Secretary Clinton, Please Specify Which Republican Speech Transcripts We Are Still Waiting For

[FourScore]

Secretary Clinton, Please Specify Which Republican Speech Transcripts We Are Still Waiting For
By greywolfe359
Monday Mar 07, 2016 · 11:48 AM EST


Ever wonder what these two say to each other? Or why one of the most evil people in the world seems so happy to see her?

Last night at the Democratic Debate, Hillary Clinton was asked yet again about the transcripts of her Wall Street speeches. And once again she made the spurious claim that she will release those transcripts when ALL candidates release theirs, including the Republicans.

Of course Bernie pointed out she’s only running against him in the Democratic Primary, and once again released the full text of all his paid speeches to Wall Street. There aren’t any.

But poor Hillary. She’s being singled out here. She says it’s not fair to ask her to release hers until all the Republicans release theirs.

But here’s the thing that’s bothering me and I’m not sure why no moderator has thought to bring it up:

Which Republicans candidates still in the race gave paid speeches to Wall Street firms to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars a pop?

For that matter, which Republican candidates gave paid, closed door speeches to Wall Street at all?

I’ll admit, I’m not the greatest investigative reporter in the world but I spent the better part of an hour googling away trying to find incidents of Rubio, Cruz, Trump and Kasich giving lavishly rewarded paid speeches to Wall Street.

I found all kinds of shady dealings. As you may know, Kasich worked for Lehman Brothers up until the crash and they’re among the worst of the worst as far as the crash goes. But having a job somewhere is a bit different from just randomly showing up, giving a speech and walking away with 10x the average median salary in this country when you’re done.

Rubio is in on the grift game. Down in Florida he landed himself a guest “professor” gig teaching a couple of classes occasionally to the tune of $69,000 a year. But still, that’s for “work” that is at least noble on the surface, though it galls me that adjuncts make about 1/5 of that for the same work when they actually know what they are doing. But then again, it’s not just one speech, classes are taught in public (students should even be taking notes!) and he got about 1/10 of what Clinton gets for ONE SPEECH.

Ted Cruz, it turns out, got some shady loans from Goldman Sachs. And he doubled down by not adequately reporting them or something. Hell, I’m not sure how taxes are supposed to work myself so I don’t get super worked up about that. But again, this was a LOAN that in theory he’ll have to pay back (and if it’s Goldman it will be paid back with lots of interest—so a Cruz net loss). So again, not really in the realm of closed door speeches where you get half a million per.

Of course there’s also Donald Trump. But Trump lives his whole life in front of cameras. He tweets out half-formed thoughts as fast as he can halfway form them. He’s got lots of shady deals going on all over the place but from what I can tell, he’s never given closed door paid speeches to big Wall Street companies for which he was compensated half a million dollars a pop.

So what paid speeches to Wall Street made by Republican candidates are we talking about? Because I can’t find any.

And there’s probably a good reason I can’t find any. If you’re currently IN Congress or the government generally, it’s ILLEGAL for you to accept that kind of money from groups that lobby Congress.

Of course Clinton defends herself with the claim that she was a “retired” politician when she made all that money. That’s why what she did is technically legal. But more than half of that money came from groups that actively lobby Congress and here’s the problem:

To be sure, there is nothing illegal or improper about a retired politician giving a speech. Ex-government officials hit the speaking circuit and write memoirs all the time. Clinton’s predecessor, Condoleezza Rice, earned $150,000 for some of her speeches after her four years as Secretary of State under Republican President George W. Bush.

“The idea of leaving office and giving speeches is not new. What’s new is that you may come back to office,” Noble said. “If she had retired after being Secretary of State, there’d be much less issue with it.”

Does anyone believe Hillary Clinton was really and truly retired? Is there anyone who ever doubted that she would run in 2016? Certainly other big name Democrats always thought she would run since none of them made a serious effort to get into this primary. But there she was taking all of that money that would have been illegal if she were still in the government all the while knowing she was going to attempt to get back in. (Hopefully we can still stop that from happening) That’s a major problem for those of us who care about getting corruption and money out of politics:

Critics argue that the harm comes from the perception of improper influence rather than from textbook-definition corruption.

“Some of the damage is already done,” said Larry Noble, a former counsel to the Federal Election Commission and a current adviser to the reform-minded Campaign Legal Center. “It undermines the credibility of our elected officials. Let’s say she becomes President and she takes a position that is pro-Wall Street. Even if she in her heart of hearts believes it’s the right way to go … people won’t believe it.”

So let’s sum up.

Hillary says she will #releasethetranscripts when all the other candidates release theirs.

We already know Bernie has none.

I can’t find any paid, closed door speeches at anywhere near half a million a pop by current Republican candidates Cruz, Rubio, Kasich or Trump.

Therefore, unless someone can find what I could not, all the Wall Street speeches by other candidates are already out there.

Your turn, Secretary Clinton.

#releasethetranscripts

http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/3/7/1497410/-Secretary-Clinton-Please-Specify-Which-Republican-Speech-Transcripts-We-Are-Still-Waiting-For

[PatrickforO]

1. Yes, it doesn't look good that she won't release the transcripts, does it?

Having observed Clinton's nature for many years, it seems like a 'damned if you do, damned if you don't' situation.