McCain's Tie to Lobbyists with Tainted Money Continue

We all know the phrase; "The more I look, the worse it gets". Well, this is exactly what continues to be my comment as I look further into Senator John McCain and his political background. Yes, he may be running for president based on his so called "experience", but that experience may also mean having a background in areas that he wouldn't want the public to know much about in today's campaign.

Everyone already knows about McCain's close relationship with his #1 political advisor and his election campaign co-chair, former US Senator, Phil Gramm. And we now know that it was Gramm, through his deregulation efforts, that opened up the loopholes of the regulations in home mortgages that allowed for the multibillion-dollar subprime mortgage meltdown. However, have the revelations about Gramm's efforts in such a major international financial debacle caused Mr. Gramm to be avoided within the political & financial community? Hardly. Phil Gramm is currently being well compensated as a Swiss bank executive and he regularly advises the Republican party on world banking and economic matters. His name is also being mentioned by the McCain campaign as a possible US Treasury Secretary, should McCain win in November. So goes the normal business-as-usual situation within the McCain campaign.

It is also known that John McCain is totally surrounded by Washington lobbyists in his campaign and his personal life. (By the way, the term "Lobbyist" was originally coined by US President, Ulysses S. Grant. It was originally given to the fundraisers that loitered in the large lobby of Washington's Willard Hotel, where they could "work" the politicians that frequented the local hotel.) In fact, it is well known that McCain currently has 59 registered lobbyist working for his campaign. The lobbyists represent a wide range of industries including; banking and finance, telecommunications, technology, military and aerospace and healthcare / pharmaceuticals.

Within the Washington elite, McCain is known as "The Champion" among those politicians that make use of lobbyist money for financing their political activities. I personally find this very disturbing, especially since Senator John McCain was years ago, also designated as one of the infamous Keating Five. These were the five United States Senators accused of corruption in the savings and loan scandal. A national corruption investigation ignited a major political scandal that became a part of the larger US Savings and Loan crisis of the late 1980s. One would hope that after fighting hard to redeem himself from this high-profile scandal, McCain would have the sense and the good judgment to avoid the taint of impropriety that his current lobbyist relationships offer. Obviously, his judgment hasn't improved and he has learned little from his past "experiences".

But even with all of this negative background, there is still yet another area in campaign finance that puts a dark shadow on John McCain and his politics.

McCain's Washington DC, "K Street" connections, (The street in the US capital known for where many of the key lobbyist office's are located.), have caused major problems with McCain's campaign since it began for the 2008 election. In April of this year, five previous lobbyists, representing countries such as Saudi Arabia to Burma and companies such as Blackwater and the Iraqi exile, Ahmad Chalabi, have had to leave McCain's campaign. But this was only the beginning of what will inevitably continue until this November.

A Little History Lesson:

In 2001, after McCain's failed campaign against George W. Bush for the 2000 Republican nomination, McCain began what he called a "non-partisan election reform organization". McCain named this new group the "Reform Institute".

As time has shown, the "Reform Institute" has become anything but an independent, "non-partisan" organization. And as was stated by Mr. Robert Crane of the JEHT Foundation, a New York social justice foundation, "We were originally a funder of the Reform Institute. But [we withdrew when] the organization had grown to mainly become a John McCain "protection agency".

The Reform Institute pays John McCain to give speeches and host town hall meetings. It touts McCain in press releases and cultivates his donor list. The Institute is housed in the same office building as McCain's Political Action Committee (PAC) and his re-election committee. Rick Davis, chief advisor and campaign chairman, (and previous lobbyist),the "Davis" lobby firm is also located in the same building. Mr. Davis is the Reform Institute's President, and the organization's staff includes McCain's chief fund raiser, Carla Eudy and his Internet Consultant, Rebecca Donatelli. The organization was incorporated by McCain's counsel, Trevor Potter, with seed money from former Merrill Lynch CEO, Herb Allison. (Allison was McCain's finance chairman in 2000.) Davis was paid $395,000 for his work of 3 years and Eudy was paid paid $295,000 as a consultant and treasurer. The Institute also paid McCain policy advisor, John Raidt, $145,000 for his efforts in 2006.

A "non-partisan" organization? I think not.

As a 501c3, non-profit organization, the Reform Institute can receive unlimited tax deductible contributions that McCain's PAC and re-election campaign could not. Two, long-time California businessmen have donated $50,000 each to the Institute. According to the Citizens for Responsibility & Ethics in Washington DC, the largest donors gave $305,985 to McCain and his PAC's. But other donors realized that it could be beneficial to donate to McCain through the institute which didn't limit the amount of the donation.

With Davis (the lobbyist) as McCain's election chairman, Verizion paid Davis $640,000 in lobbying fees. (I find it interesting that the lobby fee started when McCain took the co-chairmanship of the Senate Commerce Committee and the fee ended when McCain gave up the chairmanship.) Davis also solicited $100,000 from Cablevision after its CEO testified before McCain's Senate committee and McCain had written letters to the FCC on Cablevision's behalf.

There are many other issues that have been brought to light regarding McCain's "Institute" and how it supported the rise of the 527 political advocacy groups (i.e: Swiftboaters for Freedom, etc.), and its relationship to the scandals involving Tom DeLay, as well as Jack Abramoff and the Indian tribe casinos. When reviewing the Institute's members and donors, it continues to look like a list of "who I wouldn't want to be identified with".

John McCain, the previous "Champion of Election Finance Reform" has now become the one that is abandoning all campaign finance reform and is running away from it as fast as he can. Unfortunately, the mainstream-media continues to still go easy on McCain. Even though Barack Obama has received a lot of negative flak for opting out of public financing for his election campaign, his reasons are at least explainable and not that unreasonable. But we never hear much about the fact that McCain made a similar move during his primary campaign.

When McCain's campaign went broke, he then secured favorable financing and he promised that he would take matching public financing, which he has since backed out of doing. But we never hear the media talk about that move by McCain.

It is ironic that after the Keating Five scandal, McCain became so dedicated and was the symbol for supporting and carrying the flag for campaign finance reform. He even named his institute after his passion. Now the "Reform Institute" is the symbol of partisan, political lobbying and has gone 180 degrees away from its original purpose. Yep, it's pretty ironic and it's very sad that he's allowed this good cause to now be headed in the wrong direction.