mr. djv had been declared the dictator of the world. This is Mr. Yglesias' blog and as such he is entitled to decide who gets to comment and who doesn't.
Re SLC's comment "Mr. Saban also said that the US and Israel should negotiate with Hamas and Hizbollah and that President Bush was too pro-Israel."
-----------------
Er, no --SLC. What Haim Saban actually said re George W Bush was:
[Haaretz]
"You have a deep knowledge of the United States - will the U.S. take action to stop Iran?"
[Saban] "President Bush has no capital. He doesn't have the political capital to take a drastic step. We know what the Chinese and the Russians think, and a move by the United States alone - I doubt it. And now, with the Democrats in control of both Houses? I don't believe it will happen."
....
[Haaretz] Will she [Hillary] be good for Israel?
[Saban]"I think so. Look, President Bush is very one-sidedly pro-Israel. But look at the results of his policy. They were not beneficial for Israel. We are in a major mess. Look at the facts on the ground. Bush is a massive failure. Hillary will be more balanced than Bush. She will try to create credibility among the Arabs in order to mediate between them and us. We will get nowhere with them in direct negotiations. Only with billions, with pressure."
Ref: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/798292.html
(Page 1 and 2)
--------------
Haim Saban is not complaining about Bush being a Whore for Israel, SLC. He is merely complaining that Bush is looking somewhat ..er..shopworn.
Whereas Hillary still has a rosy blush on her cheek and can suck a golf ball through a garden hose.
Re SLC's comment "Former ambassador Kurtzer says that, "And I can tell you it is nonsense, because there was not one Israeli official and not one Israeli academic who suggested that this war was going to end well."
----------
1) Two way to interpret this, SLC.
Reading One: Kurtzer is saying that NO high Israeli official urged the American People to attack Iraq. Which would be obvious bullshit -- because there are multiple 2002 news stories to the contrary.
As I've shown you.
Reading Two: Kurtzer is being deceitful by pretending to address an issue while actually talking about something else that's irrelevent to the question.
2) Even when Sharon and his envoys were urging us to take out Saddem before he used his WMDs, they weren't telling us that Iraq would be a cakewalk.
But that DOES NOT mean that they were NOT urging us to invade Iraq. They were.
3) Furthermore, Kurtzer contradicts himself within 3 sentences. At first he says "Now, you’ve heard the nonsense which is out there which suggests that Israel or the Jewish community or the Israel lobby pushed this war on the administration"
BUT then 3 sentences later Kurtzer says "And so Israel understood far better than the wise neocons who brought us this war"
Who does Kurtzer think the Neocons are? Irish Catholics devoted to freeing Northern Ireland?
Does he think Haim Saban is FRENCH?
4) Plus the Issue is not that the Israel Lobby pushed the war on Dick Cheney.
The Issue is that the billionaire patrons of the Israel Lobby pushed the war on the Democratic Members of Congress -- and on the American people by ensuring that those who should have warned us were intimidated into silence. That our own leaders -- to preserve their political careers -- betrayed us. Shot us in the back. Killed 4000 of our children for no reason.
5) You might note , SLC, that the correct link to Kurtzer's full remarks is here: http://www.pjvoice.com/v34/34303kurtzer.aspx
For context, Kurtzer was addressing a Jewish group here in Philly. They didn't invite me to the meeting, for some reason.
Don Williams:
Saban must be holding duel citizenship. Otherwise, if he was a foreign national he wouldn't be able to contribute to any campaign.
As much as I disagree with Haim Saban's ideas and political endorsements, I am strangely fascinated with the idea of a Power Rangers-based foreign policy.
"it certainly seems to be true"
Let's check this:
- Story totally based on anonymous sources, no one at YDA seems to be willing to give his name.
- Saban denies any bribery attempt.
- Details are confusing or missing: Aravosis sez, YDA has four SDs, all but Hardt commited to Obama, HuffPo states there are three, only one endorsed Obama.
- It's not even mentioned who really talked to Saban, was it a conference call, or are most of those anonymous "testimonies" based on hearsay?
- Aravosis, who hinted at the story before HuffPo, is one of the worst Clinton haterz in this primary.
- HuffPo has recently become a hotbed of Obama fanatics; no matter how ridiculous and factually unsupported an accusation against Clinton is, you'll find it there.
- The notoriously scandal hungry media has stayed away from this story so far.
Hmm, regarding this, imho it's quite bold to go out on this fragile limb and state "it certainly seems to be true"...
This is the guy who signs Michael O'Hanlon's and Kenneth Pollack's paychecks.
SLC is a Zionist scumbag who repeats the same lies here day in and day out. He's about as Jewish as Heinrich Himmler - and about as American.
Once again he pushes his lies about Israel not supporting an attack on Iraq - when he knows full well that it has been established that Israel wanted the US to attack IRAN before Iraq - because they knew that if the US attacked Iraq first without attacking Iran, Iran would profit.
Israel only supported the attack on Iraq when the neocons assured Israel that the US would attack Iran next, if necessary. The neocons actually believed it wouldn't be necessary as Iran would collapse as soon as Iraq was conquered - a bizarre notion but apparently believed by at least some neocons.
Which is why Israel has been lying regularly about and beating the drums for an attack on Iran for the last five years, while Cheney has been trying to get Israel to do it. Of course, Israel doesn't want to be blamed for another US military disaster, so they've balked. So Cheney bribed them with another $20 billion in arms. They still balked.
So now Cheney has made up this "Iranians are killing US soldiers in Iraq" horse shit to justify a military strike on Iran. The National Security Council has signed off on this plan, and operational plans are being drawn up. All Bush has to do is give the order now.
Richard Steven Hack, you really ought to drop the studied moderation and tell us how you feel. Wouldn't that be more fun than constructing arguments and using neutral language?
Well, they've got dumb goyim like O'Reilly believing the horseshit. And, then, when to get back at G.E. for still gainfully employing his mocker Olbermann - Bill began villifying NBC parent company G.E. on-air for supplying hospital equipment to Iranian hospitals. Then. upping the ante by playing a coarse video of a superannuated penny-ante goofus americanus grabbing the mike and haranguing a G.E. spokesman at a shareholders conference about the same extended horseshit. Whereupon - the G.E. spokesman became defensive and tried to shut the old nut up fast. Operation Persia Obliteration awaiting W's idiot assent. Remember, they hate us for our free-dumb.
Re Don Williams
So now we get it. Former ambassador Kurtzer, like Mr. Williams an Obama supporter, is a liar. Just like Lawrence Wilkerson is a liar and Douglas Feith is a liar. Everybody is a liar except Don Williams. Mr. Williams can post his lies all he wants to but the fact is that the the independent testimony of these three men indicates that the officials in the Government up to and including the Prime Minister thought that the Iraq adventure was a bad idea. The comments by Israeli officials that he likes to post are nothing but them sucking up to the Bush Administration. If Mr. Williams wants to criticize them for sucking up, he will get no dissent from me. That's why I want to phase out aid to Israel so that they don't have to suck up anymore.
Why didn't he just sic the Power Rangers on them?
(Yes, Matt, this is the same guy responsible for the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers).
Re SLC's comment "The comments by Israeli officials that he likes to post are nothing but them sucking up to the Bush Administration"
-----------
Er no, SLC. They are statements by Sharon and the SENIOR LEADERS in the Israeli government telling the AMERICAN PEOPLE in 2002 that we needed to attack Saddam before he used his WMDS against us. Bibi even mentioned nukes.
Where is the Mossad intelligence to support those claims, SLC? Where are the WMDs? What did Sharon know that the French and Germans did not?
You can say the Likud were merely helping our own President lie us into a disasterous, unnecessary war. But why do you see nothing wrong with that?
Plus, of course, there are still those right wing Neocons. Who even Kurtzer says "brought us the war."
Neocons who --the last time I checked -- are supporting a right wing party in a certain country on the far side of the world.
Tom Friedman told Haaretz that the war would not have occurred if not for the propaganda of 25 or so of those Neocons. Haaretz helpfully added that "most of whom are Jewish".
By the way, what church do the owners of the NY Times, Scooter Libby, Paul Wolfowitz, Doug Feith, and Judith Miller go to? Are they Methodists?
"After 10,000 years I am finally free to conquer the Earth...! if you count Michigan and Florida, of course, as you must." ~ Hillary Clinton.
Re Don Williams
"You can say the Likud were merely helping our own President lie us into a disastrous, unnecessary war. But why do you see nothing wrong with that?"
Again, Mr. Williams is apparently reading comprehension challenged. I explicitly stated that he and I are on the same page relative to Sharon and Co. sucking up to the Bush Administration. Of course, their predecessors, Rabin, Netanyahu, Peres, and Barak also sucked up to the Clinton administration. The way to stop the sucking up is to phase out aid to Israel, which they don't need anyway. This aid is a consequence of the bribes paid to Israel and Egypt by James Earl Carter to obtain the peace treaty between them so blame that on the former president too.
Re Don Williams
By the way, if Mr. Williams wants to read a real nutcase, the attached link to a thread over at Dr. Oracs' blog should give him much fodder. In particular, look for comments by one Harry Eagar who makes the neo-cons look like wusses.
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2008/05/those_who_use_the_neville_chamberlain_ga.php#commentsArea
Just as an example, here is a short section from Mr. Eagars' first comment (his later comments are even worse).
"People who would like to tar Bush with the brush of Chamberlain have their history upside down. As commander of a powerful military, Bush was in a position to go it alone against the real enemy (Islam) and his fault was not in going to war but (like his father 10 years before), in pulling his punches.
Had he knocked over the regimes in Syria (where we would have found Saddam's weapons of mass destruction) and Iran, his war would shortly have reached a meaningful denouement, and the Moslems would have -- as they had after the Battle of the Pyramids in 1798 and Omdurman in 1898 -- behaved themselves for a generation or three."
Re SLC's comment "The way to stop the sucking up is to phase out aid to Israel,"
-----------
Well, the real problem is to change campaign finance laws to provide 100% public financing for campaigns and a ban on private contributions. So that Members of Congress don't have to whore themselves out to 6 different factions to get elected.
Next is to nationalize the news reporting and ban private ownership/influence. With enough diversity to ensure all viewspoints get heard while ensuring wealthy private interests can't run con games on the voters the way they have been doing in the past decade.
Both of those reforms are hard to do without causing new problems, but I think they will be necessary if we want to remain a republic.
An alternative might be to use the tax code to block the intense concentration of wealth. Disperse wealth and income more widely across the population and people will have the means to support opposition groups like Move On.
"Richard Steven Hack, you really ought to drop the studied moderation and tell us how you feel. Wouldn't that be more fun than constructing arguments and using neutral language?"
I'll try.
But then I'll read like SLC! Oh, NOOOOOOOOHHHHH!!!
Comments closed June 02, 2008.
| 
Heads in the Sand
This should be fun, I need some popcorn...
Posted by eric k | May 19, 2008 5:33 PM