 - Last login: 2 hours agoLunaticprophet
- lunaticprophet is a guy from Chicago, Illinois, USA.
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- Member since Apr 16, 2005
"A popular Government without popular information, or the means of acquiring, it is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy, or perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives."
-- James Madison, 4th President of the United States [1822]
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/08/AR2008050803494.html?hpid=topnews
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May 9, 9:29am
1 review
•http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/...
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Mr. (Integrity re:'Lobbyist Whore') McCain Pushed Land Swap That Benefits Backer
From the page: "Sen. John McCain championed legislation that will let an Arizona rancher trade remote grassland and ponderosa pine forest here for acres of valuable federally owned property that is ready for development, a land swap that now stands to directly benefit one of his top presidential campaign fundraisers.
Initially reluctant to support the swap, the Arizona Republican became a key figure in pushing the deal through Congress after the rancher and his partners hired lobbyists that included McCain's 1992 Senate campaign manager, two of his former Senate staff members (one of whom has returned as his chief of staff), and an Arizona insider who was a major McCain donor and is now bundling campaign checks.
When McCain's legislation passed in November 2005, the ranch owner gave the job of building as many as 12,000 homes to SunCor Development, a firm in Tempe, Ariz., run by Steven A. Betts, a longtime McCain supporter who has raised more than $100,000 for the presumptive Republican nominee. Betts said he and McCain never discussed the deal.
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Although the bill called for the two parcels to be of equal value, a federal forestry official told a congressional committee that he was concerned that "the public would not receive fair value" for its land. A formal appraisal has not yet begun. A town official opposed to the swap said other Yavapai Ranch land sold nine years ago for about $2,000 per acre, while some of the prime commercial land near a parcel that the developers will get has brought as much as $120,000 per acre."
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Other critics included a national taxpayer group that questioned the land values. "It was just a bad deal -- a rip-off to the public," said Janine Blaeloch, who heads the Western Lands Project, another opponent of the legislation.
McCain initially withheld support for Hayworth's bill, which failed in 2002. Ruskin saw McCain's restraint as an obstacle. He said Senate staff members warned him that the senator was wary of a swap because "he spent some political capital and got some bricks thrown at him" over the Tonto National Forest deal.
Ruskin, who is a pediatrician by training, said he realized he needed to hire lobbyists "to open communications with McCain's office."
He turned to some of McCain's closest former advisers. In 2002, he sought out Mark Buse, McCain's former staff director at the Senate commerce committee, which the senator chaired.
"I had gone to him to see if he had any advice as to how to deal with McCain," Ruskin said. "We had a couple of meetings and I paid him a little bit." Buse's federal lobbying records do not list the ranch as a client.
That year, lobbying records show, Ruskin also paid $60,000 to Michael Jimenez, another former McCain aide. Wes Gullett, who had worked in McCain's Senate office, managed his 1992 reelection bid, and served as deputy campaign manager for his 2000 presidential run, also lobbied on the bill, documents show. The watchdog group Public Citizen lists Gullett and his wife, Deborah, as bundlers who have raised more than $100,000 for McCain's White House bid. Ruskin also hired Gullett's partner, Kurt R. Davis, another McCain bundler and member of the senator's Arizona leadership team, to work with local officials and "to help with McCain if we needed help." Buse, Jimenez and Gullett did not return calls seeking comment.
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