[Posted by WLS]

The blogosphere is starting to buzz a little bit over Hillary’s “John Huang”.   Articles in yesterday’s WSJ, a follow-up today, and even a piece in the LAT have got to have the Clinton camp worried about what to say about Norman Hsu.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118826947048110677.html?mod=Politics-and-Policy

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB118835199704811801.html?mod=blog

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-hsu29aug29,1,5355884.story?coll=la-headlines-nation

 John Fund at the WSJ has now posted a entry at the sites Political Diary that he made available to Powerline.

http://www.powerlineblog.com/

As a refresher, recall from 1996:

Bill Clinton benefitted from the political largesse of the Lippo Group, owned by the ruling Riady and Suharto families from Indonesia. 

John Huang was a formerly the head of US Operations for the Lippo Group, controlled by the Riady family of Indonesia, before being named a mid-level Commerce Dept. official in the Clinton Admin.  He enjoyed enormous access to the WH for such a mid-level employee.  As a DNC fundraiser in 1996, he raised $3.4 million for the party and the Clinton re-election effort — mostly from the Aisan-American community.  Huang had been hired in the early 1980s by the Riady Family-owned “Worthern Banking Group” in Little Rock. 

Huang took a 50% pay cut to join the Clinton Admin in 1993, but the blow was softened by a $750,000 severance package from the Lippo Group.  Among the dubious contributions obtained by Mr. Huang was $200,000 donated by an Indonesian gardner, who later had to return to Indonesia to avoid testifying in the Senate investigation into 1996 fundraising practices.  Charlie Trie was the Arkansas restaurantuer and generous financial contributor who received wire transfers of hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Bank of China, but mysteriously relocated to Bejing when subpoenas started to roll out.

Now Hillary has the ubiquitous Mr. Hsu. 

As reported by the WSJ, Mr. Hsu — a wanted felon and fugitive from justice for a fraud conviction in California — has raised more than $1 million already for Hillary’s campaign, including more than $45,000 from the Paw family in San Francisco, who have contributed more than $200,000 to various Democrat candidates and organizations through Mr. Hsu.

Mr. Paw is a mail carrier, earning $49,000 a year.  He donated $4600.

His wife is a homemaker.  She donated $4600.

Their four adult children have various occupations — one is an executive at a mutual fund, while another is a local high school “attendance liason”.  All donated $4600.

The recently refinanced their 1200 square foot house near SF Airport for $270,000.  

What else they all have in common is that their contributions closely track the contributions made by Mr. Hsu to the same candidates and organizations.

The question is whether Hillary’s rivals on the Demo crowd will want to make an issue of this.

Bill got a pass in 1996 because he had no challenger, and the key facts didn’t come out until after the 1996 election.

Now such pass for Hillary.

I predict many days of deep discomfort as they try to figure out what to do about this. 

Rough water ahead.   

[Posted by WLS — aka “Shipwreckedcrew” for all you coming from TPM]

The Leftwingnuts seem to believe that Chertoff is in line to be the AG — I happen to think otherwise, but that’s for another post.

But some clown named Spencer Ackerman, seriously lacking in an understanding of the Bill of Rights, or simply challenged in terms of reading comprehension, has a post up with a couple of links claiming that Chertoff lied in testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee when recounting events surrounding the decision to allow the FBI to interview of John Walker Lindh without the presence of the attorney hired by his parents.

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/004029.php

At issue is a statement given to DOJ Inspector General investigators in 2002 by a DOJ Prosecutor named John De Pue, a 25 year veteran of DOJ.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/docs/depue/

Bottom line — anyone reading De Pue’s affidavit would come away with the exact opposite impression given by Ackerman in his post.  Lets compare what Ackerman claims and what the affidavit states. 

Lets start with the basics — what De Pue was asked to research. (more…)

[Guest post by DRJ]

My Dad grew up on a ranch and he has a lot of country sayings. One of those sayings is “He [or She or It] is a real jewel,” which is his way of saying something is good or special.

Richard Jewell, “the security guard who was wrongly linked to the bombing that marred the 1996 Atlanta Olympics,” died today reportedly from a pre-existing kidney ailment. I never met or knew Mr. Jewell. I only know of him from the media but his untimely death saddens me.

He seemed like a real jewel. RIP.

[posted by Justin Levine] 

I had earlier accused the L.A. Times of ignoring the very important terror financing trial currently underway in Dallas.

Steve Clow (who I presume is the same Steve Clow who is a Times employee) claims that the paper has in fact covered this case.

It turns out that Steve is technically correct – but not enough to get me to retract the main thrust of my criticism. The Times has written three stories on this case respectively dated August 14, 16 & 17.  (I would not describe three stories to be “several” as Mr. Clow does, but I suppose that is a triviality.) Each of the stories deals with only a single witness featured in the trial (an Israeli intelligence agent).  The headlines of each story: “Anonymous testimony allowed at trial“;  “Israeli agent ties charity to terrorists“; and the final story thus far – “Charity trial witness falters“.

NOWHERE does the Times detail the nature of the government’s overall case or give readers a big picture of what is going on. It does not detail any of the evidence that has been provided by outlets such as Counterterrorismblog.org. It does not cover the strong evidence linking CAIR officials to HAMAS and examine what such implications might mean to America.

Compare the coverage that the Counterterrorism blog has provided with what the Times has chosen to emphasize in it opening paragraphs of the last article it has written on the case –

Charity trial witness falters

An Israeli intelligence agent whose earlier testimony linked a U.S.-based Islamic charity to Hamas acknowledged Thursday that none of the overseas charities it supported has appeared among hundreds of names on U.S. government terrorist lists.

The testimony seemed to cast doubt on a central element of the government’s criminal case against former officials of the now-defunct Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development.

Is this a joke?? Apparently so. After all, it is the L.A. Times.  It is perfectly fair to cover holes in the testimony of a prosecution witness. But to concentrate on this side issue as the primary emphasis of your reporting in this case?? [Once again, I ask you to compare this to the kind of coverage that they could be providing if they wanted to.]

No wonder I couldn’t find coverage of this trial in my original search of the paper’s website. I made the mistake of trying to search for obvious terms such as “Ghassan Elashi” (one of the primary defendants in the trial) and “CAIR”. There is not a single mention of either of these names in the Times coverage of this trial (!). In choosing my search terms for coverage of this trial, I guess I should have known to type in “Israeli intelligence agent” instead.

This is like writing three stories concerning Kato Kaelin on the witness stand, and then proclaiming that you have covered the O.J. Simpson trial. While the claim may be technically true, it does nothing to inform the readers what they need to know about the subject.

So to Mr. Clow and the L.A. Times, I will retract my earlier statements and substitute the following criticism instead: Rather than completely ignoring the trial, the L.A. Times has provided minimal, scant and frankly pathetic coverage of this trial that does nothing to educate the reader about the overall nature of the government’s case, the CAIR connections and its significance for America.  

The more I think about it, if this is the only kind of coverage that the L.A. Times is going to offer on this trial, it is probably best that you simply ignore it altogether. Therefore, please disregard my earlier criticisms.

[Guest post by DRJ]

Via Instapundit, Mickey Kaus wonders what you have to do to get on the front page of the LA Times in a movie star town:

“Who Has to Try to Kill Themselves in this Town to Make the Front Page?

I couldn’t believe–just a few days after their prospective new owner gave them a lecture on how they had to give customers the news the customers wanted–that the editors of the L.A. Times would run the Owen Wilson suicide-attempt story on page B-3. And they didn’t! They ran it on page B-4.”

I don’t read the LA Times regularly so this isn’t really my beat. Nevertheless, I’m posting this because I suspect Patterico will not be pleased with my excessive sports and Texas posts during his absence. Maybe a little LA Times’ coverage will earn me brownie points with Patterico when he returns.

[Guest post by DRJ]

The Houston Chronicle reports that Lisa Nowak has been diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome, a disorder sometimes referred to as high-functioning autism:

“In July, NASA reported that a review of her physical and behavioral record showed no indication of psychological problems from the time she reported to the Johnson Space Center in Houston for astronaut training in August 1996.

But according to the notice filed in court Tuesday, Nowak suffers from obsessive compulsive personality disorder and Asperger’s disorder — a neurobiological condition on the mild side of a personality disorder spectrum that includes autism — in addition to depression, insomnia and related significant weight loss.

Asperger’s disorder, usually diagnosed in early childhood, impairs a patient’s ability to socialize and communicate with others, according to the Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research. Children with the disorder typically exhibit social awkwardness and an all-absorbing interest in specific topics.”

NASA must be reeling.