The story breaks new ground on two main points:
First, part of what was supposedly held in trust couldn't have possibly been "blind":
Most blind trusts involve a transfer of assets from their owner to the trust. But this document [setting up Barbour’s blind trust] explicitly said that several of Barbour's assets, including his interest in BG&R's parent company, would not be transferred. Instead, Norquist would simply assume "full control and dominion over" them. That meant that Barbour, rather than the trust, would pay taxes on these assets and would therefore know he owned them and how much they were worth. The trust would be anything but blind.
And Barbour is still visiting his lobbying firm:
So has Barbour really severed ties to his old lobbying outfit? There is one final detail worth contemplating before passing judgment. A little before 9 a.m. local time on the morning of June 19 of this year, a Cessna carrying Barbour departed Jackson-Evers airport in Mississippi for Washington, D.C. The flight touched down at Dulles airport a few minutes after noon, marking the fifteenth time since January 1, 2007, that the governor’s plane had landed in the Washington area.
Just under an hour later, tnr observed a hulking black GMC Yukon deposit Barbour outside a nondescript building at 1275 Pennsylvania Avenue, the site of the lobbying firm Barbour Griffith & Rogers. Barbour, wearing a dark suit and a sea-blue tie and identifiable by his nature-defying helmet of hair, strolled into the building alone, save for a laptop carrying-case and a cell phone. He stopped to exchange a few words with a receptionist, then disappeared from view. Roughly 90 minutes later, he exited the building with a red-headed man at his side. The two entered the Yukon and rode away down Pennsylvania Avenue. Just another day at that “little lobbyin’ firm up in Washington, D.C.”
So what do y'all think?
The K Street Evil Genius Who Took Over Mississippi
I have personally heard Haley Barbour lie on the stump. He does so with complete impunity because the local media is either too lazy or too confused or just simply afraid to take the time to point out the untruths in his carefully worded phrases. He is clearly trying to cover up his continued participation with BGR by not personally revealing the truth about his so-called blind trust. History will prove (or perhaps the courts will prove sooner) that his administration has been the most corrupt in our state's history. He plays the race card at every turn, repeats manufactured "facts" that support his diabolical political agenda crafted solely for his own or his family's or his cronies' financial gain, and NOBODY local calls him on it.In fact, the local media only repeats the mantra that Barbour is expected to win. It is very telling that the truth is having to be told by outside media. Evil genius? Absolutely.
ReplyDeleteI was wondering if you saw this article. i'd missed it for a few days and then saw it out of the corner of my eye on the PC...later remembering it at 3am when i couldn't sleep because i was reading about baseball, wishing the season had another month or 2.
ReplyDeleteI need to reread the whole thing again. I really raced through it to get up a post.
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