Hillary Clinton’s Support Base as Bogus as US Democracy

[Octafish]

This isn't posted to anger those who back Hillary Clinton or can only appreciate approved, Corporate Owned News media monopoly partners. This is meant to wake up Democracy.

Hillary Clinton’s Support Base as Bogus as US Democracy

by ERIC DRAITSER
CounterPunch via Russia Times/APRIL 22, 2016

EXCERPT...

How social media manipulation serves the Establishment agenda

Twitter, Facebook, and other social media have become very potent tools in the arsenal of the US Government as it wages a relentless information war in the service of the military-industrial complex and the agenda of the elite. In fact, social media goes far beyond just an image. Today, it has been made into an effective tool for the dissemination of misinformation and disinformation that conveniently buttresses whatever narrative the establishment wants.

SNIP...

Is This Democracy?

OK, so social media followings are meaningless as they can be manufactured, as we see currently with Hillary Clinton. But surely the actual mechanisms of voting in the US are clean? Well, not exactly.

In this election season alone there have been massive failures in multiple states that have left countless thousands of Americans without the right to vote for their candidates of choice, or victims of outright fraud. Even Arizona’s Secretary of State recently admitted that fraud had taken place on a large scale in her state. The hacktivist collective Anonymous has provided detailed analysis pointing to the fact that state databases were likely hacked and manipulated.

And then of course there’s the issue of the voting machines themselves. Recently the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law issued a comprehensive report entitled America’s Voting Machines at Risk which found that the voting machines currently in use are outdated, running the risk of catastrophic failures. The report highlighted many shocking examples that should give anyone pause when considering the validity of election results. The authors of the report noted that “Virginia recently decertified a voting system used in 24 percent of precincts after finding that an external party could access the machine’s wireless features to record voting data or inject malicious data.”

SNIP...

The fact is that nearly all electronic voting machines are designed and manufactured by companies such as ES&S (owned by Warren Buffett), Dominion (previously Diebold), Smartmatic, and Hart Intercivic, all of which are connected to very powerful interests within the ruling elite circles. In fact, researchers at the Center for Information Technology Policy at Princeton University demonstrated that in under 60 seconds, anyone could bypass the lock and replace the memory card with another. As the researchers in the video explain, “Any desired algorithm can be used to determine which votes to steal and to which candidate or candidates to transfer the stolen votes.”

CONTINUED...

http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/04/22/hillary-clintons-support-base-as-bogus-as-us-democracy/

Now, please let me know your thoughts via DemocraticUnderground. I don't do Facebook.

[Trust Buster]

1. And yet they complain on other threads that we won't back off Sanders supporters.

This thread is an example of why. That's o.k. We're on the winning side. We can stay at this as long as you wish. On to Tuesday night.

[Octafish]

2. Who's ''They''? I don't speak for anybody else on DU.

Nor am I paid to speak on behalf of anybody else -- on DU.

[Trust Buster]

4. If you follow DU, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Turnaround is fair play.

[Octafish]

20. Can you imagine Bernie's poll numbers if Corporate McPravda operated under the Fairness Doctrine?

Freaking Donald Trump gets almost $2 billion in free air time.

Sanders is described as a socialist for a $ few million and that's about it.

The INTERNET is where people KNOW and talk about Bernie Sanders.

More and more people are getting their info without CIABCNNBCBSFoxnutjobs.

And that's a good thing, especially if you believe in Democracy.

If you don't think that's a good thing, great. Just think I'm not writing to you.

[Trust Buster]

21. The people didn't buy what he was selling. The media is irrelevant.

[Octafish]

23. The media are irrelevant?

You do have a lot to learn. Here's a good place to start:

The Machine: Taking the Risk out of Democracy, Corporate Propaganda vs Freedom & Liberty

Corporate McPravda owns the airwaves. And Corporate Tee Vee is still where most Americans get most of their information.

The Propaganda System That Has Helped Create a Permanent Overclass Is Over a Century in the Making

Pulling back the curtain on how intent the wealthiest Americans have been on establishing a propaganda tool to subvert democracy.

Wednesday, 17 April 2013 00:00
By Andrew Gavin Marshall, AlterNet | News Analysis

Where there is the possibility of democracy, there is the inevitability of elite insecurity. All through its history, democracy has been under a sustained attack by elite interests, political, economic, and cultural. There is a simple reason for this: democracy – as in true democracy – places power with people. In such circumstances, the few who hold power become threatened. With technological changes in modern history, with literacy and education, mass communication, organization and activism, elites have had to react to the changing nature of society – locally and globally.

From the late 19th century on, the “threats” to elite interests from the possibility of true democracy mobilized institutions, ideologies, and individuals in support of power. What began was a massive social engineering project with one objective: control. Through educational institutions, the social sciences, philanthropic foundations, public relations and advertising agencies, corporations, banks, and states, powerful interests sought to reform and protect their power from the potential of popular democracy.

SNIP...

The development of psychology, psychoanalysis, and other disciplines increasingly portrayed the “public” and the population as irrational beings incapable of making their own decisions. The premise was simple: if the population was driven by dangerous, irrational emotions, they needed to be kept out of power and ruled over by those who were driven by reason and rationality, naturally, those who were already in power.

The Princeton Radio Project, which began in the 1930s with Rockefeller Foundation funding, brought together many psychologists, social scientists, and “experts” armed with an interest in social control, mass communication, and propaganda. The Princeton Radio Project had a profound influence upon the development of a modern "democratic propaganda" in the United States and elsewhere in the industrialized world. It helped in establishing and nurturing the ideas, institutions, and individuals who would come to shape America’s “democratic propaganda” throughout the Cold War, a program fostered between the private corporations which own the media, advertising, marketing, and public relations industries, and the state itself.

CONTINUED...

http://truth-out.org/news/item/15784-the-propaganda-system-that-has-helped-create-a-permanent-overclass-is-over-a-century-in-the-making

Thankfully, to help spread light when the protectors of the First Amendment won't, Maria Galardin's TUC (Time of Useful Consciousness) Radio. The podcast helps explain how we got here and what we need to do to move forward, starting with putting the "Public" into Airwaves again:

Alex Carey: Corporations and Propaganda
The Attack on Democracy

The 20th century, said Carey, is marked by three historic developments: the growth of democracy via the expansion of the franchise, the growth of corporations, and the growth of propaganda to protect corporations from democracy. Carey wrote that the people of the US have been subjected to an unparalleled, expensive, 3/4 century long propaganda effort designed to expand corporate rights by undermining democracy and destroying the unions. And, in his manuscript, unpublished during his life time, he described that history, going back to World War I and ending with the Reagan era. Carey covers the little known role of the US Chamber of Commerce in the McCarthy witch hunts of post WWII and shows how the continued campaign against "Big Government" plays an important role in bringing Reagan to power.

John Pilger called Carey "a second Orwell", Noam Chomsky dedicated his book, Manufacturing Consent, to him. And even though TUC Radio runs our documentary based on Carey's manuscript at least every two years and draws a huge response each time, Alex Carey is still unknown.

Given today's spotlight on corporations that may change. It is not only the Occupy movement that inspired me to present this program again at this time. By an amazing historic coincidence Bill Moyers and Charlie Cray of Greenpeace have just added the missing chapter to Carey's analysis. Carey's manuscript ends in 1988 when he committed suicide. Moyers and Cray begin with 1971 and bring the corporate propaganda project up to date.

This is a fairly complex production with many voices, historic sound clips, and source material. The program has been used by writers and students of history and propaganda. Alex Carey: Taking the Risk out of Democracy, Corporate Propaganda VS Freedom and Liberty with a foreword by Noam Chomsky was published by the University of Illinois Press in 1995.

SOURCE: http://tucradio.org/new.html

If you find a moment, here's the first part (scroll down at the link for the second part) on Carey.

http://tucradio.org/AlexCarey_ONE.mp3

It's important for there to be more than a handful of companies providing "news." Democracy depends on it.

[insta8er]

27. "The media is irrelevant" LOL

[CorporatistNation]

33. "THEY" Are The employed Shills Who Do The Hands On Work For The Powers That Be!

THAT IS WHO THEY are! "THEY" also are bureaucrats who for little favors or in exchange for choice jobs or promotions will again do the hands on dirty work for the powers that be... Such as Betty Cascio in Brooklyn...

[antigop]

3. The first time I HAD to vote on a voting machine, I knew the fix was in.

I've written quite a few programs in my lifetime, and immediately wanted to know:

1) Who wrote the programs running these voting machines?

2) Who wrote the programs that grabbed the "totals" from the voting machines?

3) Who audited the programs?

4) What were the change control procedures for updating the software?

etc., etc.

I knew years ago.

[Octafish]

7. I hear ya, antigop. Remember Mike Connell, the Ohio GOP e-vote expert from 2004?

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, former Secretary of State Colin Powell's chief of staff, said he thought the Cheney-linked assassination program was active, not a hypothetical thing. Wilkerson said ambassadors and diplomatic staff overseas reported kidnappings and other nefarious operations in their posted nations.

Well, if Cheney's secret program was killing people overseas, what was to stop them from killing people within the United States? The CIA wasn't supposed to operate domestically by law, but they do. Specifically, I'd like to know if Cheney's secret team was involved with these convenient deaths:

Michael Connell (Election Fraud Technical Guru)

John Kokal (No WMDs in Iraq)

David Kelly (No WMDs in Iraq)

Cliff Baxter(ENRON #2)

Gary Webb (CIA drugs)

Jim Hatfield (Bush bin Laden connection)

Deborah Palfrey (Washington Madame knew everybody from Congress-White House-CIA-Contracting Scam)

Raymond Lemme (Election Fraud)

Athan Gibbs (Election Fraud)

Paul Wellstone (Official White House Enemy)

Here are more people who died under suspicious circumstances while investigating, eh, government perfidy:

Danny Casolaro (Octopus investigator)

Abbie Hoffman (October Surprise investigator)

Steve Kangas (Powers-That-Be investigator)

Mark Lombardi (Conspiracies In Action investigator)

More details here:

Know your BFEE: Dead Men Tell No Tales

and here:

Know your BFEE: 1984 Death of Outstanding Congressional Staffer Buried Poppy-Moon Relationship

One more thing: Why did Cheney take the heat for the assassination program? Sneer was veep to Smirko. The little turd from Crawford was very horny for war.

Know your BFEE: Bush has Killed a Million Innocent People for Their Oil.

Bush even said Money Trumps Peace. Sometimes.

And I know you and lot of DUers knew that years ago, antigop. If the Corporate Owned News were to do their Constitutionally mandated jobs, the whole country would know.

[CorporatistNation]

35. THANK YOU! A BEAUTIFUL TESTAMENT TO THE TRUTH! AMERIKA THE FASCIST STATE!

And here it is... THANK YOU!

[CrowCityDem]

5. It's not as bogus as Bernie's 'momentum'

[Octafish]

11. Please show what part of the OP or this thread you find bogus.

Here's something on the subject from a year back.

More than 2 MILLION of Hillary Clinton's Twitter followers are fake or never tweet – and she's already under fire for 'buying' fake Facebook fans

Two different online audit tools say no more than 44 per cent of Hillary's 3.6 million Twitter fans are real people who participate in the platform

The newly minted presidential candidate is fending off accusations that her Facebook page is full of fake 'likes'

Her Facebook fan base includes more people from Baghdad, Iraq than any US city

When she was secretary of state, her agency paid $630,000 to bulk up its Facebook likes, but pledged to stop after she left

By DAVID MARTOSKO, US POLITICAL EDITOR FOR DAILYMAIL.COM IN DES MOINES, IOWA
PUBLISHED: 10:44 EST, 14 April 2015

Although Hillary Clinton boasts a robust 3.6 million Twitter followers, not even a vast right-wing conspiracy would be able to interact with 2 million of them.

According to two popular online measuring tools, no more than 44 per cent of her Twitter fan base consists of real people who are active in using the social media platform.

And at least 15 per cent – more than 544,000 – are completely fake.

StatusPeople.com, the oldest publicly available Twitter-auditing tool, reports that 44 per cent of the former secretary of state's followers are 'good'; 15 per cent are 'fake'; and 41 per cent are 'inactive,' meaning that they never tweet or reply to any tweets.

CONTINUED...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3038621/More-2-MILLION-Hillary-Clinton-s-Twitter-followers-fake-never-tweet.html

So what is bogus, CrowCityDem?

[CrowCityDem]

13. Neither Hillary's base nor our democracy are bogus. Saying they are is bogus.

[Octafish]

16. Really, when only the rich get their way from war to taxes to welfare for the rich?

You must have missed the news:

Princeton Study: U.S. No Longer An Actual Democracy

By BRENDAN JAMES
Talking Points Memo, APRIL 18, 2014

A new study from Princeton spells bad news for American democracy—namely, that it no longer exists.

Asking "[w]ho really rules?" researchers Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page argues that over the past few decades America's political system has slowly transformed from a democracy into an oligarchy, where wealthy elites wield most power.

Using data drawn from over 1,800 different policy initiatives from 1981 to 2002, the two conclude that rich, well-connected individuals on the political scene now steer the direction of the country, regardless of or even against the will of the majority of voters.

"The central point that emerges from our research is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy," they write, "while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence."

As one illustration, Gilens and Page compare the political preferences of Americans at the 50th income percentile to preferences of Americans at the 90th percentile as well as major lobbying or business groups. They find that the government—whether Republican or Democratic—more often follows the preferences of the latter group rather than the first.

CONTINUED w.links to the Princeton study, etc....

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/princeton-experts-say-us-no-longer-democracy

I can understand how that's something you might never have heard, considering who owns the news media monopoly.

Taken For Granted At Davos That US Government Run On ‘Legalized Corruption’

By: DSWright
FireDogLake.com, Wednesday January 21, 2015

While there may be confusion among some in the US as to how the American political system operates, it is apparently taken for granted by participants at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland that politics in America is based on bribery and corruption.

In an interview at Davos with Bloomberg News related to growing concerns about rising wealth inequality and its corruption influence on American politics economist and NYU business professor Nouriel Roubini stated as a matter of fact that it would be hard for the US to overcome wealth inequality because the US political system was based on “legalized corruption” which meant rich people – having more resources to bribe politicians with – would generally prevail.

Tom Keene, Bloomberg: How big is the plutocracy effect in 2015?

Nouriel Roubini: It’s significant because we are in a democracy where it supposedly has to be one man, one vote, but the reality is that those who are billionaires, those that have economic and financial power can affect legislation on taxation of capital gains, of carried interest by having that political power.

In the US we have a system of legalized corruption if you think about it. K Street and the lobbying affect legislation with the money they give the politician and therefore those who have financial resources have a greater impact on the political system than those who have less. So it’s not a true democracy, it’s a plutocracy.

This is not news to anyone paying attention. In fact, Princeton University produced an exhaustive study that made headlines demonstrating that the wealthy ultimately determine legislative outcomes in the US Congress. Add to that an experiment the progressive group CREDO and UC Berkeley ran where they offered meetings to representatives with either actual constituents or non-constituent donors with the representatives overwhelmingly choosing the donors and you certainly have a picture of a cynical system run on cash.

CONTINUED w/links...

http://news.firedoglake.com/2015/01/21/taken-for-granted-at-davos-that-us-government-run-on-legalized-corruption/#at_pco=cfd-1.0&at_ab=-&at_pos=7&at_tot=8&at_si=54c5412562e4586b

You have heard about Davos, right?

[CrowCityDem]

18. The US was never the kind of democracy you're thinking of. Or any, actually. It's a republic.

[Octafish]

22. You really think that? You should learn about Jackson Stephens and BCCI.

An important client of attorney Hillary R. Clinton, Jackson Stephens and his private investment bank, Stephens Inc., were barely mentioned in the US news media.

From three days before Bill Clinton took office:

Clinton's Wealth Of Support An Arkansas Family Has Been A Backer, And A Source Of Controversy.

By Barbara Demick
PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER STAFF WRITER, January 17, 1993

EXCERPT...

Worthen is partly owned by the Stephens family, one of the richest in America. And the Stephens family, headed by oilman and investment banker Jackson Stephens, and its businesses did more than anyone to bankroll Clinton's political ascendancy.

Early in the game, the Stephenses raised $100,000 in Arkansas to get Clinton's candidacy up and running. Then last spring, when Clinton was trailing both George Bush and Ross Perot, Worthen Bank supplied the cash- starved campaign with a $3.5 million line of credit.

Jim Wells, a vice president in Merrill Lynch & Co.'s Memphis office, evokes a revealing aphorism about money and politics.

"Money is like rain. It is not just getting the rain, but when you get it that counts. And (the Stephens money) was like rain from heaven," he said.

"Nobody knows how influential Mr. Stephens will be in the next administration, but I would be surprised if his counsel isn't called on from time to time."

CONTINUED...

http://articles.philly.com/1993-01-17/news/25959645_1_worthen-bank-stephens-family-bill-clinton

And DU2 provides a nice overview of how BCCI comes in here...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=977792&mesg_id=985500

That was DU2 in 2004. People interested in learning more about how Big Money got to corrupt US politics via can catch up here:

The BCCI Affair

[cui bono]

42. So paying people to post online isn't bogus? Buying FB and Twitter followers isn't bogus?

You must have quite a low standard there.

You do know the difference between grass roots and astroturf, don't you? You know astroturf, that tactic that everyone on DU complained about and ridiculed when the GOP did it but that Hillary supporters will now defend when she employs it?



.

[amborin]

6. K&R thanks for posting this, Octafish!

[Octafish]

15. ASTROTURF: ''Hillary Clinton Fighting for America's Workers''

http://correctrecord.org/hillary-clinton-fighting-for-americas-workers/

Doesn't mention anywhere Walmart, the anti-union company for which she sat for six years as a member of the Board of Directors.

Clinton Remained Silent As Wal-Mart Fought Unions

ABC News, Jan. 31, 2008

In six years as a member of the Wal-Mart board of directors, between 1986 and 1992, Hillary Clinton remained silent as the world's largest retailer waged a major campaign against labor unions seeking to represent store workers.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=4218509&page=1

Believe it or not, I like Hillary. It's just that I'd like to see some Democracy restored to the Democratic Party -- and to ALL of the USA.

[FlatBaroque]

34. This IS the party of the Clinton's - No principles whatsoever.

[Major Hogwash]

38. Hillary Clinton is fighting to destroy the Middle Class.

Her policies impact the Middle Class more than the 1%, and even more than the poor.

It's easier to control the proletariat's that way.

[antigop]

8. Let me just add...

It doesn't even have to be nefarious.

Programmers make mistakes.

You don't know as a voter whether that program was written correctly or not. There is no way to verify whether that program is recording your vote correctly or not.

[Octafish]

28. Democracy should not depend on a power source -- whether AC/DC or $ only.

That's why hand-counted paper ballots are best. Ballots are marked with an X beside the name of the candidate the voter supports.

The reason for the machines was to speed up the process.

Today, even in off-year municipal elections, ballots have many offices and items up for consideration.

Remember the guy who created a combination of the two? Athan Gibbs found a way to tabulate votes electronically and then generate a paper ballot for the voter and the precinct records. He died when a semi-truck smashed his car against a guard rail.

Death of a patriot: No more

By Bob Fitrakis
March 17, 2004

The subject line on yesterday’s email read: “Another mysterious accident solves a Bush problem. Athan Gibbs dead, Diebold lives.” The attached news story briefly described the untimely Friday, March 12th death of perhaps America’s most influential advocate of a verified voting paper trail in the era of touch screen computer voting. Gibbs, an accountant for more than 30 years and the inventor of the TruVote system, died when his vehicle collided with an 18-wheeled truck which rolled his Chevy Blazer several times and forced it over the highway retaining wall where it came to rest on its roof.

Coincidence theorists will simply dismiss the death of Gibbs as a tragic accident – the same conclusion these coincidence theorists came to when anti-nuclear activist Karen Silkwood died in November 1974 when her car struck a concrete embankment en route to a meeting with New York Times reporter David Burnham. Prominent independent investigators concluded that Silkwood’s car was hit from behind and forced off the road. Silkwood was reportedly carrying documents that would expose illegal activities at the Kerr-McGee nuclear fuel plant. The FBI report found that she fell asleep at the wheel after overdosing on Quaaludes and that there never were any such files. A journalist secretly employed by the FBI, and a veteran of the Bureau’s COINTELPRO operation against political activists, provided testimony for the FBI report.

Gibbs’ death bears heightened scrutiny because of the way he lived his life after the 2000 Florida election debacle. I interviewed Athan Gibbs in January of this year. “I’ve been an accountant, an auditor, for more than thirty years. Electronic voting machines that don’t supply a paper trail go against every principle of accounting and auditing that’s being taught in American business schools,” he insisted.

SNIP...

Gibbs’ TruVote machine is a marvel. After voters touch the screen, a paper ballot prints out under plexiglass and once the voter compares it to his actual vote and approves it, the ballot drops into a lockbox and is issued a numbered receipt. The voter’s receipt allows the track his particular vote to make sure that it was transferred from the polling place to the election tabulation center.

My encounter with Gibbs led to a cover story in the Columbus Free Press March-April issue, entitled, “Diebold, electronic voting and the vast right-wing conspiracy.” The thesis I advanced in the Free Press article is that some of the same right-wing individuals who backed the CIA’s covert actions and overthrowing of democratic elections in the Third World in the 1980s are now involved in privatized touch screen voting. Additionally I co-wrote an article with Harvey Wasserman that was posted at MotherJones.com on March 5, 2004. Both articles outlined ties between far right elements of the Republican Party and Diebold and ES&S, which count the majority of the nation’s electronic votes.

CONTINUED...

http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2004/853

Thanks for standing up for Democracy. That is no mistake.

I, too, remember when this was what we talked about on DU. I didn't come in until the following year, after 9-11, but I read what was being posted about e-voting, The Supremos, and the main idea that is all too-clear now: You don't steal elections to do good things.

[hollysmom]

9. social media is always a joke, can I tell you how many online polls I"stuffed " by flushing cookies

these were meaningless polls not political polls, but voting for your favorite cookie types. some friends an I would form teams to see if we could make the polls change, for our own amusements, the people on other teams tried to force it their way. These polls were not going to change the world, we just wanted to see if we could do it. That is what happens when you join an "on line gang"/board for silliness. Also we tried to help friend's dog win a prettiest contest with no appreciable prize, heh. So easy to stuff the ballot box totally destroyed my belief in any on-line poll or vote.

We know you can buy twitter follower by the 10K, that can be googled. You can buy Youtube watchings, so many things.

and historically so many ways to buy votes.

[beachbumbob]

10. More sour grapes...funny how 2008 Hillary supporters were pulling all

The same tactics and antic....I know it's difficult when your candidate has lost

[Octafish]

29. Sour grapes? Millions tossed from their homes? Trillion$ for AIG, Goldman Sachs, UBS and who else?

Tell me about it.

US Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner sacrificed homeowners to ''Foam the Runway'' for the Banks.

&t=0

TARP Inspector General Neil Barofsky: 'Geithner Admitted To Us Privately That Obama's Housing Policy Was DESIGNED To Sacrifice Homeowners In Order To "FOAM THE RUNWAY" For The Banks'

SOURCE: http://dailybail.com/home/barofsky-geithner-admitted-to-us-privately-that-obamas-housi.html

10 Million Americans lost their homes.

http://www.alternet.org/investigations/10-million-americans-foreclosed-neighborhoods-devastated

[antigop]

12. hey, Octafish...I always know you've hit the nail on the head when... nt

[Octafish]

30. Events on the other side of the globe can have a major impact on energy prices, citizen.

Depending on who your friends are, the bigger the impact, if you know what I mean.

Take Frank Giustra. From his association with a former president, Frank got a great deal in Kazakhstan:

After Mining Deal, Financier Donated to Clinton

By JO BECKER and DON VAN NATTA Jr.
The New York Times, JAN. 31, 2008

EXCERPT...

Upon landing on the first stop of a three-country philanthropic tour, the two men were whisked off to share a sumptuous midnight banquet with Kazakhstan’s president, Nursultan A. Nazarbayev, whose 19-year stranglehold on the country has all but quashed political dissent.

Mr. Nazarbayev walked away from the table with a propaganda coup, after Mr. Clinton expressed enthusiastic support for the Kazakh leader’s bid to head an international organization that monitors elections and supports democracy. Mr. Clinton’s public declaration undercut both American foreign policy and sharp criticism of Kazakhstan’s poor human rights record by, among others, Mr. Clinton’s wife, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.

Within two days, corporate records show that Mr. Giustra also came up a winner when his company signed preliminary agreements giving it the right to buy into three uranium projects controlled by Kazakhstan’s state-owned uranium agency, Kazatomprom.

The monster deal stunned the mining industry, turning an unknown shell company into one of the world’s largest uranium producers in a transaction ultimately worth tens of millions of dollars to Mr. Giustra, analysts said.

SNIP...

Mr. Giustra foresaw a bull market in gold and began investing in mines in Argentina, Australia and Mexico. He turned a $20 million shell company into a powerhouse that, after a $2.4 billion merger with Goldcorp Inc., became Canada’s second-largest gold company.

CONTINUED...

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/31/us/politics/31donor.html

Before then, from his association as the son of vice president and future president George Herbert Walker Poppy Doc Bush, George Walker Baby Doc Bush got a great deal in Bahrain.

Harken Energy And Insider Trading

by Stephen Pizzo
Mother Jones, September / October 1992

EXCERPT...

Harken Energy was formed in l973 by two oilmen who would benefit from a successful covert effort to destabilize Australia's Labor Party government (which had attempted to shut out foreign oil exploration). A decade later, Harken was sold to a new investment group headed by New York attorney Alan G. Quasha, a partner in the firm of Quasha, Wessely & Schneider. Quasha's father, a powerful attorney in the Philippines, had been a staunch supporter of then-president Ferdinand Marcos. William Quasha had also given legal advice to two top officials of the notorious Nugan Hand Bank in Australia, a CIA operation.

After the sale of Harken Energy in 1983, Alan Quasha became a director and chairman of the board. Under Quasha, Harken suddenly absorbed Junior's struggling Spectrum 7 in 1986. The merger immediately opened a financial horn of plenty and reversed Junior's fortunes. But like his brother Jeb, Junior seemed unconcerned about the characters who were becoming his benefactors. Harken's $25 million stock offering in 1987, for example, was underwritten by a Little Rock, Arkansas, brokerage house, Stephens, Inc., which placed the Harken stock offering with the London subsidiary of Union Bank -- a bank that had surfaced in the scandal that resulted in the downfall of the Australian Labor government in 1976 and, later, in the Nugan Hand Bank scandal. (It was also Union Bank, according to congressional hearings on international money laundering, that helped the now-notorious Bank of Credit and Commerce International skirt Panamanian money-laundering laws by flying cash out of the country in private jets, and that was used by Ferdinand Marcos to stash 325 tons of Philippine gold around the world.)

SNIP...

Suddenly, in January 1990, Harken Energy became the talk of the Texas oil industry. The company with no offshore-oil-drilling experience beat out a more-established international conglomerate, Amoco, in bagging the exclusive contract to drill in a promising new offshore oil field for the Persian Gulf nation of Bahrain. The deal had been arranged for Harken by two former Stephens, Inc., brokers. A company insider claims the president's son did not initiate the deal -- but feels that his presence in the firm helped with the Bahrainis. "Hell, that's why he's on the damn board," the insider says. "...You say, 'By the way, the president's son sits on our board.' You use that. There's nothing wrong with that."

Junior has told acquaintances conflicting stories about his own involvement in the deal. He first claimed that he had "recused" himself from the deal; "George said he left the room when Bahrain was being discussed 'because we can't even have the appearance of having anything to do with the government.' He was into a big rant about how unfair it was to be the president's son. He said, 'I was so scrupulous I was never in the room when it was discussed.'"

Junior alternately claimed, to reporters for the Wall Street Journal and D Magazine, that he had opposed the arrangement. But the company insider says, to the contrary, that Junior was excited about the Bahrain deal. "Like any member of the board, he was thrilled," the associate says. "His attitude was, 'Holy shit, what a great deal!'"

CONTINUED...

http://www.georgewalkerbush.net/harkenenergyandinsidertrading.htm

The parallels are an illusion, citizen. The lines are unequal length, depending on your precinct.

[JaneyVee]

14. 10 Million voters so far.

[Octafish]

32. So if she's so popular, why does Hillary's campaign have to pay millions for Facebook Friends, etc.?

And if this story had never seen the light of day, would the online community supporting Hillary's campaign admit the practice -- or admit being paid to do so?

[7wo7rees]

17. Octafish, you are amazingly awesome. Tks. nt

[tex-wyo-dem]

19. Thanks for the post, Octafish...

As always, if there's a way to manipulate public perception to keep the status quo gravy train rolling, they will do it.

It all boils down to $$$ in the end... Screw the People.

[Hydra]

24. K&R Octa

Sad to see so much paid for support for evil policies.

[bbgrunt]

25. K and R!

[liberal from boston]

26. Social Media

A big Thank You Octafish!!!

[haikugal]

31. You rule Octafish! Thanks!

[bobthedrummer]

36. Whenever confronted by the truth that is so adverse to the Clinton campaign, or the Clinton family

and its "star-studded" donor network-the SOP is to attack and discredit the source, which many of US are immune to, finally. As you and I and others now know so well, Sir, these tactics are much less effective after years of being employed post-9/11 by the BFEE-which was installed in office not elected (that's a coup in my book).

So after years and years of being messed with by "the best" many of US didn't "die like the rest" (literally in my case-figuratively for others). Since that was IRL it is "small potatoes" here on DU in 2016 for so many of US "vets" of the information wars that have adapted and evolved over time The truth is spoken loud and clear in your OP subjectline, Sir! K&R

Hillary Clinton campaign issues online rebuttal of Clinton Cash criticisms (Sabrina Siddiqui May 6, 2015 Guardian)
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/06/hillary-clinton-campaign-online-rebuttal-book-family-charity

The Clinton's controversial foundation (The Week June 2015)
http://www.theweek.com/articles/562566/clintons-controversial-foundation

It's Al From's Democratic Party, the rest of us just live here. The takeover. (madfloridian DU 9-22-2015)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10027191121

Semper Fidelis!

[dreamnightwind]

37. Thanks, excellent OP and all of your posts down-thread

You're on a roll! Now if we can only figure out how to get information that discredits entrenched positions to replace those positions. Anyway you have outdone yourself in this thread, greatly appreciated.

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

39. K&R. Good stuff!!! Keep it up.

[vintx]

40. When it came out she was paying people to post in support of her

I figured the rest of this would come out.

She's astroturfing Twitter like crazy.

Corporations know how to market their brands.

[Uncle Joe]

41. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, Octafish.

[AmBlue]

43. SAVED for posterity...

KICKED for visibility, RECOMMENDED to all who care about true democracy, and SHARED with everyone I know who needs an unvarnished TRUTH lesson. This is such an important post and follow-up.

Thank you, OCTAFISH!!!!

[seafan]

44. You are The Man, Octafish.

Truth.


And Hillary Clinton's support base is also as bogus as that September 11 "report" we've been fed for years, in addition to George W. Bush's imperialistic war on Iraq that she and the rest of the militaristic hawks and sniveling cowards voted for.


As I noted in that thread, and I'll repost here, because, for me, it is clearer every day that passes:

Octafish, I don't know exactly where I was when I first figured out that we, the people, have been had, and had for many decades. Was it the Election 2000 debacle in Florida?

Was it during the duplicity, scandal, false feel-goodism and systematic deterioration of Democratic ideals during the Clinton years of the 1990s?

Was it during Poppy Bush's invasion of Iraq in the early 1990s, killing many thousands of Iraqis, and leading to Dim Son's next invasion of Iraq in 2003, followed by the primal scream of watching another Bush trying to buy his way into power in 2016?

Was it watching the snakes slither away from Iran-Contra crimes, as Poppy pardoned the bunch on Christmas Eve, 1992?

Was it during the murderous years of Reagan in the 80s?

Was it watching the textile mills close down in the South and shipping all those jobs to faraway lands, and forcing many of our southern families into abject poverty?

Was it during the darkness of the Nixon/Viet Nam era?

Was it during the horror and sorrow of losing John F. Kennedy in 1963?


I don't know any more. All I know now is that we probably have one more chance to get back onto the right path to survival into history, and that is to propel Bernie Sanders into power.


Octafish, for the past decade and a half here, you've been slicing and dicing the BFEE, and unearthing the Truth for all of us here, and your efforts to inform have spread farther than you know. 'Thank you' just seems inadequate. But, again, thank you.

You are a friend to us all.