McCain's Top Strategist Lobbied For Iran-Linked Firm

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Source: The Huffington Post

In the summer of 2005, John McCain's chief strategist Charlie Black, working for his firm Black, Kelly, Scruggs & Healey, was paid $60,000 to lobby the U.S. government on behalf of the Chinese oil conglomerate CNOOC. At the time, CNOOC was mounting an aggressive bid to buy Unocal, a California-based oil giant, and Black was tasked with churning up congressional support. But the bid ultimately fell through, in part because of objections over the China oil industry's ties to Iran, a country in which it had already invested tens of millions of dollars.

"This transaction poses a clear threat to the energy and national security of the United States," wrote Rep. Joe Barton, a Texas Republican. "U.S. national energy security depends on sufficient energy supplies to support U.S. and global economic growth. But those supplies are threatened by China's aggressive tactics to lock up energy supplies around the world that are largely dedicated for their own use."

Flash-forward nearly three years and Black's old client -- which later scored a $16 billion deal with the Iranian government -- could now create major headaches for his current boss. On Monday, McCain, in a speech at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, called for a broad and aggressive international campaign to divest from Iran.

"We should privatize the sanctions against Iran by launching a worldwide divestment campaign," he said. "As more people, businesses, pension funds, and financial institutions across the world divest from companies doing business with Iran, the radical elite who run that country will become even more unpopular than they are already."

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/02/senior-mccain-aide-had-cl_n_104696.html

[Mountainman]

1. So we are fighting China to lock oil in the Mid East for our use?

[notesdev]

2. Is there anyone

connected with McCain who ISN'T on the federal gravy train? Does he have any, you know, actual friends, or is every last one of his associates there for the money?

[Supersedeas]

11. under the table negotiating

[MidwestTransplant]

3. McCain's EXTENSIVE ties to scumbag lobbyists who lobby against American interests

are going to be a major contributor to his downfall.

[Oceansaway]

4. i agree...n/t

[Amerigo Vespucci]

6. Here's the difference between 2004 and 2008, as I see it...

...there was a major story in Newsweek after the 2004 election about John Kerry. It talked about a number of things...the Swift Boat crap, the "I was for the war before I was against it" chorus, on and on.

What the article claimed was that Kerry was pissed 24/7...ranting to his wife, ranting to his daughters, unhappy with Mary Beth Cahill as his campaign manager...

But this was all behind closed doors. He never went ballistic and fired people and took charge and stood his ground. He did go windsurfing a few times, and the media was right there to report it.

There was a full month...one month...in which the Swift Boat issue just laid out there in the media, seeping into the minds of the voting public.

I don't think the Democratic Party is going to sit back for Rove smears in 2008. I just don't. I think it's going to be a battle of epic proportions, and I think that John McCain will site back in ashen horror as piece after piece after piece of dirty laundry is yanked out of his closet and held up for public scrutiny.

[bulloney]

9. You'd think so, but who was AWOL during Vietnam and whose military service was slammed in '04?

Somehow, the RW media gerbils will make McCain's ties to lobbyists a virtue.

[Supersedeas]

12. dunno about downfall -- the Free Ride Press is unlikely to reveal it

[pattmarty]

5. Even the clerks are probably lobbyists.

[Narkos]

7. So then why does he want to bomb Iran? Don't get it...

[Ashy Larry]

8. K&R

And bookmarked for later.

[Supersedeas]

10. nothing to see here -- the Media Free Ride just goes and goes and goes