Mark Penn and Top McCain Advisor Lobbied For Ahmed Chalabi

[DrFunkenstein]

“Running a presidential campaign is good for business.” Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton’s chief strategist and the Worldwide CEO of international public relations/ lobbying firm Burson-Marsteller, wrote those telling words in his confidential internal corporate blog.

In the past, the company has also represented the Chinese National Offshore Oil Co, the Russian Government Press Office, Haiti, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, and Ahmed Chalabi, the disgraced president of the Iraqi National Congress who pushed for the overthrow of Saddam. But most of the firm’s clients remain secret: Unless direct lobbying is involved, there is no disclosure requirement.

http://www.hillaryproject.com/?/en/story-details/conflict_of_interest_burson_marsteller_and_hillary_clintons_alliance/

Senator Clinton also took credit for strengthening U.S. ties with Ahmad Chalabi, the convicted embezzler who played a major role in convincing key segments of the administration, Congress, the CIA, and the American public that Iraq still had proscribed weapons, weapons systems, and weapons labs.

She has expressed pride that her husband’s administration changed underlying U.S. policy toward Iraq from “containment” – which had been quite successful in defending Iraq’s neighbors and protecting its Kurdish minority – to “regime change,” which has resulted in tragic warfare, chaos, dislocation, and instability.

In addition, although top strategic analysts correctly informed her that there were no links between Saddam Hussein’s secular nationalist regime and the radical Islamist al-Qaeda, Senator Clinton insisted that Saddam “has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members.”

http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/4802

A host of prominent Republicans fall under Penn's purview. B-M's Washington lobbying arm, BKSH & Associates, is run by Charlie Black, a leading GOP operative who maintains close ties to the White House, including Karl Rove, and was a partner with Lee Atwater, the consultant who crafted the Willie Horton smear campaign for George H.W. Bush in 1988. In recent years Black's clients have included the likes of Iraq's Ahmad Chalabi, the darling of the neocon right in the run-up to the war; Lockheed Martin; and Occidental Petroleum.

http://www.hillaryproject.com/?/en/story-details/hillary_inc/

Can anyone still doubt Ahmad Chalabi's place among history's great con men? Last week's police raid on his Baghdad offices—following reports that he'd supplied U.S. intelligence secrets to Iran—signaled the collapse of his once-mighty power base in Washington.

But con men tend to thrive when their marks WANT to be conned. And President George W. Bush's national-security team was rife with the most gullible marks imaginable. As long as Chalabi's interests converged with the Bush team's interests, he was their man.

http://www.slate.com/id/2101123/



Edited to Shorten Up Headline

[tekisui]

1. Chalabi?

Hillary should have taken the chance to fire him. This will drag on for another week.

[DrFunkenstein]

4. Chance to Fire Him? She Was Backing Chalabi, Too!

See quote by the very respected Stephen Zunes above.

[tekisui]

6. I was referring to her chance to fire him after the Columbian Union Buster Lobbying.

Everyday Penn stays on her campaign is a day to look into these kinds of stories.

[DrFunkenstein]

10. AFP: US defends decision to renew Blackwater (another Penn client) deal in Iraq

The State Department on Monday cited the need to protect staff in Iraq as justification for renewing a contract with private security firm Blackwater USA without prior Iraqi government approval.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, interviewed by the US television network CNN, complained that Washington had renewed the contract without his government's approval, adding the issue was still under consideration.

The company's guards shot dead 17 Iraqi civilians while escorting an American diplomat through Baghdad in a September 16, 2007 incident that the Iraqi government considers a crime.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080407/pl_afp/usiraqunrestsecurityblackwater;_ylt=Ar5OthqGJHvLlP8k69qAjdRWr7sF

I don't who their lobbyist was to get a contract renewed after sending the region into flames by murdering 17 civilians in cold blood, but the guy is good (in a loosely defined sense of the word).

[libnnc]

2. whoa

nelly

[stellanoir]

3. Anyone who would fall for bogus intelligence from a known extortionist and

a guy who's handle is "Curveball" has no business being in being involved in governance.

[berni_mccoy]

5. KICK for the Truth.

[jazzjunkysue]

7. "Firing"="Sending him over to your enemy: And he knows your dirtly little secrets.

Lord only knows what laundry he could hang her with if she ever cut him loose: She probably can't afford to piss him off that much. He could write a tell-all or sell his story to a magazine. At this point, he's in too deep to let him go.

[40ozDonkey]

8. Didn't Chalabi tell the Iranians we were listening in on them?

That's why they raided his offices in Iraq, isn't it?

[Oilwellian]

9. He told the Iranians we had broken their codes

(CBS/AP) A small number of civilian Pentagon employees are being given lie detector tests in an effort to determine who told Iraqi leader Amhad Chalabi that the U.S. had broken secret codes used by Iran, according to the New York Times.

CBS News Correspondent Jim Stewart reports FBI counter-intelligence agents are focusing on the highest levels of the Pentagon in the probe. The code break was a closely held secret known only to small group of key officials.

Sources have told CBS News that Chalabi tipped Iran to the fact that the codes have been broken, saying he had gotten the information from an unidentified American.

Chalabi has denied passing any classified information to Iran, and his supporters assert that the CIA is trying to destroy the former exile.

In a bid to turn the tables on his accusers, Chalabi's U.S. lawyers have asked the Justice Department conduct an investigation into who gave the "false leaks" to the media.

Several news organizations, including CBS, The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times learned of the alleged betrayal from U.S. intelligence agencies weeks ago. But the news organizations agreed to withhold reporting it until recently because of U.S. attempts to shore up the intelligence losses.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/05/20/iraq/main618637.shtml

The last I heard, Chalabi is the oil minister in Iraq. Convenient, eh?

[dkf]

11. Wow Mark Penn is poisonous...

Are all these campaign pollsters connected to interests like the Colombian Govt. and Chalabi's group?