Say Anything Blog

Literally! Her “Paws” are a family supposedly living in a little run down house, but manage to pony up thousands upon thousands of dollars to elect Hillary. These folks are living like the Clampetts but spending like the Drysdales!

DALY CITY, Calif.—One of the biggest sources of political donations to Hillary Rodham Clinton is a tiny, lime-green bungalow that lies under the flight path from San Francisco International Airport.

Six members of the Paw family, each listing the house at 41 Shelbourne Ave. as their residence, have donated a combined $45,000 to the Democratic senator from New York since 2005, for her presidential campaign, her Senate re-election last year and her political action committee. In all, the six Paws have donated a total of $200,000 to Democratic candidates since 2005, election records show.

...William Paw, the 64-year-old head of the household, is a mail carrier with the U.S. Postal Service who earns about $49,000 a year, according to a union representative. Alice Paw, also 64, is a homemaker. The couple’s grown children have jobs ranging from account manager at a software company to “attendance liaison” at a local public high school. One is listed on campaign records as an executive at a mutual fund.

The Paws’ political donations closely track donations made by Norman Hsu, a wealthy New York businessman [FUGITIVE FROM JUSTICE: see below] in the apparel industry who once listed the Paw home as his address, according to public records. Mr. Hsu is one of the top fund-raisers for Mrs. Clinton’s presidential campaign. He has hosted or co-hosted some of her most prominent money-raising events.

If you earn only $49,000 a year in San Francisco, you are barely getting by with the rent! Can you say: “High cost of living”?

...The Paw family is just one set of donors whose political donations are similar to Mr. Hsu’s. Several business associates of Mr. Hsu in New York have made donations to the same candidates, on the same dates for similar amounts as Mr. Hsu.

Can you say money laundering?

The Paw’s Daly City home is a one-story house in a working-class suburb of San Francisco. On a recent day, a coiled garden hose rested next to a dilapidated garden with a half-dozen dried out plants. The din of traffic from a nearby freeway was occasionally drowned out by jumbo jets departing San Francisco International Airport.

William and Alice Paw are of Chinese descent. The entire family got their Social Security cards in California in 1982, according to state records. All but one of the Paws registered to vote as “nonpartisan.” A San Mateo County elections official said that members of the Paw family vote “sporadically.”

Yeah! Right! Sporadic, nonpartisan voters give a couple of hundred thou to Hillary...that’s not suspicious! A chart in the story tells us the Paws have given more to Hillary since 2005 than the Maloofs who own the Palms Casino in Vegas and the Sacramento Kings!

Read the whole thing:

Wall Street Journal

UPDATE: This story just keeps getting better! Turns out Hsu is on the lam! The LA Times has this:

WASHINGTON -- For the last 15 years, California authorities have been trying to figure out what happened to a businessman named Norman Hsu, who pleaded no contest to grand theft, agreed to serve up to three years in prison and then seemed to vanish.
Opinion Journal
"He is a fugitive," Ronald Smetana, who handled the case for the state attorney general, said in an interview. "Do you know where he is?"

Hsu, it seems, has been hiding in plain sight, at least for the last three years.

Since 2004, one Norman Hsu has been carving out a prominent place of honor among Democratic fundraisers. He has funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions into party coffers, much of it earmarked for presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary (Diane) Rodham (Milhous) Clinton of New York.

Captain Ed over at Captain's Quarters had this today:

More has also come out about Hsu's success in raising funds through the Paw family of Daly City, who not-co-coincidentally live in Hsu's old house. The family that took out a $270,000 refinance on their home have contributed a whopping $213,000 over three years to Democrats, including $55,000 to Hillary. Their son Winkle Paw turns out to have even closer connections to Hsu -- he works for the fugitive.

Also, the LAT reports that Hsu has another modest household in the $200,000 range for donations. The Danny Lee household in New York, which includes a roommate named Yu Fen Huang, gave $201,200 to Democrats since 2004, including over $37,000 to Hillary.

However, that hasn't been Hsu's best fundraising act. He garnered over a million dollars in capital to buy latex gloves for resale, supposedly to waiting clients. Hsu got arrested when investors found no gloves, no clients, and nothing but a scam. Hsu fled after his plea agreement on the grand theft, and turned into a major Democratic fundraiser. Hillary may have some explaining to do -- and several other Democrats right along with her.

Indeed!

UPDATE II:

Norman Hsu, the fugitive from justice who may have illegally funneled over a million dollars to Hillary Clinton and other leading Democrats, has apparently gone missing. The New York Times tried to find the elusive Mr. Hsu this week and ran into a stone wall.

There are no offices for Mr. Hsu at any of the addresses he listed for his companies, and at the elegant residential tower that he gives as his personal address, Times reporters were told he moved out two years ago.

Even E. Lawrence Barcella, Mr. Hsu's lawyer, seemed to be abandoning his client. He said that Mr. Hsu was getting a California lawyer to represent him over a warrant that was issued there in the 1990s when Mr. Hsu failed to show up for a court hearing after pleading no contest to grand theft charges. Mr. Barcella carefully declined to comment on the whereabouts of his client and stressed that he won't be handling Mr. Hsu's argument with California authorities: "On that matter, he will be represented by California counsel."

All of this is very reminiscent of the 1996 Clinton fundraising scandal. A total of 120 witnesses either fled the country, pleaded the Fifth Amendment or otherwise were unavailable for questioning. In the end, a total of 14 people were found guilty on various charges relating to the scandal. No wonder the Hillary Clinton campaign wants to change the subject away from Mr. Hsu.

UPDATE III:

Fri Aug 31, 6:06 PM ET

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. - A top Democratic fundraiser whose criminal past has roiled the campaigns of top presidential candidates turned himself in Friday in California, where he had been a fugitive for more than 15 years.

Hillary taught him well! He surrenders the Friday evening before a holiday weekend! By the time people get back to work Tuesday, this will be "old news"!