This is bigger than the Abramoff scandal of 2006,
Norman Hsu, a purported clothing magnate who became a top Democratic donor, was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of running a fraudulent investment scheme and using some of the proceeds to make political contributions.
The 15-count indictment formalized a case brought by the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. The government alleges that Mr. Hsu conducted “a massive scheme that defrauded investors across the United States” of tens of millions of dollars. He also was charged with violating federal campaign-finance laws by making contributions to various political candidates in the names of others.
Suitably Flip has done a fantastic job chronicling this big scandal, which plagues many Democrats who have received Hsu-connected cash.
Tags: culture of corruption, Norman Hsu
December 5th, 2007
While the FEC against Hillary Clinton works its way through the bureaucracy, an interesting news story about Norman Hsu has come out in the Wall Street Journal. Interesting because of this:
The man went bankrupt in the United States in 1990, bankrupt in Hong Kong in 1997 and made his first federal political donation in 2003. Huh? Yeah, you read that right - a double-bankrupt starts gathering large donation amounts six years after his second bankruptcy. You might want to recall what happened in 2003 - campaign finance reform went into effect, and politicians were in desperate need of people who could raise large sums of money from a large number of donors. Hsu gave his first $2,000 to John Kerry in 2003, and became such a success as a money raiser that Democrats embraced him far and wide. How? How does a bankrupt convince people to give very large amounts of money to politicians?
There is something mighty fishy here - and now that we have the substance of our FEC complaint (ie, illegal donations via Chinese connections), it becomes vital that we get to the bottom of all this. Hsu’s money came from somewhere, and people don’t give to politicians without some expectation of return on their investment. Don’t think that its just Hillary involved - she’s the biggest hog at the trough of illegal and questionable money, but Obama and Edwards and the entire Democratic party are right there with her, only outpaced because of Clinton’s uncanny ability to attract money, legal or otherwise.
My opinion? Someone or some group is purchasing the Democratic party - I don’t know who it is or what their ultimate motivation is, but the fact of all this illegal money shows that someone out there wants very much to have a very large say in what Democrats do in office. For the safety of our democratic institutions, we must demand that this be investigated fully.
Tags: 2008 Campaign, illegal donations, Norman Hsu
November 13th, 2007
