Abramoff's ‘Wicked Witch’ targeted over a dinner in Waikiki

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‘Wicked Witch’ targeted over a dinner in Waikiki
By Kevin Bogardus and Mike Soraghan
December 05, 2007

Jack Abramoff called her the Wicked Witch of the West. “WWW” for short in his e-mails. And he wanted to burn her.

Joan Plaisted, a career foreign service officer, was ambassador to the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) in 1998, when the island nation hired Abramoff and his firm to battle the United States on a multibillion-dollar aid agreement.

Over dinner at a hotel overlooking Honolulu’s Waikiki Beach, his new clients dished out gossip on Plaisted. She wore a revealing dress to a Halloween soiree, they told him. She brought a bottle of wine to a party and didn’t share.

“She’s a disgrace to the United States government,” Abramoff declared, according to an attendee. “And I’m going to do something about it.”

That started a remarkable lobbying campaign to persuade members of Congress to discredit a U.S. diplomat by way of speeches on the floor of the House of Representatives.

Foreign service experts said it would have been an unprecedented public attack on a diplomat serving overseas. The campaign was ultimately scuttled when the republic’s president, Imata Kabua, canceled a 1999 visit that was to coincide with the denunciations.

But the hard charge at Plaisted wasn’t the only way Abramoff’s work for RMI pushed the lobbying envelope.

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http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/wicked-witch-targeted-over-a-dinner-in-waikiki-2007-12-05.html