by Jack Kelly
October 4, 2016

As a young reporter for the Dallas Times Herald, I covered the trials of two of the smaller fry in Watergate. What’s going on now makes me wonder what all the fuss was about back then.

The Clinton Foundation and associated email scandals dwarf Watergate – and every other political scandal in American history.

Besides Watergate (1973-74), the other biggies are Iran-Contra (1985-87), Teapot Dome (1921-22), the Whiskey Ring (1875), and Credit Mobilier (1872-73).

The Reagan administration sold arms to Iran, used the proceeds to buy weapons for anti-Communist guerrillas in Nicaragua. That violated the Boland Amendment, which forbade expenditure of funds to oust the Sandinista regime.

Iraq was then at war with Iran. It was in the interest of the United States to keep these bitter enemies of ours fighting each other for as long as possible. It was also in our interest to keep the Communists from establishing a foothold in Central America.

It was not in America’s interest for the Obama administration to pay $1.7 billion to Iran. Much of that money likely will be used to support Iran’s nuclear program, Hezbollah and terror groups.

Payments to the mullahs violated a law that forbids aid to Iran, said former U.S. attorney Andrew McCarthy. This has elicited barely a murmur of protest from journalists outraged by Iran-Contra.

President Nixon covered up a petty crime (a break-in at the headquarters of the Democrat National Committee in the Watergate office building) of which he had no prior knowledge. The “smoking gun” that brought down the Nixon presidency – an 18 ½ minute gap on a single audio tape – pales into insignificance compared to the destruction of thousands of Hillary Clinton’s emails after they’d been subpoenaed.

Watergate didn’t endanger national security. It’s all but certain Hillary’s use of insecure private servers has provided our enemies with a treasure trove of America’s secrets.

Two deals Secretary of State Clinton approved after donations were made to the Clinton Foundation also endanger our security. She permitted the Russians to take control of 20 percent of U.S. uranium supplies. And she facilitated the transfer of dual use (military and civilian) technologies to the Kremlin.

In 1921, in exchange for money and gifts totaling about $404,000, Interior Secretary Albert Fall granted – on very generous terms and without competitive bidding – leases to oil companies on federal land in Wyoming (Teapot Dome) and California.

Fall went to prison. The Obama administration is doing essentially the same thing with regard to “green” energy firms who want to build on federal lands, but few journalists have noticed.

Comprised mainly of distillers in St. Louis, Chicago and Milwaukee, the Whiskey Ring in 1875 bribed IRS and other government officials to avoid paying the liquor tax. After the ring was exposed by Treasury Secretary Benjamin Bristow, 238 were indicted, 110 convicted.

Ostensibly a holding and construction company created by stockholders of the Union Pacific railroad, Credit Mobilier was basically a scheme to rip off the taxpayers, who subsidized construction of the transcontinental railroad. Credit Mobilier grossly overcharged UP for building the railroad, which passed the bills on to the federal government. Stock was given to key members of Congress to grease support for the sweetheart deal.

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Credit Mobilier involved what was big money in 1872. But even after factoring in inflation, Credit Mobilier, the Whiskey Ring and Teapot Dome added together are chump change compared to what the Clinton Foundation has raked in with its “play for pay” schemes.

Financial analyst Charles Ortel found major discrepancies between what donors say they gave and what the Clinton Foundation reported receiving. The Clintons and their partners have lined their pockets at the expense of the desperately poor, he said.

After a devastating earthquake struck Haiti in 2010, Bill and Hillary controlled dispersal of more than $10 billion in aid funds.

“On earthquake anniversaries Haitians…have made a ritual of searching through the rubble for the reconstruction funds that were donated by good people from all around the world,” said Haitian journalist Dady Cheri. “Everyone asks: ‘Where did the money go?’”

Answer: in the Clintons’ crooked pockets. So – why didn’t Trump say a word about the Crooked Clinton Foundation in the debate last night? The greatest political scandal in American history conducted by a former president and his wife who may be elected president, and he ignored it entirely. Why?

 

— Jack Kelly is a former Marine and Green Beret, and was the Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Air Force during the Reagan Administration, and he is the national security writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. This article originally appeared at To The Point News