# Podiumgate (Arkansas) - how big a deal is this?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245
**Category:** Politics & Elections
**Created:** [October 7, 2023, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245 "2023-10-07T14:41:37Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/21 "2023-10-07T16:49:18Z")
I am definitely against Huckabee, but this does not seem like a major deal. This seems like the type of thing I’d dismiss if it was against a candidate I support, so I’ll dismiss it against a candidate I don’t support.
She is terrible leader and has terrible policies.
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### Author:  [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/22 "2023-10-07T17:00:03Z")
Much ado …yada yada yada.
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### Author:  [@CairoCarol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CairoCarol)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/23 "2023-10-07T17:19:17Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#):
>
> this does not seem like a major deal.
Perhaps so, but a taped-up lock in the Watergate building didn’t seem like a big deal either. It’s where it all eventually led that was the scandal.
So far, this appears as if it could be similar. If all they did was buy a podium with funds that weren’t intended for that purpose, it may very well be small potatoes. But if the linked story is accurate, it seems like the administration is going through an awful lot of trouble to obscure a relatively minor bit of possible wrongdoing. THAT makes me wonder where this might all lead.
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### Author:  [@Moriarty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moriarty)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/24 "2023-10-07T17:30:27Z")
> [@Shoeless](#):
>
> Turns out the company who made the podium is owned by a BFF of SHS. Who, as people start digging through social media discover, was not only with SHS (along with a third woman) in Paris, out partying quite a bit, but they have also been seen together at many other government and social functions over the years.
So I’ll ask the salacious question: any chance this is a secret paramour?
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### Author:  [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/25 "2023-10-07T17:31:41Z")
If this is no big deal, why did Sanders apparently go (and continues to go) to such great lengths to cover it up? Either she’s a moron who’s covering up a nothing scandal, or there’s something embarrassing there (or worse).
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### Author:  [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/26 "2023-10-07T17:40:54Z")
IMO…she’s a liar. Who lies about everything. She learned from her former employer.
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### Author:  [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/27 "2023-10-07T17:41:22Z")
I doubt it. There were three women - Sanders, Virginia Beckett (who owns the company making the podium) and someone named Hannah Stone. Social media sleuths have found pictures of the three of them traveling all over the world the last few years.
If I had to speculate on the answer to my own question above (what’s a podium got to do with international travel to a trade show?) my guess would be that the invoice for the podium was to actually cover travel expenses for Beckett and possibly also Stone. Which would explain why it’s mixed in with the expense reports for the trip, and also why the actual podium doesn’t seem to exist.
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### Author:  [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Son_of_a_Rich)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/28 "2023-10-07T17:56:05Z")
Maybe suspicions wouldn’t have been so aroused if it had been 4 podiums at 5 each. That would almost seem reasonable. I think it probably went like this: “You look depressed. Would 20 thousand dollars and a trip to Paris cheer you up?”
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### Author:  [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/29 "2023-10-07T19:48:41Z")
Anyone who could possibly hold Sanders accountable is also a Republican so nothing will happen, especially now that taxpayer money has been removed from the equation.
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### Author:  [@CairoCarol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CairoCarol)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/30 "2023-10-07T20:08:36Z")
It looks like so far only two people have clicked on the article. I have no idea how reliable the author is, but he makes several references to the fact that Republicans aren’t thrilled with Sanders:
> …Arkansas is a pretty Republican state at this point. But the FOIA changes are too big a pill for even state Republicans to swallow…
>
> …This seems to have been enough for a lot of state Republicans. One state Senator, James Hickey, called for the Legislative Joint Auditing Executive Committee to investigate the whole situation and get to the bottom of it…
>
> …My informants back in Arkansas tell me that Gov. Sanders had already burnt through a lot of good will through a generally high-handed and bulldozing approach to pushing through her legislative agenda — something many of us will likely recognize or find familiar from her stint as White House Press Secretary. She’s Arkansas and Trumpite royalty so she probably would have gotten away with all that. But it’s made even state Republicans not terribly interested in going out on a limb with her…
If all of that is true, she may eventually be in trouble as long as the Republicans feel they have a replacement for her.
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### Author:  [@slicedalone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slicedalone)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/31 "2023-10-07T20:21:03Z")
Amazed they didn’t go straight to “What about Hunter Biden?”
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### Author:  [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/32 "2023-10-07T20:41:17Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#):
>
> I am definitely against Huckabee, but this does not seem like a major deal.
> [@Aspenglow](#):
>
> This is a pretty tangential connection, to post a story about bedbugs in Paris.
To bring this tangential hijack back into relevance to this thread, evidence of blatant corruption, no matter how minor, should always be a big deal in the same way that finding a single bedbug in your house is always a big deal. You don’t know the degree of the infestation and, if left unchecked, the infestation will always grow.
The only forces that hold corruption at bay are the integrity of elected leaders and our willingness to mete consequences upon those leaders if they fail to live up to our ideals. If those forces ever falter, then corruption inevitably seeps into the system. As citizens in a democracy, it’s our job to hold leaders to a high standard and enact consequences for failure to meet our standards, otherwise, we get the leadership we deserve.
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### Author:  [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/33 "2023-10-07T20:43:15Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#):
>
> The only forces that hold corruption at bay are the integrity of elected leaders and our willingness to mete consequences upon those leaders if they fail to live up to our ideals. If those forces ever falter, then corruption inevitably seeps into the system. As citizens in a democracy, it’s our job to hold leaders to a high standard and enact consequences, otherwise, we get the leadership we deserve.
I agree with all this. But tangential asides about bedbugs lead to lengthy, non-relevant hijacks in the thread – and that’s a different matter.
If you wish to argue the moderation further, don’t do it in this thread.
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### Author:  [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/34 "2023-10-07T22:25:53Z")
Do you want your politicians to take a stand or not?
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### Author:  [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/35 "2023-10-07T22:33:26Z")
> [@CairoCarol](#):
>
> I have no idea how reliable the author is… (snip)
If you have some time, poke around the Talking Points Memo site, read some of Josh Marshall’s posts in the edblog or listen to a couple of the podcasts. Marshall has been doing political analysis since the GW Bush era, which is when I first started reading Talking Points Memo (which was originally just his blog). He’s pretty sharp.
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### Author:  [@chela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chela)
#### Post date: [October 7, 2023, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/36 "2023-10-07T23:32:55Z")
> [@Shoeless](#):
>
> I doubt it. There were three women - Sanders, Virginia Beckett (who owns the company making the podium) and someone named Hannah Stone. Social media sleuths have found pictures of the three of them traveling all over the world the last few years.
Just girls wanting to have fun, with a podium in Paris.
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### Author:  [@Moriarty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moriarty)
#### Post date: [October 8, 2023, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/37 "2023-10-08T01:13:33Z")
> [@Shoeless](#):
>
> If I had to speculate on the answer to my own question above (what’s a podium got to do with international travel to a trade show?) my guess would be that the invoice for the podium was to actually cover travel expenses for Beckett and possibly also Stone. Which would explain why it’s mixed in with the expense reports for the trip, and also why the actual podium doesn’t seem to exist.
That makes sense. I recall a congressman who had been bringing his friend along on trips by classifying him as a photographer.
Do we even know if this company makes podiums? I presume it’s a furniture company.
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### Author:  [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)
#### Post date: [October 8, 2023, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/38 "2023-10-08T03:18:24Z")
It ain’t necessarily the crime, it’s the cover up! As DJT is experiencing with the classified documents.
And it simply amazes me how cheaply politicians can be bribed in America, and I’m not even gonna get to the Supreme Court.
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### Author:  [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)
#### Post date: [October 8, 2023, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/39 "2023-10-08T04:53:28Z")
> [@chela](#):
>
> Just girls wanting to have fun, with a podium in Paris.
There’s a movie in there, somewhere.
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [October 8, 2023, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/podiumgate-arkansas-how-big-a-deal-is-this/991245/40 "2023-10-08T05:03:37Z")
_A Lectern for the Worst_
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