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‘US Hails Chile For Surviving Pinochet’

From the AP article:

The White House on Sunday marked the death of former Chilean dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet by calling his rule a “difficult period” and commending the country for establishing a free society.

Oh yeah, Chile, good job surviving that CIA orchestrated military coup. Sorry about the assasination of your ex-foreign minister by our CIA operative (who was also in charge of Pinochet’s notorious detention centers).

And of course, we feel real bad that our current president, George W. Bush (otherwise known as “Junior”) undercut your recent case against Pinochet because he wanted to protect his dad from being implicated.

When was that? Oh yeah, in September. But ya’ know, things move fast nowadays. That was a long time ago. So when Junior congratulates you on your ability to survive our government’s contribution to your history, give us a smile!

I’m crossposting this from my dairy at the Daily Kos.

As I mentioned in my previous post, Texas Republican Representative Henry Bonilla became the Chairman of the American Dream PAC in 1999. The PAC has had an amazing and checkered history.

The PAC’s website was taken down in 2002, shortly after their Executive Director/Treasurer Lydia Meuret was convicted of embezzling roughly $120,000. An LA Times article had this interesting quote:

“Had there been any checks or balances, it probably never would have happened,” she said recently, as she prepared to begin serving a 15-month prison term. “I would just write myself checks.”

Meuret was simultaneously the Treasurer for Republicans for Clean Air, a PAC that seemingly sprang out of thin air and ran ads in key states in 2000 against Senator John McCain. They depicted then-Texas Governor George W. Bush as friendly to the environment and McCain as a polluter, and were widely credited with swinging the Repubican presidential primary in Bush’s favor.

The PAC was funded by Sam and Charles Wyly, brothers, Bush Pioneers and tax evasion suspects. It had no street address or phone number. The only officer listed was Meuret and the PO Box, which was also used for the American Dream PAC, was registered to Meuret.

When McCain’s Deputy Campaign Manager filed an FEC complaint against Republicans for Clean Air alledging excessive contributions, failure to report a contribution, failure to register and report and exceeding the $25,000 annual contribution limit, Meuret sought to distance herself. The Washington Post reported…

“But Meuret said she knows next to nothing about Republicans for Clean Air, except the “consultant” who hired her and told her not to reveal his name. She added that a news release would soon be distributed ending the mystery of who aired the ads. Yet there was no announcement.”

The unnamed consultant was Jeb Hensarling, Meuret’s predecessor as Treasurer for the American Dream PAC. Hensarling has since become the U.S. Representative for Texas District 5 and was elected just yesterday as the Chairman of the Republican Study Committee.

Since its founding, the American Dream PAC’s stated mission has been…

“Hard work. Strong families. Free markets. Individual liberties. The ideals of the American Dream form the foundation of our Republican Party. Today, the American Dream PAC is leading the charge to help minority GOP candidates across our nation implement these precious values.”

However, as the Washington Post reported in 2003, that mission was all but abandoned towards the end of 2000. That was when the last slate of minority candidates, featured on the PAC’s website, received their contributions.

Then, in 2002, Meuret filed a Texas Ethics Commission report claiming that the PAC had contributed to the campaigns of 3 more minority candidates. But did they? Those contributions didn’t show up in the PAC’s FEC filings.

Despite the scandals and the current lack of a street address, phone number, known board members or a website, the American Dream PAC continues to bring in more money every year. This year, their receipts (so far) have totalled $113,405, most of which has been spent. The largest PAC contributor has been the United Parcel Service PAC with $15,000, bringing their all-time contributions total to $35,000. UPS also gave $54,000 to Texans For Henry Bonilla.

Why would UPS drop $89,000, plus great photo ops on a single politician? I’ll leave that to someone else to figure out.

I’m crossposting this from my diary at the Daily Kos. San Antonio Express News columnist Carlos Guerra used some of my research in his column today.

The Texas District 23 House race is one of the few still to be decided this year. On December 12th, voters will choose between Republican Henry Bonilla and Democrat Ciro Rodriguez. Bonilla called a press conference yesterday (Dec. 4th) to accuse Rodriguez of ties to terrorists and to insinuate corruption. The charges were so ludicrous that, at first, only San Antonio’s WOAI was willing to touch the story.

But what of Bonilla’s record? During the 2004 campaign cycle, Bonilla accepted $1000 from the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe, as part of the Jack Abramoff bribery scandal.

Texans For Henry Bonilla received $8500 from defense contractor ADCS, the main co-conspirator in the Duke Cunningham bribery scandal. Bonilla is on the House Defense Appropiations Committee.

In addition, Bonilla’s political fund, the American Dream PAC, received a $3000 contribution from ADCS in 2005.

Strangely enough, one of Bonilla’s largest 2005-2006 campaign contributors ($20,000) was… the American Dream PAC. Bonilla heads the PAC, and has done so since 1999. He awarded himself the highest contribution ever given by the PAC. (Tom Delay comes in second with half that.) He also used the American Dream PAC to give himself $5000 in 2002. I’m baffled as to why Bonilla, using the Texans for Henry Bonilla PAC, would donate $15,000 to the American Dream PAC, only to receive most of it back as campaign contributions.

The American Dream PAC was founded to provide financial assistance to minority Republican candidates. However, since Bonilla has taken over the organization, most of their contributions have gone to non-minority candidates, Tom Delay’s defense fund, the Texas GOP redistricting fiasco and an embezzlement scheme for which one of their former treasurers was convicted in 2003.

Other interesting American Dream PAC and Texans For Henry Bonilla contributors include Enron, convicted felon Jeffrey Skillings, Arthur Andersen and Reliant Energy, all of whom contributed in 2000-2001 during the time that they were colluding to game the California energy market, leading to its collapse. Enron’s last contribution was made 2 weeks after the SEC investigation into their dealings began, and a mere 3 days before Kenneth Lay announced that Enron had overstated its profits by $586 million.

Given that the FEC says Texans For Henry Bonilla has had 5555 individual contributors, I’m sure I could find much more than this, but my time is limited. Regardless, the facts above show clearly that Bonillas in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.