''That's what they offered."

[Octafish]

Democratic Jeopardy Question: "Why did you accept $675,000 from Goldman Sachs to speak?"



Has Goldman ever paid anybody else $675,000 to speak?

Hillary Clinton is going to really regret saying these 4 words about Goldman Sachs

By Chris Cillizza
Washington Post, February 4

Hillary Clinton spent an hour talking to CNN's Anderson Cooper and a handful of New Hampshire voters in a town hall on Wednesday night. For 59 minutes of it, she was excellent — empathetic, engaged and decidedly human. But, then there was that other minute — really just four words — that Clinton is likely to be haunted by for some time to come.

"That’s what they offered," Clinton said in response to Cooper's question about her decision to accept $675,000 in speaking fees from Goldman Sachs in the period between serving as secretary of state and her decision to formally enter the 2016 presidential race.

The line is, well, bad. More on that soon. But, the line when combined with her body language when she said it makes it politically awful for her.

Clinton is both seemingly caught by surprise and annoyed by the question all at once. Neither of those is a good reaction to what Cooper is asking. Both together make for a uniquely bad response.

CONTINUED...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/02/04/4-words-on-goldman-sachs-that-hillary-clinton-is-going-to-really-regret/?tid=hybrid_experimentrandom_3_na

Video etc. etc. etc. at link.

[LAS14]

1. Yup, caught by surprise and..

... annoyed by the question. ALL secretaries of state have gone on speaking tours. Their agents negotiate the fee, I'm sure. They are invited to speak because they have a special perspective on world events. The fee is miniscule, given Clinton's income as an author. That it should cross anyone's mind that there was something nefarious afoot was a surprise and annoying. Perfect answer as far as I'm concerned.

[Octafish]

4. Those are BILLIONAIRE wages.

Check it out:



Warren Buffett: He made $12.7 billion this year or ~$37 million per day; ~$1.54 million per hour; or ~$25,694 per minute.

Bill Gates: He earned $11.5 billion this year which works out to be ~$33.3 million per day; $1.38 million per hour; or ~$23,148 per minute.

Sheldon Adelson: The casino mogul earned $11.4 billion this year which means he made ~$33 million per day; ~$1.38 million per hour; or $22,946 per minute.

Jeff Bezos: He made $11.3 billion this year or ~$32.7 million per day; $1.36 million per hour; or ~$22,745 per minute.

Mark Zuckerberg: The Facebook founder made $10.5 billion this year or ~$30.4 million per day; ~$1.27 million per hour; or ~$21,135 per minute.

Masayoshi Son: He made $10.3 billion this year or ~$29.86 billion per day; ~$1.24 million per hour; or $20,732 per minute.

Sergey Brin: He made $9.3 billion this year which works out to be ~$26.9 million per day, $1.12 million per hour; or $18,719 per minute.

Larry Page: He made $9.3 billion this year which works out to be ~$26.9 million per day, $1.12 million per hour; or $18,719 per minute.

Lu Chee Woo: He brought in $8.3 billion this year or ~$24 million per day; ~$1 million per hour; or ~$16,706 per minute.

Carl Icahn: The billionaire investor made $7.2 billion this year, which works out to be ~$20.87 million/day; ~$869,565/hour; or ~$14,492/minute.

SOURCE: http://www.businessinsider.com/what-warren-buffett-makes-per-hour-2013-12

A billionaire makes about as much as the average person working three part-time, minimum wage jobs for a year, per minute.

Of course, after they cash out, they move it offshore to Panama and Switzerland.

[amborin]

7. and more here, re: CEOs, many/most of whom are HRC donors:

http://www.aflcio.org/Corporate-Watch/Paywatch-Archive/CEO-Pay-and-You/100-Highest-Paid-CEOs

[Faux pas]

2. There are a lot of things

she needs to regret saying. Let's make a list. I'll start with "Super Predators".

[Octafish]

6. ''We came. We saw. He died.'' or: ''Lookit all that oil!!!''

MONEY means POWER.

"Libya has some of the biggest and most proven oil reserves — 43.6 billion barrels — outside Saudi Arabia, and some of the best drilling prospects."

http://www.medialens.org/index.php/component/acymailing/archive/view/listid-3-alerts-precis/mailid-74-three-little-words-wikileaks-libya-oil.html

Mohammad Gaddafi shared the oil wealth with the Libyan people, not just the one-percent Wall Street types.

For over four decades, Gaddafi promoted economic democracy and used the nationalized oil wealth to sustain progressive social welfare programs for all Libyans. Under Gaddafi’s rule, Libyans enjoyed not only free health-care and free education, but also free electricity and interest-free loans. Now thanks to NATO’s intervention the health-care sector is on the verge of collapse as thousands of Filipino health workers flee the country, institutions of higher education across the East of the country are shut down, and black outs are a common occurrence in once thriving Tripoli.

-- http://www.globalresearch.ca/libya-from-africas-wealthiest-democracy-under-gaddafi-to-us-nato-sponsored-terrorist-haven/5482974

While little reported in the USA, Libya's former leader also used the wealth to better life throughout the poorest nations of Africa.

''War on Libya is War on Entire Africa.''

In 2010 Gaddafi offered to invest $97 billion in Africa to free it from Western influence, on condition that African states rid themselves of corruption and nepotism. Gaddafi always dreamed of a Developed, United Africa and was about to make that dream come true - and nothing is more terrifying to the West than a Developed, United Africa.
-- http://www.reunionblackfamily.com/apps/blog/show/7869956-war-on-libya-is-war-on-entire-africa-

Wall Street-on-the-Potomac prefers to do business with those it can relate to: greedy types.

[pdsimdars]

3. Didn't you see that Nader interview where he showed the contract she has them sign?

That is the speaking fee she requires on her contract. And he also pointed out a section where she requires them to pay $1000 for a stenographer to take notes of the lecture and they are to be solely HER property.

Talk about control!

[Octafish]

8. Like a commercial: Candidate for the Jet Set

High fashion, expense for Hillary travel

by LAURA MYERS
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL, Aug. 16, 2014

EXCERPT...

She usually requires those who pay her six-figure fees for speeches to also provide a private jet for transportation — only a $39 million, 16-passenger Gulfstream G450 or larger will do.

SNIP...

But Clinton’s $225,000 is something of a cut-rate. Documents obtained by the newspaper show that she initially asked for $300,000 and reveal that she insists on controlling every detail of the private event, large and small, to ensure that she will be the center of attention.

SNIP...

According to her standard speaking contract, Clinton will remain at the event no longer than 90 minutes; will pose for no more than 50 photos with no more than 100 people; and won’t allow any press coverage or video- or audio-taping of her speech.

The only record allowed will be made by a stenographer whose transcription will be given only to Clinton. The stenographer’s $1,250 bill, however, will go to the UNLV Foundation.

The foundation, meanwhile, is prohibited from advertising the event on radio, TV or billboards. Mail and website ads are allowed, although Clinton staffers must approve in writing any promotional material. One unhappy UNLV Foundation official in an email complained of “meddling” after Clinton’s agency edited a description of the annual dinner to “dumb it down.”

CONTINUED...

http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/las-vegas/high-fashion-expense-hillary-travel

Lots to learn, wot?

[pdsimdars]

9. Holy moly. Tooooo much.

[BernieforPres2016]

13. $1000 an hour for a stenographer?

Does Hillary also supply the stenographer? Sounds like good work if you can get it.

[JoePhilly]

5. And the Wheel of Outrage spins round and round.

[Octafish]

10. Personally, $250,000 per speech would solve a lot of problems.

Mine and the audience's.

[winter is coming]

11. And what did they want in exchange for what they offered? n/t

[Octafish]

12. Continued permission to operate with Impunity...

...it's become like a tradition for people of means, banksters and such.



Alfred McCoy explained why on Democracy Now, way back on May 1, 2009:

Historian Alfred McCoy: Obama Reluctance on Bush Prosecutions Affirms Culture of Impunity

EXCERPT...

AMY GOODMAN: Well, talk about President Obama’s approach, on the one hand, releasing the torture memos — and I’d like you to respond to specifically what’s in those torture memos —

ALFRED McCOY: Sure.

AMY GOODMAN: — but then saying he will not be holding the interrogators responsible, people involved with it; we have to move forward, not move back.

ALFRED McCOY: Right. That’s exactly how you get impunity. That’s what’s happened every single time in the past. For example, in 1970, the House and Senate of the United States discovered that the Phoenix Program had been engaged in systematic torture, that they had killed through extraditial executions 46,000 South Vietnamese. That’s about the same number of American combat deaths in South Vietnam. Nothing was done. There was no punishment, and the policy of torture continued.

In 1994, for example, the US ratified the Convention Against Torture. There was no investigation of past practice. So, when that ratification went through, it was done in a way that in fact legalized psychological torture, because when we ratified that convention, we also, if you will, passed a reservation, which then got codified into US federal law, Section 2340 of the US Federal Code. In that code, we said that psychological torture, which is actually the main form of torture practiced by the United States since the 1950s, is basically not torture.

And we defined, very cleverly, under that code, what psychological torture is. We simply said it’s four things. It’s extreme physical pain, forced injection of drugs, threats against another, or doing that to a third party. OK? That’s all that psychological torture is. In other words, everything in those torture memos, all those techniques of belly slaps, face slaps, face grabbing, waterboarding, is, under US law, supposedly not torture, because when we — President Clinton ratified the UN Convention Against Torture, he didn’t look into the past, he didn’t discover what the nature of American torture was. And so, we’re now at a moment where if we don’t prosecute or don’t punish or don’t seriously investigate, that this will be repeated again.

Another thing that emerges from the memos is, in fact, that the Bush Justice Department is very well aware. If you read the May 2005 memo by the head of the Office of Legal Counsel, Steven Bradbury, he says, “Look, I can’t assure you that waterboarding is not torture. You know, the courts may find that it is torture. But don’t worry about it. Because you know what? The courts aren’t going to rule on this.” So in other words, don’t worry about the law, because the law doesn’t apply to you. The law will not be brought to bear. And that’s the problem of President Obama’s procedure. The men were assured that they could torture, because it wouldn’t come before the courts.

There’s another problem with those memos, as well. Those memos argue again and again that the most extreme of all the authorized CIA techniques, waterboarding, is not torture, because it does not violate that same Section 2340 of US Federal Code. But it does. Waterboarding is the most cruel, the most extremely cruel form of torture known to man, very simply because of this — and people don’t understand, I think, waterboarding. Amy, if you and I were riding in a car, and we went off a bridge in January here in Wisconsin and crashed through the ice and went down to the bottom of the Ohio River, within three minutes you and I would be dead from drowning. If there were an infant in a car seat behind us, that infant could survive for twenty minutes under water. A weak, fragile three-month-old infant could survive twenty minutes under water, be plucked by the rescue crew from the waters and suffer no brain damage, be perfectly fine. Alright? How can this happen? It’s the mammalian diving reflex. The human being is so afraid of death by drowning that we are hardwired into our biology, into our…

JUAN GONZALEZ: I want to —

ALFRED McCOY: — brains with this bizarre mammalian diving reflex. So, therefore, waterboarding, which induces this primal fear of death by drowning, is the most painful form of torture you can concoct. That’s why it’s existed for 500 years.

CONTINUED...

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/5/1/torture_expert_alfred_mccoy_obama_reluctance

For some reason, President Obama has allowed Baby Doc Bush, Sneering Dick Cheney, and their fellow traitors get away with war crimes and who knows what else. McCoy's warned us that it's business-as-usual for Empire and it will happen again -- unless it's punished and those responsible held accountable. Part of the Democratic Party is in favor of prosecuting ALL the crooks, warmongers and traitors. That's the segment I like to associate with.