Say Anything Blog

Nothing changed since the savings and loan scandal.
Was he not one of the “Keating five”?

I just knew this sounded familiar.  From AP:

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid collected a $1.1 million windfall on a Las Vegas land sale even though he hadn’t personally owned the property for three years, property deeds show.

In the process, Reid did not disclose to Congress an earlier sale in which he transferred his land to a company created by a friend and took a financial stake in that company, according to records and interviews.

The deal was engineered by Jay Brown, a longtime friend and former casino lawyer whose name surfaced in a major political bribery trial this summer and in other prior organized crime investigations. He’s never been charged with wrongdoing - except for a 1981 federal securities complaint that was settled out of court. ...
The deal began in 1998 when Reid bought undeveloped residential property on Las Vegas’ booming outskirts for about $400,000… One of the sellers was a developer who was benefiting from a government land swap that Reid supported.

From Ed Morriseey:

Harvey Whittemore, a lobbyist and real-estate investor, plied Reid with campaign contributions and employed Reid’s family members—and in exchange, Reid did a number of favors that allowed Whittemore to realize large profits at the expense of environmental regulations that Reid helped Whittemore bulldoze.

...The land Whittemore bought in 1998 from a defense contractor who intended on using it for target practice had a number of restrictions on its use. A quarter of it was subject to a federal power-line right of way. Another quarter had federal protection for the desert tortoise, an endangered species that also is Nevada’s official state reptile. The land had a fragile series of streams and washes that required special permission on which to build without ruining the desert’s ecosystem.

None of these obstacles proved too difficult for Whittemore, at least not while he had his friend Harry Reid running interference in Congress. Interior refused to relocate the tortoises for over five years, until the Bureau of Land Management agreed to swap the land for another parcel abutting a federal preserve elsewhere. No one ever did an analysis to determine whether the deal was fair to either party, nor did the BLM go to Congress for approval on the changes to a project that Congress had explicitly legislated.

In 2002, Reid worked on the power corridor. He inserted obscure provisions into a land management bill that relocated the power corridor, freeing Whittemore to build on the 10,500 acres that Congress had previously held—which means that someone else now had to lose property value for Whittemore’s benefit, and for no cost whatsoever. That bald move caused raised eyebrows at the BLM and the Senate’s Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and Reid backed away—for the moment. Less than two years later, Reid tried again to give Whittemore the land for a song ($160,000), but Congress balked again. He finally settled for freeing the land for development and allowing Whittemore to buy it at a fair market rate, and forcing the government to relocate the power corridor.

In 2005, Reid and fellow Nevada Senator John Ensign conducted a series of interventions with the EPA to eliminate the final obstacle—the environmental impact on the fragile ecosystem in Coyote Springs Valley. When the agency blocked Whittemore’s efforts, Reid and Ensign held several meetings with EPA officials to pressure them into submission.

Whittemore used another Reid son, Lief, to lobby his father’s office for assistance. In the end, the pressure paid off, as the EPA backed down from its opposition after winning a few concessions on the development plan.

What did Reid get in exchange for all of this support? According to the Times, Whittemore contributed $45,000 to Reid and his PACs since 2000. He also gave the DSCC $20,000 in 2000, when it pushed Reid as a leader for the party in the Senate. Reid’s son Josh got $5,000 for his unsuccessful campaign for a city council seat; his other sone Rory got $5,000 for his successful effort to win a spot on the Clark County Board of Commissioners.

...In fact, it seems as though Whittemore’s project was part of the transactions the AP discovered. “One of the sellers was a developer who was benefiting from a government land swap that Reid supported”—that’s the same project as Coyote Springs. A major portion of that story had to do with Reid trying to grease the skids for the land swap so that Whittemore could get around the federal right-of-way.

Reid’s payoff came when he quietly sold at a huge profit the land sold to him at under market terms, by Whittemore.

McCain, unlike Reid, has not been shown to have profited at all from his intervention on behalf of a supporter.

“Poverty of goods is easily cured; poverty of the mind is irreparable.”

Bob, thank you for that cut and pasted article.

Those who think the party or the country, will be “taught a lesson” by handing the levers of power over to the liberals will learn a lesson, but it will be at the expense of our country and her liberties. And there are no guarantees that the party or the country will come out stronger, more conservative or better positioned to win elections against the incumbent liberals.

Proof, Bat,

Feed not the troll.

Out Here
Rodney G. Graves

Persia delenda est.
Latin: “Persia (modern day Iran) should be destoyed”

RG: Just dishing back some of the predigested pap that bob dishes out...a parody of his own lame comments!

Those who think the party or the country, will be “taught a lesson” by handing the levers of power over to the liberals will learn a lesson, but it will be at the expense of our country and her liberties. And there are no guarantees that the party or the country will come out stronger, more conservative or better positioned to win elections against the incumbent liberals.

Crooked crooks. That’s what politicians are.