Hillary Is Tainted By Money From Northern Marianas Islands Sweatshops (where women are enslaved)

KittyWampus

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Fri Mar-07-08 05:20 PM
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Hillary Is Tainted By Money From Northern Marianas Islands Sweatshops (where women are enslaved)

Edited on Fri Mar-07-08 05:41 PM by cryingshame

Abramoff�s shadow falls on 2008 Presidential Election.

The Culture of Corruption still fuels the Republican Party. Candidate after candidate lives in the fear of Jack Abramoff�s shadow. They live in the fear that their ties to the scandal will become known.

I�ve been working to make sure that those connections and those stories are uncovered, shared and make their way into the narrative of 2008.

The list is growing. I�ve been talking with some campaigns (and invite others to get in touch). In 2006 we defeated 20 of the Abramoff 65. Of the survivors, most are still on the list for 2008.

They are being joined others.

Three are running for President. Unfortunately, one of them is a Democrat.

Of them all, John McCain is the worst. His Cover-up of the Abramoff scandal is a crime against America. I recently wrote about this in a Dairy (Jack Abramoff: John McCain�s other Lobbyist problem...). See link for details on McCain

Next is Nader- tenuous link at best. See link for details on Nader

Senator Clinton is another matter.

In 1995 she was at a fundraiser on Guam and took $25,000 from the Tan Family for the DNC. It was a mini-scandal at the time and it waits in the wings for the press and the GOP to resurrect if she becomes our nominee.

The Hong Kong based Tan Family is behind most of the worst labor violations and corruption on the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), a US Territory 40 miles north of Guam. Accepting their money ties Senator Clinton to that corruption.

Those who dig a little deeper know about the deep ties between the Republican Party and the Tan Family. They know about more than $250,000 in recorded donations to Republican candidates from Tan Family members, employees and companies between 1996 and 2004. They know about the $223,679 paid by the Tan Family to help Jack maintain his multiple sports arena skyboxes in 2000.

Then there are the funds buried and barely reported that moved from the Tan Family through the Abramoff/DeLay network, such as $1.4 million from the Rose Garden Holding Co. (http://www.dccc.org/stakeholder/archives/004226.html ) and the $2.35 million that flowed through the Tan Family controlled Western Pacific Economic Council.

One could also safely include the $620,000 from the Saipan Garment Manufacturers Association and I firmly believe that the Tan Family was the driving force behind the CNMI Government sending Jack another $8,471,131. And then there is the very odd story of an address in Hong Kong that was used by Team Abramoff, the "Baby Jacks" (like the Alexander Strategy Group) and several other members of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy as a money drop and House of scandal.

The rough total that the Tan Family moved for the GOP through their bagman, Jack Abramoff was over $13.25 million. They used much of this money to fund off-the-books operations like New Hampshire phone jamming and other operations designed to rig elections, "elect" Republicans and support the effort to establish one-Party rule in the USA.

And that is just the surface of what is known.

In 1992, the Tan Family received the largest fine in US Labor Department history, $9 million, for their sweatshops�and it came from the Bush I Administration. The Family�s sweatshops were fined another $1.3 million for other violations (Sweating it out in Saipan is a good overview of the company from the Hong Kong Standard).

When they gave Hillary Clinton $25,000 of soft money in 1995, they were already working with Abramoff. They were trying to get sweatshops established on Guam. After the scandal broke in the press, the Clinton Administration shut down the effort to allow CNMI style sweatshops on Guam. Bill Clinton had been burned by the Tan Family and from that moment, his administration fought to end the abuse on the CNMI. The effort failed in the "noise" of the Impeachment/Ken Starr follies (another Abramoff triumph).

You would think that the Clintons would know exactly who the Tan Family were and why one should avoid them as donors�especially after the Abramoff scandal broke and the Family was mentioned over and over and over again as key players in the bad doings of Jack and his team.

And yet, in 2005, Senator Clinton accepted $10,000 from these well-known sweatshop owners and patrons of Jack Abramoff.

Here is the dirty cash that ties Senator Clinton to sweatshops, labor abuse and Jack Abramoff:

KIM LAM, PEK, Homemaker; 9/30/2005; $2,000
TAN, JOISE, N/A/Homemaker; 10/2/2005; $2,000
TAN, RAYMOND, Luen Thai/President; 9/30/2005; $2,000
TAN, SIU L, Tan Holdings Corp./Chairman; 9/30/2005; $2,000
TAN, WILLIE, Luen Thai/COO; 9/30/2005; $2,000

This is corrupt and dirty money that the Tan Family earned through sweatshops and human trafficking, but there is more.

A few years ago, the Tan Family created a multi-national Corporation, Luen Thai to expand the reach of their business and give it a patina of respectability. They specialize in helping brands "outsource" their textile manufacturing for profits.

The head of Luen Thai USA is a fellow named Richard Helfenbein. Along with his family, he has added another $16,000 of Tan Family money to Senator Clinton�s campaigns.

If I found ANY Republican with these solid connections to the Tan Family, they would be high on the list of the Abramoff connected in any election year. I have never seen the Tan Family give a donation without the expectation of a return on their "investment". Perhaps Senator Clinton is the exception to the rule�but my research has led me to doubt it.

And that places me in a dilemma.

What if she becomes the Nominee of the Democratic Party?

Do I sweep her connection to the corruption under the rug? Shall I pretend not to see it?

I have asked her various campaigns to return or explain this money for almost two years. They do not care�not about this money and not about the victims still suffering on the CNMI. These workers and women are invisible to her.

But she is not alone; they are invisible to most of America. But most American�s have an excuse not to know about the CNMI, Senator Clinton does not.

I hope Barack Obama will become our Nominee. It would be nice to go into November with a Nominee free of Jack Abramoff�s shadow. He can take McCain to task for the Abramoff cover-up and challenge his life-long history of situational "ethics".

Senator Clinton can not.

I wish that Senator Clinton did not have the sweatshop tainted cash. I wish she was not the only Democrat to get money from a Family that moved millions of off-the-books dollars to the GOP through Jack Abramoff.

I wish it was not true, but it is.

As I compile the list of 2008 Candidates connected to Abramoff, I would like to have a Democrat-free list. If Senator Clinton is our Nominee, the list will be a lot of Republicans and one Democrat.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/3/4/1851/49069/460/468395