Lee Fang: Howard Dean Advises Corporate Health Care Clients To Fund ‘Both Sides,’ Run Attack Ads

[ProSense]

Lee Fang: Howard Dean Advises Corporate Health Care Clients To Fund ‘Both Sides,’ Run Attack Ads

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Dean has been lobbying without disclosure for about three years. In 2009 after his stint as chairman of the Democratic Party, Dean joined the law/lobbying firm McKenna, Long & Aldridge as a non-attorney “Strategic Advisor.” The firm’s lobbying practice has a wide range of clients, from health care, to insurance, to even Keystone XL beneficiary TransCanada. The firm website says Dean “focuses on health care and energy issues, as well as providing expertise derived from his extensive experience in public office.” The firm seems to advertise Dean as a lobbyist, despite the fact Dean has not registered as a lobbyist.

I clipped a portion of a video posted online by McKenna, Long & Aldridge that features Dean discussing the post Citizens United campaign finance world along with former Republican Party chief, Michael Steele. Dean candidly disclosed that he works primarily with health care corporations, and that he advises that if they do contribute, they should contribute to both Republicans and Democrats:

DEAN: Even without the Citizens United decision, I’ve advised a lot of clients in the industries that I usually end up working with, which are mostly healthcare industries, not to give any money to either side, or if you do, give it to both sides because politicians really don’t know much about the issues. They really don’t. But believe me, they remember who gave money and they remember those ads. [...] But they remember the ads, and they remember who was on whose side and who wasn’t, and it makes a big difference.

During the remarks, Dean later commented that he opposed the Citizens United decision because it creates the strong perception of government corruption for the public.

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While it may sound surprising that a former Democratic Party chairman would encourage corporations to donate to Republicans, Dean’s advice makes sense considering his job as a paid consultant to the lobbying firm McKenna, Long & Aldridge. What’s more troubling, however, is how Dean uses his powerful platform as a pundit and political leader without disclosing his work as an influence peddler.

In the media, Dean is typically portrayed as a former governor and liberal political leader. When, for example, Deancalled for killing health reform in 2009, using arguments that simply didn’t square with reality, he never disclosed that his lobbying firm was representing major health care interests that were impacted by the bill. Dean has also been linked to a lobbying effort to de-list the People’s Mujahedin of Iran (MEK) as a State Department-recognized terrorist organization.

- more -

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2012/04/lee-fang-howard-dean-advises-corporate-health-care-clients-to-fund-both-sides-run-attack-ads.html

This is from Yves Smith's site, which I have criticized for going after Democrats, including Elizabeth Warren. The piece certainly tries to paint Dean as an opportunist.

[Schema Thing]

1. It may TRY to paint Dean as an opportunist...but it fails

by using his own words.


as in:

DEAN: Even without the Citizens United decision, I’ve advised a lot of clients in the industries that I usually end up working with, which are mostly healthcare industries, not to give any money to either side, or if you do, give it to both sides because politicians really don’t know much about the issues. They really don’t. But believe me, they remember who gave money and they remember those ads. But they remember the ads, and they remember who was on whose side and who wasn’t, and it makes a big difference.

During the remarks, Dean later commented that he opposed the Citizens United decision because it creates the strong perception of government corruption for the public.



Nope, no opportunism there, just a straight shoot, shooting straight.

[cali]

2. lol. so you criticize this site but when they go after Dean, you pantingly post it

how... opportunistic of you.

And how very amusing.

[ProSense]

3. You know

lol. so you criticize this site but when they go after Dean, you pantingly post it

how... opportunistic of you.

And how very amusing.

...I read the first comment, and I am going to edit to insert the word "tries," so that you can comment without making this about me.

[cali]

5. sorry, but I'm not unfamiliar with your history re Dean

so yes, it is at least partially about you.

[ProSense]

6. Oh please

I'm not unfamiliar with your history re Dean

so yes, it is at least partially about you.

...you seem to be searching for a straw to grasp.

[DCKit]

7. cali, if it's out there, I want to know about it.

If we're not aware of the attacks, we can't adapt or fight back.

[ProSense]

8. Well,

I ignored it before, but it's not an isolated attack:

Washington’s high-powered terrorist supporters

By Glenn Greenwald

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But look at what is happening now to Fran Townsend and many of her fellow political elites. In August of last year, The Christian Science Monitor‘s Scott Peterson published a detailed exposé about “a high-powered array of former top American officials” who have received “tens of thousands of dollars” from a designated Terrorist organization – the Iranian dissident group Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) — and then met with its leaders, attended its meetings, and/or publicly advocated on its behalf. That group includes Rudy Giuliani, Howard Dean, Michael Mukasey, Ed Rendell, Andy Card, Lee Hamilton, Tom Ridge, Bill Richardson, Wesley Clark, Michael Hayden, John Bolton, Louis Freeh — and Fran Townsend. This is how it works:

Former US officials taking part in MEK-linked events told the Monitor or confirmed publicly that they received substantial fees, paid by local Iranian-American groups to speaker bureaus that handle their public appearances.

The State Dept. official, who is familiar with the speech contracts, explains the mechanism: “Your speech agent calls, and says you get $20,000 to speak for 20 minutes. They will send a private jet, you get $25,000 more when you are done, and they will send a team to brief you on what to say.”

<...>

Yet we have the most well-connected national security and military officials in Washington doing far more than all of that right out in the open — they’re receiving large payments from a Terrorist group, meeting with its leaders, attending their meetings, and then advocating for them in very public forums; Howard Dean, after getting paid by the group, actually called for MEK’s leader to be recognized as the legitimate President of Iran – and so far none have been prosecuted or even indicted. The Treasury Department investigation must at least scare them. Thus, like most authoritarians, Fran Townsend suddenly discovers the importance of the very political liberties she’s helped assault now that those Constitutional protections are necessary to protect herself from prosecution. It reminds me quite a bit of how former Democratic Rep. Jane Harman — one of the most reliable advocates for Bush’s illegal spying program — suddenly started sounding like a life-long, outraged ACLU member as soon as it was revealed that her own private communications were legally surveilled by the U.S. Government.

<...>

But whatever else is true, the activities of Townsend, Rendell, Dean, Giuliani and the rest of MEK’s paid shills are providing more than enough “material support” to be prosecuted under the Humanitarian Law decision and other statutes. They’re providing more substantial “material support” to this Terrorist group than many people — usually vulnerable, powerless Muslims — who are currently imprisoned for that crime. It’s nice that Fran Townsend suddenly discovered the virtues of free speech and free association guarantees, but under the laws she and so many others like her have helped implement and defend, there is a very strong case to make that her conduct and those of these other well-connected advocates for this Terrorist group is squarely within the realm of serious criminal behavior.

http://www.salon.com/2012/03/12/washingtons_high_powered_terrorist_supporters/singleton/

I don't read Greenwald. I came across the piece linked to in this Daily Kos diary:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/03/13/1073921/-Howard-Dean-to-Be-Prosecuted-for-Supporting-Terrorists-

[rhett o rick]

4. "While it may sound surprising that a former Democratic Party chairman would encourage corporations

to donate to Republicans,"

It's only surprising to those that are naive.

It's almost Spring. Occupy something.