Small Vendors Feel Pinch of Clinton’s Money Troubles

[FarCenter]

By MICHAEL LUO -- Published: February 23, 2008 -- New York Times

It was just $2,492.63, a pittance, really, alongside million-dollar television buys and direct mail drops. But with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s bid for the Democratic presidential nomination enduring a rough patch, Peter Semetis, the owner of a deli and catering business in Lower Manhattan, had been following the news and growing increasingly worried that he was not going to be paid for the assorted breakfast trays, coffee, tea and orange juice he had provided the campaign for an event in mid-December.

...

Mr. Semetis catered a Clinton event, a rally she did not attend, at the offices of District Council 37, the public employees’ union, on Dec. 15, charging the campaign $2,300, plus $192.63 in tax. Officials promised him that his business, Sale & Pepe Fine Foods, would be paid by check or credit card in a couple of weeks. After a few weeks passed, he started calling to see about the holdup.

...

After a reporter from The New York Times contacted the Clinton campaign on Friday, Howard Wolfson, Mrs. Clinton’s communications director, said a check to pay Mr. Semetis had been put through the day before, and he furnished a copy of the check, dated Feb. 21, as proof. When asked to explain the delay, he said only: “We do our best to pay our vendors in a timely fashion.”

Mr. Semetis, however, is not the only one who has been having trouble lately collecting money from the Clinton campaign. The Hotel Ottumwa, a family-owned hotel in Ottumwa, Iowa, played host to an event attended by former President Bill Clinton on New Year’s Eve for several hundred people and had been trying for almost a month and a half to get paid. The hotel had initially asked for payment of the $9,125 bill up front but kept being put off. But the owners figured that if any political campaign was good for it, Mrs. Clinton’s would be.

...

[Debi]

1. Yep

They should have held off a couple of million dollars of payment to Mark Penn and paid the Boys and Girls Club and smaller Iowa School Districts.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x4697277

[Medusa]

2. a deadbeat president

yeah that's exactly what this country needs. :eyes:

[Debi]

3. I hope her staff finally got paid

since she told the MSM that they were NOT working without pay. (Then her FEC report comes out and the DID work without pay for part of the month of January :eyes:)

[UALRBSofL]

13. That was a very harsh thing to say about Clinton

And I'm alerting that post.

[Debi]

16. If the post is taken down I'll repeat it - She lied to the media when she said her staff

was getting paid. Her FEC report proves otherwise. She didn't pay her staff/small school districts/small county Democratic parties/food vendors/small hotels/INSURANCE costs.

What is the definition of deadbeat?

dictionary: deadbeat1 (dĕd'bēt') Slang.
n.
One who does not pay one's debts.
http://www.answers.com/topic/deadbeat

[Tatiana]

22. She didn't pay the very people who need the money.

It would be one thing if she we were talking about huge conglomerates who have enough operating $$$ to wait, but these seem like local and small vendors.

[Debi]

23. That's right Boys and Girls Clubs - YWCAs - YMCAs n/t

[asdjrocky]

4. Penn is one of my only problems with the Clintons.

But he is a BIG problem for me.

[Debi]

6. What does it say that he's seeing about $1-2 million a month in salary

and caterers/hotels/delis/schools/county parties/STAFF are not getting paid?

Here's another thread on it:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=4721512&mesg_id=4721512

[asdjrocky]

9. Oh, you don't have to tell me-

I was writing about Penn, and all of his dirty crap back in November. Just take a look at my journal.

In 94 when the Clintons lost Congress they invited Penn into the inner circle, and he's been marching them to the right, ever since.

[Debi]

10. And fleecing them in the process! n/t

[Whisp]

12. accountability!

:rofl:

[Debi]

19. ZERO! n/t

[babylonsister]

5. How irresponsible. Is this how they plan on running the country? nt

[Debi]

7. Hmmmm

Their wealthy friends get taken care of with our $$ while we and our friends get shafted x( Sound familiar :shrug:

[Robeson]

8. Robin Hood in reverse....

...yeah, we've seen the past eight years.

[Debi]

11. Why ask for more of the same? n/t

[hendo]

14. Can this really be real?

Just imagine what would happen to any one of us if we ran up a huge bill and then didn't pay it for two months.

How can we trust someone to run the country when she cant even pay her own bills on time?

[Debi]

17. Look for yourself

Here's her campaign debts owed through the most recent FEC reporting

http://query.nictusa.com/pres/2008/M2/C00431569/D_DEBTS_C00431569.html

[workinclasszero]

15. Hey Penn gets paid first...

After all, he is the genius that is running such a magnificent campaign for Hillary. :rofl:

[Debi]

18. Maybe he's saving up

knowing it might be his last?

[VolcanoJen]

21. Did you hear about the New Hampshire landlord who finally got his check...

... from the Clinton campaign, and promptly donated the full amount to Obama? :-)

[VolcanoJen]

20. Dirty politics: Clinton campaign leaves trail of filth in abandoned offices

Not to pile on, but...

http://wonkette.com/354290/clintons-campaign-leaves-trail-of-filth-in-abandoned-offices

[Debi]

24. Clinton County Iowa

<snip

And a building manager in Clinton, Iowa found in the wake of Hillary’s team a befouled dungheap where once there was a pleasant six-room suite. The chairwoman of the Clinton County Democrats said she was “shocked” and “frustrated” to hear about what a pack of savages the Clinton team had been.

Sadly, unlike the last time Clinton staffers were accused of defiling abandoned premises, nobody seems to have left behind any mysterious “porn bombs.”

<snip>

+++++

Nice place along the Mississippi River. Awful of the staff to do that.

[Johnny__Motown]

25. Poll Question: Which candidate cares about people like you? After reading this......