Well, as you all know, the tax returns are out, and reporters, bloggers, and activists are pouring over them. The New York Times noticed something interesting:
claimed deductions for $10.2 million in charitable contributions. The contributions went to a family foundation run by the Clintons that has given away only about half of the money they put into it, and most of that was last year, after Mrs. Clinton declared her candidacy.
Now, I can understand giving to your own foundation. After all, you want to control where the money goes if you're giving that much money, and if you've got your own foundation, there's no better way to exert that control. But why did the money sit for years unused? And is it just coincidence that the money was spent right when the Clinton presidential campaign got underway?
More on transparency below the fold...
I am more than a little suspicious that most of the money was not spent when both Clintons have spoken for years about the urgency of the poverty situation for so many Americans. Just as one example, look at what was happening in New Orleans. The Clintons spoke out against inaction in New Orleans, and yet their foundation was inactive? The timing of the spending has me rankled.
And why won't the Clintons release the names of donors to the Clinton Foundation? They sold the names to InfoUSA:
ABCNews.com has learned that the Clinton Foundation sold portions of the list through a data company headed by a longtime friend and donor.
Is that the problem, we need buy transparency? Is transparency only for sale to the highest bidder?
InfoUSA has a terrible reputation regarding selling lists that target elderly people who can easily be defrauded. It has just been served with a delisting notice from NASDAQ:
InfoUSA formed a special board committee of five directors in December to respond to the SEC investigation and shareholder lawsuit, which alleges that the company misspent millions, some of it on former President Bill Clinton and U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y.
According to the New York Times, these are the kinds of lists sold by InfoUSA:
InfoUSA advertised lists of "Elderly Opportunity Seekers," 3.3 million older people "looking for ways to make money," and "Suffering Seniors," 4.7 million people with cancer or Alzheimer’s disease. "Oldies but Goodies" contained 500,000 gamblers over 55 years old, for 8.5 cents apiece. One list said: "These people are gullible. They want to believe that their luck can change."
Back to the Clinton Foundation, an article from the New York Times said:
donations are up 70 percent since Hillary's campaign got under way -- with two-thirds of the money coming from just 11 donors.
I don't know about the rest of you, but I'd like to know who those 11 donors are. Maybe they're people who just want to help with these global initiatives, or maybe they are peddling influence and skirting campaign finance laws... Without transparency, how can we know? If the Clintons' hands are clean, then she should want us to know.
I'd also like to know more about why the Clinton Foundation waited until around the time she announced her candidacy to start spending money when they keep talking about the urgency of poverty in this nation and around the world. What? They never heard of Katrina? And that's just one example... But the thing that really bothers me the most is that they were willing to sell their donor list to a shady company but not give it to the voters.