Dick Morris Baselessly Accuses Clintons Of Money Laundering
Reported by Ellen - February 9, 2008 -
Once again, FOX News, the “real journalism, fair and balanced” network, brought on Dick Morris to grind his axe against Hillary Clinton with unsubstantiated accusations. Last night, February 8, 2007, on Hannity & Colmes, Morris speculated, with no evidence other than his second-hand assessment of Clinton’s finances, that the $5 million she recently lent her campaign came from money-laundered funds from Dubai. An obviously furious Alan Colmes looked as though he wanted to throw Morris off the set. With video.
The video below starts with Colmes’ go-round with Morris in the second of a two-part discussion about (who else?) the Clintons. Colmes told Morris that the Clinton campaign’s financial troubles have been blown out of proportion because after she loaned her campaign $5 million, she raised $6.5 million on the internet. “That was a one day story,” Colmes said. “People hang on to this idea that she can’t pay her staff which is not true. They’re now getting paid. So let’s put this in perspective.”
Morris said (and Colmes agreed) that the proper perspective is that Obama has out-raised Clinton. Then Morris added, “What worries me is not the $5 million. It’s where it came from.”
“Do you have any evidence to know where it came from?” Colmes asked.
Bottom line: No, Morris didn’t. But he did not let lack of hard facts stop him from making slimy accusations against the Clintons anyway. “A large portion of (Bill Clinton’s) income, an undisclosed portion, comes from Dubai. The emir of Dubai, Ron Berkle, the supermarket guy, and Bill set up a partnership to manage Dubai’s assets. It was reported in the Wall Street Journal three weeks ago that Clinton wanted a $20 million buy out from that deal. If he got the $20 million buy out and took five of it and Hillary put it into the campaign, that was money laundering.”
Colmes was angry. “This is all if,” he said. As Morris interrupted, Colmes added, “You’ve got to let the other person speak, too. This is all if. The fact of the matter is and according to (Clinton spokesperson) Howard Wolfson, who I’m sure you will discount with your back of the hand, whatever money she’s putting in the campaign is coming from her income, not his. She made $7 million on her book. You’ve no evidence that her own money was not…”
“Alan, are you serious?” Morris asked derisively, interrupting again. “She made $7 million from her book. She lives in the United States, she pays 40% taxes on it. She lives off it. She makes $200,000 a year in the Senate and from that she gave $5 million to her campaign?”
“You have no evidence,” Colmes began.
“What, does she dress in a barrel?” Morris said. He and Hannity laughed uproariously.
“You’re just mean-spirited,” Colmes said, disgusted. “You can sit and laugh and I’m sure you’re really proud of yourself (he may have said “yourselves”) and think you’re very funny.”
“Come on!” Morris said. “$7 million plus 1.4 million, 8.4 in a 40% tax bracket’s four and a half million. She didn’t eat, she hasn’t dressed, she just gave 5 million bucks?”
Colmes said, “The fact of the matter is, you have no evidence whatsoever and you’re doing this all on speculation because of your blind hatred for the Clintons.”
And before the segment wrapped up, there was a bit more bickering between Hannity and Colmes.
Comment: Couldn’t Hillary have banked the book money and lived off Bill’s money? Couldn’t she have put the book money into some kind of trust, corporation or partnership that did not pay 40% in taxes? Couldn’t she have gotten a loan of $5 million to give her campaign? Some combination of the above? It’s more than irresponsible for a national news network to be airing this kind of speculation without any foundation or investigation. Yet, it happens repeatedly with Morris.
I’m sure if a liberal guest were to speculate about Dick Cheney’s secret energy meetings, the profits the Bush administration high-ups have made as the result of the Iraq war, why Bush refused to testify under oath during the 9/11 hearings, etc., that guest would not get one hundredth of the respect that Morris gets every week on FOX News.
