John McCain and the “Keating Five: Scandal
By Sherman DeBrosse
It is an odd coincidence that Joe the Plumber, Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher of Holland, Ohio, bears the last name of the son-in-law of Charles Keating, who was the central figure in the famous but largely forgotten Keating Five Scandal. Another key player was John Mc Cain. The Obama campaign produced a video onm the scandal but has pretty much left it alone. When it was mentioned, the mainstream media did not follow up by providing even sketchy details.
Banker Charles Keating, originally an Ohioan, also got into the business of befriending Arizona politicians. He gave a $55,000 campaign contribution to Bob Corbin, a former Marley employee, who ran unopposed for attorney general. He would supervise state-chartered banks. Keating got his start as a lawyer for Carl Lindner, who made great profits from the Vietnam War. One of the nation’s wealthiest men, Lindner owned 7 S &L that were to fail. By owning United Brands, he was in a position to reap profits from the government’s secret programs to fund and supply the Nicaraguan contras through Hondouras.
Keating purchased property for his office in Phoenix from a mob-connected attorney in 1980. He had a mansion in the Bahamas, where the same attorney family had a casino.
Prudential Insurance loaned him $2 million in 1985. He had numerous dealings with BCCI, which turned out to be the bank of crooks and criminals.
Keating had invested 17.5 million in TrendInvest without notifying his American Continental board. Walter Bush, cousin to the current president, was involved with Continental, which later collapsed. There were many other baffling investments. Some think he was laundering CIA money involved in its Latin American operations.
Keating had a business relationship with Hensley. Keating was good at buying political influence, and he had a ten year close relationship with John McCain, donating about $112,000 to McCain campaigns. Nine times, he paid to transport McCain’s family and babysitter to his place in the Bahamas, often on a private plane. In addition, he permitted Cindy and her father to buy into a lucrative shopping center in California. In return McCain helped him convince Ronald Reagan to deregulate the Savings and Loan industry and place a Keating friend on the board that regulated it. Deregulation was a green light for Keating to build the Phoenician, a resort, in partnership with the rulers of Kuwait. The federal government seized it in February, 1989. His bellmen were permitted to remove 24 cartons of documents.
When the Feds started investigating Keating, McCain organized the “Keating Five” senators to put pressure on the Federal Home Loan Bank board to back off. At one point McCain even demanded that the chairman of that board not participate in the investigation of Keating.
When Keating began to get into trouble and marketed $230,000,000 in bad bonds, he came up with a scheme to cover them with profits from a water scheme. He and a partner bought up a lot of water rights and then had the legislature pass a law requiring Phoenix to first buy as much water as Keating could sell before going to other vendors. They planned to pump about a million acre feet of water in a year. De Concini would also profit because he had purchased some water rights. Such a scheme could only take place in a state where the press looked the other way and the politicians were largely corrupt. The Arizona Republic and the Phoenix Gazette were owned by the family of Dan Quayle.
The Arizona House of Representatives breezed the bill through in two days, but Jerry Gilespie held up things in the Senate. He found a way to stop it dead in its tracks, but he lost his seat in the next election. No wire service reported the story but it was covered by Phoenix Magazine in 1989. This doomed Keating.
As late as May, 1988, Keating thought he had won his battle against the Federal Home Loan Bank Board. On the 20th, he threw a big party because Senators Mc Cain and De Concini, with three others, had succeeded in having the investigation of his Lincoln Savings from San Francisco to Washington. In excitement, he removed his shirt to reveal a tee shirt with a skull and bones superimposed over the letters FHLBB. He had spent a million dollars buying politicians. It looked like he had won, but he was done in when the water scheme petered out.
Keating was eventually fined 3.6 billion and sent to prison. He has been called the father of the S &L crisis. McCain was investigated by the Senate Ethics Committee and was only told he exercised “poor judgment.” Almost as soon as he saw that he had a problem, he played the role of the repentant sinner and began to create the false reputation that he was an opponent of lobbyists and the improprieties seem to flow from their involvement in public life. To convince voters that he was a different sort of politician, he started calling for campaign finance reform. Mrs. McCain retained her profitable partnership with Keating.
Showing posts with label Keating Five Scandal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Keating Five Scandal. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Agenda for an Honest Media
When Barack Obama was campaigning in the Toledo area, he met the now famous “Joe the Plumber” of Holland, Ohio. Joe said that he was about the buy his boss’s business and that it earns more than $250,000 a year. Joe was unhappy because he thought Obama’s tax plan would hurt him and slow his quest for the American dream.
The electronic media presented Joe as an uncommitted voter. We do not know if Joe presented himself as such. Joe has said that Social Security is a “joke,” and that Obama is a socialist. He volunteered that he admires Mc Cain and the military. He admitted that he was not earning a great deal, which calls his story into question.
We know now that he was not a licensed plumber and that he said he practiced plumbing on his employer’s license. The problem is that this is not legal in Lucas County, where he works.
Some suspect that Joe ( Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher) was a plant because people with his last name in Ohio and Florida are big Republican contributors. Some even hypothesize that he is related to the son-in-law of Charles Keating, as in John Mc Cain and the Keating Five scandal. This is unlikely, and it would take the resources of a news organization with integrity to find out if he was a McCain shill and/or connected to his namesake in the scandal.
There are other matters that an honest press should be exploring.
2. Today Senator Ted Stevens testified in his own defense regarding extensive construction work done on one of his houses by an important Alaska firm. It allegedly came to about $250,000. Some suggest that Sarah Palin benefitted in the same way when her $500,000 + mansion was built. Todd, the “First Dude,” admitted that some buddies helped him. It is suggested that they were a contractors’ laborers who were also working on her sports complex in Wasilla. This one is hard to research because Mayor Palin saw to it that there was very little paperwork necessary to build in the city.
3. The press spent many weeks airing material about Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright and the white priest who was a guest homilist at Obama’s church. We hear nothing about Sarah’s pastors even though it is very likely that they oppose the separation of church and state and want to establish a theocracy. It is a matter or record that she thinks pastors should be able to endorse candidates without risking tax problems.
4. The press must raise questions about Mrs. Mc Cain’s tax returns. We know that she still profits from a deal with Keating. Is she profiting from a no-bid beer distribution contract in Iraq. Is her firm helping the campaign in any ways?
5. We could use an honest report on John McCain’s incestuous relationship with the communications industry, especially cable television.
The electronic media presented Joe as an uncommitted voter. We do not know if Joe presented himself as such. Joe has said that Social Security is a “joke,” and that Obama is a socialist. He volunteered that he admires Mc Cain and the military. He admitted that he was not earning a great deal, which calls his story into question.
We know now that he was not a licensed plumber and that he said he practiced plumbing on his employer’s license. The problem is that this is not legal in Lucas County, where he works.
Some suspect that Joe ( Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher) was a plant because people with his last name in Ohio and Florida are big Republican contributors. Some even hypothesize that he is related to the son-in-law of Charles Keating, as in John Mc Cain and the Keating Five scandal. This is unlikely, and it would take the resources of a news organization with integrity to find out if he was a McCain shill and/or connected to his namesake in the scandal.
There are other matters that an honest press should be exploring.
2. Today Senator Ted Stevens testified in his own defense regarding extensive construction work done on one of his houses by an important Alaska firm. It allegedly came to about $250,000. Some suggest that Sarah Palin benefitted in the same way when her $500,000 + mansion was built. Todd, the “First Dude,” admitted that some buddies helped him. It is suggested that they were a contractors’ laborers who were also working on her sports complex in Wasilla. This one is hard to research because Mayor Palin saw to it that there was very little paperwork necessary to build in the city.
3. The press spent many weeks airing material about Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright and the white priest who was a guest homilist at Obama’s church. We hear nothing about Sarah’s pastors even though it is very likely that they oppose the separation of church and state and want to establish a theocracy. It is a matter or record that she thinks pastors should be able to endorse candidates without risking tax problems.
4. The press must raise questions about Mrs. Mc Cain’s tax returns. We know that she still profits from a deal with Keating. Is she profiting from a no-bid beer distribution contract in Iraq. Is her firm helping the campaign in any ways?
5. We could use an honest report on John McCain’s incestuous relationship with the communications industry, especially cable television.
Monday, October 6, 2008
John Mc Cain's Work for Keating Sheds Light on Today
Though presenting himself as Mr. Clean, the fact is that John McCain has a long history of questionable dealings with lobbyists. In 1987, he worked with four other Senators—all Democrats—to prevent federal regulators from taking over the Lincoln Savings and Loan Association, headed by Charles Keating. McCain attended two meetings with federal regulators to pleas Keating’s case. When he learned that the bank was under criminal investigation, he withdrew from efforts to help Keating. The bank collapsed and Keating went to prison. He was accused of selling worthless bonds to 23,000 people, many of whom were old people. The Five Senators were known as the Keating Five, but McCain and John Glenn were only admonished for showing poor judgment.
Senator McCain said he was only helping a constituent. The fact was that Keating and McCain had been friends since 1981. In three campaigns, Keating raised $112,000 for MCain. McCain made at least nine trips paid for by Keating, three of which were to Keating’s Bahamas complex. Despite Senate rules, McCain did not disclose the flights until forced to. Cindy McCain and her father, Jim Hensley, put $359,100 into Fountain Hills, a Phoenix strip mall sponsored by Keating. It was a” sweetheart deal,” according to the New York Times.
Keating was known as a nasty bigot and bully, and many avoided him. But McCain viewed him as a personal friend. Keating had great influence with President Ronald Reagan, who tried unsuccessfully to give Keating control of the board that regulates savings and loan associations. McCain succeeded in persuading Reagan to nominate two Keating men for that board. Some would say McCain was trying to put minions of the fox in the henhouse.
Keating also had a plan to lift the rule barring direct investments by the S and Ls, which was strongly backed by Newt Gingrich, Mc Cain, and some Democrats. Had the rule been changed, the S and L scandal would have been far worse. McCain probably backed the rule change because, like Phil Gram, he thought regulations should be stripped away. Even in the face of today’s possible financial meltdown, Mc Cain has not changed his mind, nor has Gram, who is a likely candidate for Secretary of the Treasury under the Arizonan. As late as March 25, 2008, McCain thought the mortgage crisis could be solved by stripping away regulations.
McCain was masterful in extricating himself from the Keating Five Scandal, calling it "my asterisk." And saying it will be mentioned on his tombstone. Almost as soon as he saw that he had a problem, he played the role of the repentant sinner and began to create the false reputation that he was an opponent of lobbyists and the improprieties seem to flow from their involvement in public life. To convince voters that he was a different sort of politician, he started calling for campaign finance reform.
Recently, McCain denied ever meeting Lowell “Bud” Paxson, even though there was a 2002 court deposition proving they had met.
Yet in 2006 he said he no longer supported public financing of elections. In 2008, he first signed up for public financing of his primary campaign and then backed out when it provide advantageous to do so. That allowed him to raise more money and spend much of it after the primaries had ended and before the conventions. Then, signing on for public financing of the general campaign, he denounced Obama for being inconsistent and not going for public financing. In all this, McCain looks far less like the honest maverick than a very skilled and crafty pol.
In 1999, MC Cain, then chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, pressed the FCC hard to let Paxson Communications purchase a Pittsburgh television station. The FC claimed McCain’s request seemed like a threat and believed he had crossed the line separating propriety and impropriety. The firm had donated $20,000 to McCain. The firm had provided McCain transportation on a company jet on several occasions. Very briefly, the press raised questions about his relationship with a pretty young Paxson lobbyist who was often in his company in 2000. No solid evidence of a sexual relationship was found, so the press decided not to look into the rest of the story. The fact that McCain is clearly the darling of the press could have something to do with the drying up of the entire story.
When confronted with information about his conduct in the Paxson case, McCain said he was just prodding bureaucrats and then produced documents to show he had done the same thing in other cases involving large contributors. What chutzpah!
In 1999, McCain staff twice intervened to help wealthy contributor and close personal friend Donald Diamond obtain land from closed Army base Fort Ord in California. That deal allowed him to turn a $20 million profit, and another arrangement in 2005, again with McCain help, promises to be more profitable. This involves as many as 12,000 homes and benefits more than one McCain backer. Two former McCain staffers were hired as lobbyists in this complex deal to get him aboard. Twice in the 1990s, McCain introduced land legislation to help Diamond, and a third measure is now before the Senate.
In 2001, questions were raised about legislation he backed for the cruise industry and the large contributions it gave him.
Recently, it was learned that John McCain had more lobbyists working for his 2008 campaign than any other presidential candidate. Even after 6 were forced to leave due to their ties to unsavory regimes, there are 59 who do nothing but raise money. One of them is Ralph Reed, who was shown to be taking advantage of Native American clients in hearings McCain chaired! Over time, 133 lobbyists have worked for the Straight talk Express.
Others do other things in the campaign. Rick Davis is campaign manager, and Charlie Black is senior political advisor. Among Black’s clients were AT%T, Rupert Murdock, and Blackwater. Twenty-one McCain people also represented AT&T. Black had also been paid to shepard around Ahmed Chalabi, whose distortions helped get the US to invade Iraq. Could this be connected to McCain’s view that American troops must soldier on there, possibly indefinitely.
Two lobbyists were closely tied to the mortgage industry, which could explain why McCain has been so very friendly to the same industry. Randy Scheunemann, McCain’s foreign policy analyst, has represented the Republic of Georgia, and spoke on McCain’s behalf on this issue as recently as August 17. This could explain why McCain is so hawkish about the Russo-Georgian struggle. He speaks as though he is already president, keeping force and all other options on the table.
None of this information is to suggest Mc Cain is a crook. He is obviously very closely tied to the lobbyists and special interests that he frequently complains about. There is no doubt that he has a history of going to bat for them—sometimes appearing to go to far. He has repeatedly promised to never doing anything that gives the appearance of impropriety, but his track record is just the opposite of this.
He probably is not a crook, and deserves great praise for his service in the Vietnam War. But he is only mortal and has a bad track record for consistency and truth telling, despite all his self-praise about honesty. The most worrisome quality is that he seems to have a very poor learning curve. Had the nation followed the course outlined by Newt Gingrich, Charles Keating, Phil Gram, and McCain in the 1980s, the banking collapse of the George H.W. Bush years would have been infinitely worse. He learned nothing from this, and continued to hawk deregulatory policies through t he 1990s and supported the Phil Gram legislation that brought on the California energy crisis and today mortgage meltdown. As late a March he said the answer was more deregulation, and, we are told, he remains in telephone contact with his economic guru, Phil Gram.
It is far from unthinkable to speculate that should McCain enter the White House next January, that economy is experiencing severe shocks, and it is clear that a President McCain would have no clue as to what to do about it.
Senator McCain said he was only helping a constituent. The fact was that Keating and McCain had been friends since 1981. In three campaigns, Keating raised $112,000 for MCain. McCain made at least nine trips paid for by Keating, three of which were to Keating’s Bahamas complex. Despite Senate rules, McCain did not disclose the flights until forced to. Cindy McCain and her father, Jim Hensley, put $359,100 into Fountain Hills, a Phoenix strip mall sponsored by Keating. It was a” sweetheart deal,” according to the New York Times.
Keating was known as a nasty bigot and bully, and many avoided him. But McCain viewed him as a personal friend. Keating had great influence with President Ronald Reagan, who tried unsuccessfully to give Keating control of the board that regulates savings and loan associations. McCain succeeded in persuading Reagan to nominate two Keating men for that board. Some would say McCain was trying to put minions of the fox in the henhouse.
Keating also had a plan to lift the rule barring direct investments by the S and Ls, which was strongly backed by Newt Gingrich, Mc Cain, and some Democrats. Had the rule been changed, the S and L scandal would have been far worse. McCain probably backed the rule change because, like Phil Gram, he thought regulations should be stripped away. Even in the face of today’s possible financial meltdown, Mc Cain has not changed his mind, nor has Gram, who is a likely candidate for Secretary of the Treasury under the Arizonan. As late as March 25, 2008, McCain thought the mortgage crisis could be solved by stripping away regulations.
McCain was masterful in extricating himself from the Keating Five Scandal, calling it "my asterisk." And saying it will be mentioned on his tombstone. Almost as soon as he saw that he had a problem, he played the role of the repentant sinner and began to create the false reputation that he was an opponent of lobbyists and the improprieties seem to flow from their involvement in public life. To convince voters that he was a different sort of politician, he started calling for campaign finance reform.
Recently, McCain denied ever meeting Lowell “Bud” Paxson, even though there was a 2002 court deposition proving they had met.
Yet in 2006 he said he no longer supported public financing of elections. In 2008, he first signed up for public financing of his primary campaign and then backed out when it provide advantageous to do so. That allowed him to raise more money and spend much of it after the primaries had ended and before the conventions. Then, signing on for public financing of the general campaign, he denounced Obama for being inconsistent and not going for public financing. In all this, McCain looks far less like the honest maverick than a very skilled and crafty pol.
In 1999, MC Cain, then chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, pressed the FCC hard to let Paxson Communications purchase a Pittsburgh television station. The FC claimed McCain’s request seemed like a threat and believed he had crossed the line separating propriety and impropriety. The firm had donated $20,000 to McCain. The firm had provided McCain transportation on a company jet on several occasions. Very briefly, the press raised questions about his relationship with a pretty young Paxson lobbyist who was often in his company in 2000. No solid evidence of a sexual relationship was found, so the press decided not to look into the rest of the story. The fact that McCain is clearly the darling of the press could have something to do with the drying up of the entire story.
When confronted with information about his conduct in the Paxson case, McCain said he was just prodding bureaucrats and then produced documents to show he had done the same thing in other cases involving large contributors. What chutzpah!
In 1999, McCain staff twice intervened to help wealthy contributor and close personal friend Donald Diamond obtain land from closed Army base Fort Ord in California. That deal allowed him to turn a $20 million profit, and another arrangement in 2005, again with McCain help, promises to be more profitable. This involves as many as 12,000 homes and benefits more than one McCain backer. Two former McCain staffers were hired as lobbyists in this complex deal to get him aboard. Twice in the 1990s, McCain introduced land legislation to help Diamond, and a third measure is now before the Senate.
In 2001, questions were raised about legislation he backed for the cruise industry and the large contributions it gave him.
Recently, it was learned that John McCain had more lobbyists working for his 2008 campaign than any other presidential candidate. Even after 6 were forced to leave due to their ties to unsavory regimes, there are 59 who do nothing but raise money. One of them is Ralph Reed, who was shown to be taking advantage of Native American clients in hearings McCain chaired! Over time, 133 lobbyists have worked for the Straight talk Express.
Others do other things in the campaign. Rick Davis is campaign manager, and Charlie Black is senior political advisor. Among Black’s clients were AT%T, Rupert Murdock, and Blackwater. Twenty-one McCain people also represented AT&T. Black had also been paid to shepard around Ahmed Chalabi, whose distortions helped get the US to invade Iraq. Could this be connected to McCain’s view that American troops must soldier on there, possibly indefinitely.
Two lobbyists were closely tied to the mortgage industry, which could explain why McCain has been so very friendly to the same industry. Randy Scheunemann, McCain’s foreign policy analyst, has represented the Republic of Georgia, and spoke on McCain’s behalf on this issue as recently as August 17. This could explain why McCain is so hawkish about the Russo-Georgian struggle. He speaks as though he is already president, keeping force and all other options on the table.
None of this information is to suggest Mc Cain is a crook. He is obviously very closely tied to the lobbyists and special interests that he frequently complains about. There is no doubt that he has a history of going to bat for them—sometimes appearing to go to far. He has repeatedly promised to never doing anything that gives the appearance of impropriety, but his track record is just the opposite of this.
He probably is not a crook, and deserves great praise for his service in the Vietnam War. But he is only mortal and has a bad track record for consistency and truth telling, despite all his self-praise about honesty. The most worrisome quality is that he seems to have a very poor learning curve. Had the nation followed the course outlined by Newt Gingrich, Charles Keating, Phil Gram, and McCain in the 1980s, the banking collapse of the George H.W. Bush years would have been infinitely worse. He learned nothing from this, and continued to hawk deregulatory policies through t he 1990s and supported the Phil Gram legislation that brought on the California energy crisis and today mortgage meltdown. As late a March he said the answer was more deregulation, and, we are told, he remains in telephone contact with his economic guru, Phil Gram.
It is far from unthinkable to speculate that should McCain enter the White House next January, that economy is experiencing severe shocks, and it is clear that a President McCain would have no clue as to what to do about it.
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