OK, I bit the bullet and read the article, and I’ll play devil’s advocate (I’m an Obama guy.)
So this Timmons guy worked with 2 guys who were convicted of acting as unofficial agents of Saddam. Timmons claims that he didn’t know they were acting as unofficial agents of Saddam, and based on the article, I’m not willing to call him a liar on that. He was working to ease sanctions on Iraq, apparently at the request of Saddam (through these two agents), but there’s nothing inherently wrong with that IMO, since he very well could have felt that it was in the best interest of the Iraqi people.
The only damning information is that he stood to profit from these deals, but the article doesn’t spell out how… all we have is the word of the two guys who got convicted, and another U.N. guy who says that Timmons would have to be very niave not to know that he’d be able to benefit financially.
But the article never went that last step and explained (to my dumb head, at least), how exactly Timmons would have benefited. Did he work for oil companies? Stock? Kickbacks? Aside from getting paid directly for his lobbying efforts, how would he stand to benefit exactly?
Now, he’s a free agent lobbyist who had some bad clients, and that was probably pretty boneheaded. And nobody likes free agent lobbyists anyway. Dude’s probably a sleazeball. But is the evidence really there to declare him to be “Saddam Hussein’s corrupt lobbyist?” That seems somewhat misleading and inflamatory.
Choie, I know I was one of the posters who made a lame joke earlier and I’m sorry about that.
I think there’s a difference between what has “legs” in the general discussion/reportage going on about the election and what has “legs” here.
You alluded to that difference yourself. The fact that magellan01’s thread has “taken off” and yours has far fewer responses is actually quite telling. The number of posts that constitute 99% of the posts in his thread are people actually taking to the time to call bullshit on something that just happens to be making the rounds in the media and that’s quite encouraging.
But it should also be encouraging that few posters have made any attempts in this thread to defend or or hand-wave away the information you posted in your OP, even if those who normally would constitute a smaller proportion of SDMB members. That nearly non-existent number speaks well to your cite and the tacit acknowledgement that these associations can’t be defended on any level, despite the paucity of discussion otherwise.
It’s not that they fling shit and it sticks to the walls. They lob shit into the middle of their mob and then they go and smear it on the walls. It sticks better that way.
Firstly, thanks very much to MEBuckner for the title change! Very surprised that my request was granted; I know you mods are busy and besides, since the poor title was my fault, I figured I was stuck with it. It’s greatly appreciated.
Ah, Democrats. We’re such kind and compassionate souls that we always try to see the other person’s side! But the devil needs no advocate, he does just fine for himself. Sometimes sleaze is indefensible.
Your generosity of spirit is palpable, but what in heaven’s name leads you to extend it to him? His colleague says differently; Vincent testified that he told Timmons about his meetings with Iraqi officials. (And Vincent was testifying against Park, not Timmons; he didn’t have to give up this info.)
As usual in these cases, his actions reveal either shocking naivete (amazing how often these tough oilmen, lobbyists, political advisers and politicians are duped!) or corruption and greed. You think Timmons was a dewy-eyed babe in the woods? He was a Washington insider who “worked as a senior aide to every Republican president since Richard Nixon.” Yeah, I don’t buy that he was just so innocent and warm-hearted toward the Iraqi people that they were his motivation for being an advocate for Saddam Hussein regime. It’s a touching notion, though, I’ll grant you.
Again, that’s Tariq Aziz, one of Saddam’s most well-known henchmen; a man near the top of a U.S. enemy’s government. Remember, Timmons himself put this deal together by convincing Vincent to work with Park. Park’s resume was no secret.
In other words, aside from potentially sharing in a $45 million payment from a vicious, brutal dictator’s regime and enemy of our country, how did he benefit? I guess just the satisfaction of a job well done.
Inflamatory I’ll grant you–I changed the title to get some gazes in this general direction and start more conversation–but I stand by its verity. Of the two excuses, corruption or naivete, the latter just doesn’t fly … not with a man of his experience and background.
Well, I’m not willing to defend this guy much longer, but here goes.
I wouldn’t argue any niavete on his part, excepting to say that I imagine the business of being a lobbyist is inherently sleazy, and requires one to regularly consort with unsavory types. Especially when dealing with Iraq. I’m just not sure if the evidence is there that he full well knew that he was working with people who were working under orders direct from Saddam.
I also still don’t understand where this $45 million was supposed to come from. Was that just his payment for his services? Would that check have born a Hussein signature? The article makes the accusation and throws out the number, but then doesn’t specify where the money was supposed to come from.
Oh you don’t need to apologize! That’s part and parcel of the SDMB’s spirit, and I enjoy this community’s irreverence. My posts were just me being frustrated, not really so much by the lack of conversation here, but in the bigger picture by my almost certain dread/knowledge that this story will be one of many to slide off the Republicans’ slimy hides.
Well, I think that the reason why something wouldn’t have conversational legs here certainly differs from why it won’t fly in the reportage may differ, but not in fact that it’ll probably die a sputtering death in both places. I’m pretty cynical these days.
That’s very true, I agree there! Of course, Drudge, Limbaugh and Hannity hadn’t yet reported on the story and offered them their talking points, so my cheeky response would be that without their input, the usual suspects can’t think of an adequate defense (yet). Cold reading: it’ll start with lambasting the reporter and the Huffington Post as lying partisan leftists.
Ironic, though, that the less defense a side offers to a story, the quicker it fades away. Maybe that was the motivation behind the 2004 Kerry campaign’s frustrating passivism after all; of course, what works here at the SDMB is not true for real life.
I bet they won’t, since they are ahead and the polls are showing that McCain is actually losing support from going negative. I suspect Kerry bringing it up was a shot across the bow - warning McCain that if he brings up the Ayers or Wright shit, Obama will pound him into a photon with dirt that actually is significant.
The cool thing about that is that if McCain brings it up, he gets pounded, and if he doesn’t., the rabble that seems to constitute his base these days think he is a pussy.
Remind me to never, ever play chess against Obama. I’d get clobbered.
I don’t thinks it’s remotely possibile to be a successful politician without occasionally, inadvertently, brushing up against some pretty shady characters. I speculate that there’s no politician into whose you past you couldn’t dig and find some association with some kind of scum bag or other.
Having said that, if McCain is going to try to score points with Ayers, et al., it’s perfectly fair to expose similar connections in McCain’s past. I will stipulate however that someone has to be pretty much a rube to put much stock in worries about whether a politician managed to totally avoid any associations with scum bags.
McCain’s associations have nothing to do with why I can’t vote for him, exepting his idiot pick of Sarah Palin.
It’s not. They hired a lobbyist who has lobbied for hundreds of dudes, including every GOP prez since Nixon. Nor *is he *Saddam Hussein, which is the fucking point. You can hire a lobbyist yourself, anyone can. The lobbyist does not have to agree or support the views of the dudes who hire him, he only has to cash their checks. Nor does that article say that William Timmons actually was a lobbyist for Hussein just that “he worked with” two lobbyists for Iraq. Just about everyone in Washington DC has 'worked with" most of the most influential lobbyist companies. Huffington seems to think this is a big deal. It ain’t.
And just about everyone associated with education in Chicago has “worked with” Ayers. The point for most of us is not that McCain is somehow worse for this relationship (although this particular one gets pretty close to the line IMHO), he’s worse for hypocritically choosing to make such a big deal out of Obama’s associates whilst expecting a pass on his own.
And it doesn’t matter anyway, it’ll be the perception not the reality.
Yes, of course, I know. All hail the mighty dollar! What you do in order to gain it is a-ok with the Republicans! But it’s McCain’s choice and hypocrisy that are at issue here. He’s questioning Obama’s associations and meanwhile picked this sleazemeister to lead his transition team knowing this guy’s been lobbying for Saddam. And yes, Timmons had been doing this. His own efforts were on behalf of the Iraqi government.
No, if I am understanding this article correctly, Timmons didn’t just happen to ‘work with’ these lobbyists. This wasn’t some 500-member law firm where Timmons just passed a pair of associates in the hall now and then. He introduced them and set them up to work together. Timmons was, if you will, the marriage counselor. Assuming he isn’t a naive, ignorant or negligent businessman, he knew what Park was doing, he knew what Vincent was doing, and was looking forward to profitting from it.
Incredible how the right wingers have been weeping and wailing over Obama’s casual link to a guy whose heinous acts were forty years ago, despite the fact that Ayers has no connection to Obama’s current or future plans for his administration. (Former terrorists are not, by the way, banned from good society forever if their current activities turn respectable. Take Gerry Adams, for example, or even Arafat.)
Meanwhile, McCain puts a moral vacuum of a lobbyist – one who has literally taken money from the regime of the most notorious despot in the past twenty years – in charge of his transition team, and the righties apparently are gonna handwave it away. What vile hypocrisy and what hubris on McCain’s part, that he thought this would go unquestioned.
I would be shocked … well, if I’d been born only yesterday and had never seen the Republicans at work.
Well, setting aside the implication that the guy at the top of the ticket isn’t ultimately responsible for the things his own campaign spokespeople and running mate say … the answer is “yes.”
Maybe that was the motivation behind the 2004 Kerry campaign’s frustrating passivism after all; of course, what works here at the SDMB is not true for real life.