It's like putting a "For Sale" sign on the Secretary of State. The disclosed 2000-plus name Clinton Foundation donor list is one big appearance of conflict-of-interest...not to mention appearance of corruption, bribery, and influence-peddling. It is an invitation for prosecution, not a recommendation for disinterested public service.
Just one example, this item from Bloomberg News:
Dec. 19 (Bloomberg) -- Canadian investor Victor Dahdaleh, facing a U.S. federal probe of allegations that he helped Alcoa Inc. defraud a Bahrain government-controlled metals company, is among donors who gave as much as $5 million to former President Bill Clinton’s charitable foundation.
The U.S. Justice Department in March said it was investigating claims in a lawsuit by Aluminum Bahrain BSC, which said Dahdaleh acted as a middleman for bribes that helped Alcoa overcharge the Bahrain company by as much as $975 million for alumina, used in aluminum manufacturing.
Dahdaleh’s dispute with Bahrain -- home of the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet and an anti-terrorism ally -- shows how entanglements by Bill Clinton’s financial backers may pose headaches for Hillary Clinton as the New York senator seeks confirmation as President-elect Barack Obama’s secretary of state.
“It certainly creates a couple of extra hurdles for the Obama administration,” said Joel Rosenthal, president of New York’s Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs.
