The McCain campaign is strongly denying the paper's reporting that in 2005, a White House National Security Council staffer called John McCain's Senate office to complain that [McCain campaign manager] Rick Davis' lobbying firm was "undercutting American policy on Ukraine" by representing a Kremlin-backed politician....
The story also raises the possibility that Davis' firm may have violated the anti-espionage Foreign Agents Registration Act, by failing to register work for Yanukovich with the U.S. government....
If the account of the NSC staffer's call is true, it suggests McCain should have known about the work by Davis' business -- but installed him as campaign manager anyway.
"We don't need any lectures from a campaign that waited fifteen months to purge the lobbyists from their staff, and only did so because they said it was a 'perception problem. It's too bad their campaign is still rife with lobbyist influence and doesn't see a similar 'perception problem' with the man currently running their own vice presidential selection process, a prominent DC lobbyist whose firm has represented Exxon and a top Enron executive, or their campaign chair and John McCain's top economic adviser Carly Fiorina, who presided over thousands of layoffs at Hewlett Packard while receiving a $21 million severance package and $650,000 in mortgage assistance," said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.
How is Gramm still involved in McCain's campaign? How many more scandals is McCain going to ignore before he pulls the plug on this guy? Not so surprisingly, the so-called liberal media somehow failed to mention that Phil Gramm is McCain's campaign co-chair and rumored choice for Treasury secretary when they wrote the story about the latest problems at UBS.
So much for McCain's big talk about change. It's business as usual, including yet another banking scandal right under his nose.
For those not familiar with the former Senator turned wealthy lobbyist and McCain for President co-chair, this is a must read article. Phil Gramm has played an important role in a number of failed initiatives including the S&L failure, the energy deregulation fallout and Enron, and more recently the subprime mortgage meltdown. Remember, this is the guy who is shaping McCain economic policy. He's a highly paid lobbyist for one of the worst hit banks in the subprime crisis and yet he is still a co-chair of the McCain campaign.
Keep in mind that Phil Gramm and McCain are still unable to admit these policies were failures. Gramm says he "didn't intend this." Not the most comforting response from the architect. This is the same bullheadedness that we've experienced from Bush, who still can't admit any failures. More of the same is not what we need. Read through both links and get to know the man rumored to be McCain's choice as Treasury Secretary.
John McCain is supposed to be the great reformer. That's just pure bull. He scammed the FEC's public financing system last year -- something for which he's not been held accountable -- yet. And, his campaign is rife with very powerful D.C. lobbyists who work for some very shady characters -- and that's really starting to damage the McCain brand:
"It's the biggest anti-Washington streak in the American electorate in decades, and McCain's problem is that his campaign is full of Washington-lobbyist types," said Chris Kofinis, a former John Edwards aide. "You can't be the guy who is striving for reform when the people who run the campaign are fighting against reform."
Democrats have hammered McCain on that very issue for months, noting that campaign manager Rick Davis and senior adviser Charlie Black have spent decades lobbying in Washington. Both have left their companies.
The criticism exploded this month with the disclosure that two McCain advisers worked for DCI Group, a consulting firm that several years ago worked with a moderate member of Myanmar's military junta.
McCain was furious. The two resigned and the new policy followed.
Then, McCain fired an energy policy adviser who lobbied energy companies and asked another consultant to resign from the campaign's Virginia leadership team given a conflict. Former Texas Rep. Thomas G. Loeffler also resigned as McCain's national finance co-chairman because of lobbying ties that reportedly included Saudi Arabia.
Uh oh. Did I just read the McCain was furious? Watch out. We're told by many who have seen it (and many, many have) that a furious McCain is a very, very scary thing indeed. Problem for McCain is that he should be furious with himself. This is all his fault. He gathered all these lobbyists to run his campaign. Obviously, McCain didn't think it would be an issue -- but it is.
McCain's campaign is rife with lobbyists. They run the entire operation. Last week, two of them were dumped because they represented the brutal regime in Myanmar. Another one left over his involvement in an anti-Democrat 527.
This week, another one -- a very top fundraising official -- has already dropped. This one, Thomas Loeffler, McCain's national finance co-chair, not only represented Saudi Arabia, he lobbied McCain on behalf of Saudi Arabia -- after saying he didn't:
John McCain's national finance co-chairman has stepped down, becoming the latest adviser to leave the Republican's presidential campaign because of ties to lobbyists.
Former Texas Rep. Thomas G. Loeffler, one of McCain's key fundraisers, resigned after the campaign last week instructed staff to disclose all lobbying ties and to make certain they are no longer registered as lobbyists or foreign agents.
McCain's campaign on Sunday confirmed Loeffler's resignation.
Loeffler lobbies for the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co., which with Northrop Grumman Corp. won a lucrative contract to provide air refueling tankers for the Air Force. McCain helped scuttle an earlier contract that would have gone to a competitor, Boeing Co.
Newsweek reported over the weekend that Loeffler's "lobbying firm has collected nearly $15 million from Saudi Arabia since 2002 and millions more from other foreign and corporate interests, including a French aerospace firm seeking Pentagon contracts."
Lobbying disclosure records also showed that on May 17, 2006, Loeffler listed meeting McCain along with the Saudi ambassador to "discuss US-Kingdom of Saudi Arabia relations," even though Loeffler told a reporter last month that he had not discussed his clients with McCain, Newsweek said.
The lobbying staff are dropping like flies at the McCain campaign. There's not going to be anyone left over there before long.
So, when is McCain going to fire Charlie Black? Or is Black's work for brutal regimes okay?
Via Huffington, Charlie Black is unfazed by the criticism of his work for brutal dictators:
I'm not ashamed of anything the firm did," McCain adviser Charlie Black says of his days as the principle in one of Washington's most influential lobbying firms. "If they want to use it to fire up the left wing, well, that's fine."
McCain's campaign staff is rife with lobbyists. But, apparently, McCain finally found lobbyists who crossed the line. That line is pretty far out there -- representing a brutal military regime that is now letting hundreds of thousands of its citizens die. Over the weekend, he lost two key staffers because they represented the Myanmar regime:
Doug Davenport, the regional campaign manager for the mid-Atlantic states, founded the DCI Group's lobbying practice and oversaw the contract with Myanmar in 2002.
"Doug has tendered his resignation and we have accepted it," Jill Hazelbaker, McCain's communications director, wrote in a e-mail.
He joins former DCI Group CEO Doug Goodyear, who resigned yesterday from the post of convention CEO after Newsweek reported that DCI was paid more than $300,000 to represent Myanmar's ruling junta.
Absent the typhoon, these guys would still be working for McCain.
