Why did Bill Clinton deny meeting Kazakh officials in the Clintons' home:

[ProSense]

Bill in Central Asia

There's been a long stream of mildly eyebrow-raising stories about Bill Clinton's life in and near the private sector, but today's Times piece feels a bit different, with its doses of uranium mining and autocracy.

<...>

Also, part of the story takes place the month Hillary entered the race:

Both Mr. Clinton and Mr. Giustra at first denied that any such meeting occurred. Mr. Giustra also denied ever arranging for Kazakh officials to meet with Mr. Clinton. Wednesday, after The Times told them that others said a meeting, in Mr. Clinton’s home, had in fact taken place, both men acknowledged it.

“You are correct that I asked the president to meet with the head of Kazatomprom,” Mr. Giustra said. “Mr. Dzhakishev asked me in February 2007 to set up a meeting with former President Clinton to discuss the future of the nuclear energy industry.” Mr. Giustra said the meeting “escaped my memory until you raised it.”

Wednesday, Mr. Clinton’s spokesman, Ben Yarrow, issued what he called a “correction,” saying: “Today, Mr. Giustra told our office that in February 2007, he brought Mr. Dzhakishev from Kazatomprom to meet with President Clinton to discuss the future of nuclear energy.”

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edited title

[Nimrod2005]

1. Liar?

[SteppingRazor]

2. Oh, c'mon. Clinton was just sewing up the Kazakh vote.

:P

[Occam Bandage]

3. Hm...slumlord or maniacal dictator? Which is more "baggage?"

[madrchsod]

5. crooked chicagoan trumps a brutal dictator any day

[Tom Rinaldo]

9. If you frame the queston that way

A slum lord hands down. The world is full of "maniacal dictators" and as long as they don't directly threaten the U.S. very few Americans care about them. Nazarbayev is hardly anti-American and Russian President Putin is increasingly moving toward being every bit as much of a "maniacal dictator" as Nazarbayev. Yet Americans don't expect our leaders to have nothing to do with Putin. Now slum lords, those Americans know about and care about and understand how they screw average Americans.

[blm]

10. Hey - Rezko caused 9-11 and war. Oops...no...that was Jackson Stephens

So what political careers did Jackson Stephens BANKROLL? Only Poppy Bush and Bill Clinton. I wonder what he got for it?

Hey - what DID Clinton do with that BCCI report he was handed when he took office?

[madrchsod]

4. what did hillary know and when did she know it

i`m bad...don`t ask questions about the clintons. it`s obama and rezko that needs to be discussed everyday because...you know..it`s a several thousands of dollars while the clintons maybe in the tens millions.

you should refrain from questioning the next president of the united states

[papau]

14. What did Barack's wife know and when did she know it (Mrs. Barack is a director of Dean Foods)

A group of small dairy farmers in the southeast U.S. have filed a lawsuit against Dean Foods Co. accusing the company of price fixing. Dean is the largest distributor of milk in the country, and the largest distributor of organic milk in the country through Horizon Organics. The farmers claim that Dean used its influence and multistate network of milk cooperatives to run a monopoly. The farmers in the lawsuit are asking for class-action status, which would allow other regional farmers to join in the case.

-- Organic Consumers Association, 07/11/2007
Source URL: www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_6108.cfm

In 2003 two shareholders filed lawsuits against Dean Foods and Horizon Organic Holding Corp. alleging that Dean paid too little for an agreement to acquire the company. The lawsuits, which seek class-action status, also charge that the companies didn't meet their legal obligation to look after the interests of Horizon Organic shareholders. Executives of the companies said the lawsuits were without merit. Dean Foods settled with the shareholders in May 2007.

-- Oakbridge Insurance Services, 05/10/2007
Source URL: dandodiary.blogspot.com/2007/05/more-options-backdating-lawsuit.html

For the second year in a row, shareholders have filed a proposal asking Dean Foods Co. to report to shareholders how it is responding to widespread concern that industrial-scale organic dairies, which supply milk for its Horizon Organic brand, violate consumer trust, seriously jeopardizing share value. Dean Foods has appealled to the SEC for the authority to prevent its shareholders from voting on the proposal.

-- Natural Newswire, 03/26/2007
Source URL: www.naturalnewswire.com/2007/03/investors_conti.html

In 2006, Chairman and CEO Gregg L. Engles earned $11 million in compensation from Dean Foods. This is equivalent to earning $212,028 per week.

-- AFL-CIO, 04/05/2006
Source URL: www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch/ceou/database.cfm?tkr=DF&pg=6

In November 2004 Dean Foods paid a $400,000 civil penalty to settle Securities and Exchange Commission allegations that it may have aided the Fleming Companies to alter revenue statements in order to look like inflated profits. John D. Robinson, a senior executive for Dean Foods, had to pay a $50,000 civil penalty.

-- U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, 09/14/2004
Source URL: www.sec.gov/news/press/2004-129.htm

Human Rights

In July 2001 seven former and current workers at an Dean Foods dairy in California have filed a lawsuit against the company claiming it failed to protect them from alleged workplace harassment by fellow employees, who they say hung nooses and scrawled Confederate flags, swastikas and KKK graffiti. The workers say that Dean Foods either ignored the complaints or dismissed them. The suit demands unspecified money damages for the racist incidents which date from 1993 until May, 2000 when the workers say that the plant superintendent told them that nooses "are an old Southern custom." Dean Foods and the plaintiffs agreed to a settlement of $3.3 million in February 2003.

-- U.S. District Court, 06/11/2007
Source URL: none available

Dean Foods scored 73 out of 100 on the Human Rights Campaign's 2006 Corporate Equality Index. The Corporate Equality Index is a tool to measure how equitably companies are treating their gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender employees, consumers and investors.

-- Human Rights Campaign, 09/18/2006
Source URL: www.hrc.org/Content/ContentGroups/Publications1/Corporate_Equality_Ind...

Dean Foods refused to acknowledge same-sex marriage licenses issued in San Franciso. Requests by employees seeking to add partners to their health care plans were denied.

-- San Francisco Gate, 04/06/2004

[madrchsod]

18. no she is not a director of dean foods and she never was

"In 2005, Dean Specialty Foods Group, LLC was spun off from Dean Foods and became Bay Valley Foods, a division of TreeHouse Foods, Inc. TreeHouse, now an independent and publicly traded company, is led by Sam Reed and a team of seasoned food executives who were largely responsible for the tremendous growth at Keebler in the 90s"

http://www.bayvalleyfoods.com/
Bay Valley Foods - Welcome


http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=191105&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=765470&highlight=
TreeHouse Foods - Press Releases 2001


Michelle Obama joined the Board of Directors of TreeHouse Foods in June 2005, shortly after the company was spun off its parent company, Dean Foods

[Clintonite]

6. This is news?!?! Your'e trying to hard.

[ProSense]

7. No, you're right. Bill lying isn't news, just this lie. n/t

[FrenchieCat]

8. Hahahaha!

We Know why!

[Rageneau]

11. This is just another NY(w)T hit piece that attempts to smear Clinton.

Careful readers with reading-for-comprehension scores of 7th grade or above (after clearing their minds of resentment and prejudice) will realize that Clinton is accused of nothing improper anywhere in this story, even though it is written to imply as strongly as possible that he did something unethical, immoral, wrong.

When read carefully, the most Clinton can be accused of in this story is of taking advantage of a multimillionaire's free airplane to fly to remote places to try to get donations to charity.

CHARITY!

Clinton knew the score, but he did nothing overt to affect any dealings. Everyone involved (except the NY(w)T and the Clinton-haters) say his presence had nothing to do with the final decision, and even this biased story makes it clear that he did all this "scheming" not to benefit himself, but the sick and dying. What a scumbag, eh?

So Clinton praised the high mucky-muck of Whocaresistan when he said, "I'm going to start working for democracy and fair elections." What is Clinton supposed to say ti=o that? -- "I wish you wouldn't"?

So Clinton now admits to a meeting at his home -- implying he had lied before. Bullshit! Again, the New York whore Times is not interested in the truth -- which is that AFTER this visit to Whocaresistan, at some LATER date, back in the USA, Giustra called up Bill and asked if he could bring this nuclear guy from that country to discuss policy, and Bill -- who is concerned about worldwide nuclear proliferation (as any good person should be) -- said, "Sure."

IOW, there were two meetings. The first one -- overseas -- had nothing to do with uranium and nuclear issues. The second one -- in the US -- was a casual, hastily arranged one that Clinton received zero remuneration for. The NY(w)T is trying to mislead its readers into thinking Clinton has been caught lying and pandering for money here, when the truth is, all he did was extend himself at great personal expense to attempt to do what Jesus tells us ALL to do.

And because of Clinton-hatred and the evil desire to quickly convict him of everything his enemies accuse him of, the NY(w)Times manages to accomplish its slander, convincing even ostensible Democrats, ostensible liberals, ostensible fair-minded people here at DU that Clinton is a bad guy.
When the truth is, he is a much better human than most of us will ever be.

[alcibiades_mystery]

12. Oy, vey

So Clinton praised the high mucky-muck of Whocaresistan when he said, "I'm going to start working for democracy and fair elections." What is Clinton supposed to say ti=o that? -- "I wish you wouldn't"?

Yeah, that's all it is. The suggestion - and I agree that it is only a suggestion at this point - is that Clinton helped solved Nazarbayev (Whocaresistan isn't "Whocaresistan" for people living under his regime) international human rights problem by giving his obviously anti-democratic regime a thumbs up, in exchange for mining contracts for his buddy Giustra.

now, you can dispute that suggestion (and I wish you would), but portraying it as merely a "so what" is pretty despicable. Your correct move is to show that it's not true, not that's no big deal for a former President to sell his human rights evaluations to dictators as part of a contract bid. That's not so good.

[ProSense]

15. Really, so bill always conducts his charitable work

in a meeting at his home, which he disguises as a discussion about nuclear energy, and then lies, pretending it never happened?

Yeah, right: Bill is the victim!

[KittyWampus]

13. why won't they release their tax returns? Did they profit illegally from this as well?

[agdlp]

16. Factcheck and debunking New York Times Story on Clinton and Frank Giustra

No matter how much conjecture and innuendo is thrown around, it does not change the simple fact that former President Clinton had no involvement in Frank Giustra's business dealings in Kazakhstan.

In fact, the only agreement he signed in Kazakhstan during his 6 hour visit was to allow that country to purchase lower-cost medicine to fight AIDS through the Clinton Foundation's HIV/AIDS Initiative.

As a number of journalists who have joined President Clinton on his Foundation trips around the world can attest, he frequently travels to countries where the Foundation is working to combat AIDS and improve the lives of people in the developing world.

Indeed, the fact that President Clinton traveled to Kazakhstan on Frank Giustra's plane, and the visit itself, was reported by Esquire magazine in December, 2005



Regarding Frank Giustra's philanthropic support for the Clinton Foundation:



Regarding President Clinton's meeting with the head of Kazakhstan state uranium company:



Regarding President Clinton's reported remarks about President Nazarbayev and Kazakhstan's effort to head the Organization of Security and Cooperation in Europe:



Regarding President Clinton's letter to President Nazarbayev:




Regarding President Nazarbayev's invitation to CGI:



source: http://facts.hillaryhub.com/

[rucky]

17. Maybe it was really Sacha Cohen?

:shrug:

[Igel]

19. I saw that paragraph, too (but in the original source, the NYT).

And I found it bewildering.

On the one hand, you have the quote from the article: 'Both Mr. Clinton and Mr. Giustra at first denied that any such meeting occurred." ' The only inference is that the reporter spoke to Mr. Clinton and that Mr. Clinton personally responded. After all, the article is addressing Bill Clinton's veracity, not that of some intermediary.

But then the article continues, and after a few paragraphs the reporter leaves the contrary implication, that Bill Clinton hadn't actually said anything himself.

'Wednesday, Mr. Clinton’s spokesman, Ben Yarrow, issued what he called a “correction,” saying: “Today, Mr. Giustra told our office that in February 2007, he brought Mr. Dzhakishev from Kazatomprom to meet with President Clinton to discuss the future of nuclear energy.”

'Mr. Yarrow said his earlier denial was based on the former president’s records, which he said “show a Feb. 27 meeting with Mr. Giustra; no other attendees are listed.” '

Now, 'Mr. Yarrow said his earlier denial' is a bit ambiguous. But if you take 'his' to mean 'Clinton's', you're in a bit of a bind because then you have 'the former president' later in the sentence. It forces 'his' to corefer with 'Mr. Yarrow' and makes the reading that 'his' = 'Clinton's' ungrammatical for most English speakers. For that reading, you'd want, "Mr. Yarrow said the former president's denial was based on his records...."--slightly ambiguous, but ungrammatical for nobody.

From that I infer that the reporter was attributing to Clinton what Yarrow said, and playing up Yarrow's mistake as wilful falsehood on the part of Clinton.