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DonViejo

(60,536 posts)
Fri Aug 26, 2016, 03:40 PM Aug 2016

Joe Conason: Pay For Play? The Scandal Is Judicial Watch Misleading Gullible Media

Listening to the national media over the past few weeks, many Americans may now believe that the Clinton Foundation was set up as a “pay-to-play” scheme for Hillary Clinton to squeeze wealthy foreigners and rich Americans for millions of dollars. According to this theory, popularized by a lavishly funded right-wing organization called Judicial Watch, the Secretary of State would only deal with people and governments that had donated big money to her husband’s foundation. But that story is itself a scam and a fraud, perpetrated by Judicial Watch with misleading information fed to gullible and lazy Washington journalists.

Consider the tale of the Crown Prince Salman of Bahrain, head of state of one of America’s primary allies in the Persian Gulf. Rummaging through thousands of Hillary Clinton’s emails, Judicial Watch discovered that the prince had requested a meeting with the Secretary of State on a specific day in 2010, via an email from Clinton Foundation executive Doug Band to Hillary’s aide Huma Abedin.

In a hysterical press release, Judicial Watch denounced this request as an outrageous example of unethical and possibly illegal behavior, because “by 2010, (the crown prince) had contributed $32 million” to CGI (the Clinton Global Initiative).”

That damning narrative, usually condensed into “Bahraini prince gave $32 million to Clinton Foundation,” appeared in news outlets across the country. By leaving out the most important facts — which show there was no unethical conduct — Judicial Watch could confidently assume that gullible (or malicious) journalists would omit that crucial information as well. And of course, they did.

-snip-

http://www.nationalmemo.com/pay-for-play-the-scandal-is-judicial-watch-misleading-gullible-media/

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Joe Conason: Pay For Play? The Scandal Is Judicial Watch Misleading Gullible Media (Original Post) DonViejo Aug 2016 OP
Taking anything Judicial Watch says seriously is more of a comment on the media than any of the ... Jim__ Aug 2016 #1
Kellyanne Conway's husband George T. Conway Hortensis Aug 2016 #2
Wonder what Judical Watch thinks about Donald Trump's contribution to Thinkingabout Aug 2016 #3

Jim__

(14,045 posts)
1. Taking anything Judicial Watch says seriously is more of a comment on the media than any of the ...
Fri Aug 26, 2016, 03:54 PM
Aug 2016

... asinine accusations against the Clintons. The corporate media sucks.

Hortensis

(58,785 posts)
2. Kellyanne Conway's husband George T. Conway
Fri Aug 26, 2016, 04:47 PM
Aug 2016

once worked for Judicial Watch, trying to drive the Clintons out of politics, and before that was one of a group of lawyers who secretly convinced Paula Jones to dump her attorneys' advice for settlement and pursue a public case against Bill Clinton, and then continued on to develop the Monica Lewinsky scandal as part of a group known as "impeachment's little elves."

Back around 2006 the Conways wrote a blog together through the National Review. Glenn Greenwald described the bloggers postings as "A vile case study in GOP filth-peddling." Must have been as bad as described as NR seems to have cleaned it from its archives.

So far it's seeming that, all through the Clintons' political lives, pretty, perky Kellyanne has been actively connected to virtually every dirty operative in right-wing politics that I've heard of, and no doubt a far large number I haven't. No wonder her interview with Rachel Maddow was described as a "fascinating duel" by a Washington Post writer, as sweet Kellyanne pushed her theme of Donald as really respectable and mainstream. Or that Rachel joked immediately after the initial civil exchange that maybe they should end the interview right there while they were ahead.

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