[corp-focus] Crooks

[Robert Weissman]

Crooks
By Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman

The two major political parties are crooked.

Without shame, they take big money from criminals.

Corporate Crime Reporter last week released a report documenting $9.3
million given by convicted criminals to the Democrats and the
Republicans in the 2002 election cycle. (See the full report, "Dirty
Money: Corporate Criminal Donations to the Two Major Parties," at www.corpo=
ratecrimereporter.com)

The Democrats took $2.1 million of the dirty money, the Republicans took
$7.2 million.

Terry McAuliffe, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee,
condemns President Bush for his "inability to stand up to corporate crimina=
ls."

Et tu, Terry?

President Bush talks a tough line on corporate crime, but then pockets
millions from the crooks and proceeds to dismantle the enforcement
agencies that would crack down on the most serious of those crimes.

Both Deborah DeShong, communications director of the Democratic National
Committee, and Christine Iverson, press secretary for the Republican
National Committee, did not return calls seeking comment on this story.

Probably the right move.

How can a political party defend taking money from convicted corporate crim=
inals?

It is indefensible.

The Dirty Money report found that 31 major convicted corporations gave
the $9.3 million to the two political parties in the 2002 election cycle.

(These soft money contributions will be prohibited in future elections,
due to the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform legislation. However,
corporate criminal campaign funding will still flow from company PACs,
company executives' hard money contributions and burgeoning "527" issue
committees, and to state parties.)

Archer Daniels Midland -- ADM -- tops the list of criminals that gave
money to the parties.

ADM pled guilty in 1996 to one of the largest antitrust crimes ever. The
company paid a $100 million criminal fine -- at the time, the largest
criminal antitrust fine ever.

The company was convicted of engaging in conspiracies to fix prices, to
eliminate competition, and to allocate sales in the lysine and citric
acid markets worldwide.

So, here we have a major American corporation, convicted of an egregious
antitrust crime that cost us all tens of millions of dollars.

And it turns around and freely gives $1.7 million to Democrats and
Republicans =96 in just the last two years.

And the two major political parties are not ashamed.

They do not blush.

They do not care.

Because it is apparently okay in Washington to take money from convicted
corporate criminals.

The second largest corporate criminal donor is Pfizer, the
pharmaceutical giant, the maker of Lipitor, and Viagra and Zoloft.

In 1999, Pfizer pled guilty to fixing prices in the food additives
industry. The company paid $20 million in fines.

No free market philosophy for ADM and Pfizer -- when in doubt, fix prices.

In the last two years, Pfizer gave $1.1 million to the Democrats and
Republicans. Convicted criminal.

The parties looked the other way.

Chevron was convicted in 1992 of environmental crimes and paid a $6.5
million criminal fine. Chevron gave $875,400 in the 2002 election cycle
to both parties.

Grumman, which was convicted in 1990 of false statements -- lying --
gave $741,250 to both political parties in the most recent election cycle.

And American Airlines, convicted in 2000 of illegal storage of hazardous
waste at Miami airport, paid a fine of $8 million, and then turned
around and donated $655,593 to the Democrats and Republicans.

Where is Ann Coulter?

Where is Rush Limbaugh?

Where is Bill Bennett?

Where is Hannity and where is Colmes?

Where are the conservative drumbeaters, condemning criminality at every tur=
n?

Why aren't they raving about the convicted criminals in our midst?

These convicted criminals are companies with massive resources, with the
ability to manipulate the system to avoid the criminal penalty even when
they are caught redhanded.

Yet defying the odds, these companies were caught redhanded and they
were forced to plead guilty to serious crimes.

Last year, during the height of the corporate crime wave, scores of
lawmakers felt it necessary to give back to Enron PACs or to Enron
executives money that had been donated to their campaigns.

These politicians felt a sense of shame =96 especially since the
television cameras were focused non-stop on the issue =96 until Bush moved
the spotlight to Iraq.

Here was Enron, a runaway corporation that epitomized the fast and loose
business ethics of recent years.

That runaway corporation crashed, leaving thousands unemployed and
without pensions. Ever since, Enron executives are being indicted left
and right.

And so, scores of public officials who had financially benefited from
Enron's largesse felt a sense of shame, and felt threatened by an angry
public, so they decided to give the money back to Enron -- or better
yet, to donate it to charity.

It was the right thing to do.

Politicians should not take money from crooked companies, or crooked
executives, or PACs set up by crooked companies.

But Enron has not been indicted.

Enron is not a convicted corporation.

And yet scores of politicians, because of the political heat, because of
the scorching white glare of publicity, decided that Enron money was too
hot to handle.

But what about the convicted corporations that every year donate
millions to both political parties?

We call upon the Democratic and Republican parties to get rid of this
dirty money.

It is tainted money.

It is criminal money.

Give it up.


Russell Mokhiber is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime
Reporter, http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com. Robert Weissman is
editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Multinational Monitor,
http://www.multinationalmonitor.org. They are co-authors of Corporate
Predators: The Hunt for MegaProfits and the Attack on Democracy (Monroe,
Maine: Common Courage Press; http://www.corporatepredators.org).

(c) Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman

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