Comments on: John Edwards, (his own) lenders, Lakoff, bumper stickers, & blind trust(s)

By: JackD

JackD — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 22:45:23 +0000

I think there were some analogous issues for Kerry and his wife that may have involved blind trusts. There is nothing about the blind trust process that prevents the beneficiary from instructing the trustee to disclose the assets to a governmental agency or to the press. The beneficiary is not supposed to be able to access the information for his own use or investment instructions that are specific as to holdings as opposed to classes of holdings.

By: zinya

zinya — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 22:01:31 +0000

hm, the link you gave didn’t work (said it had expired) but I’m guessing that this AP report — also on yahoo on the 13th — is either the same or similar?:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070813/ap_on_el_pr/romney_wealth

and, you’re right, it’s interesting and, to me, raises more questions, which I seem to be full of: Who’s kidding whom in calling these things “blind trusts’? With the kind of disclosure that Romney had to make about it — and had the leverage to postpone until he could get through his first straw poll — it’s obviously not blind anymore to him or to anyone else, yet that’s still what they’re calling it. And yet the one in their children’s name — with $100 million of obviously Romney’s own money in there — isn’t subject to disclosure? What kind of “loophole” is that?

I also came across this, which I’d hadn’t seen mention of before but is ‘old news’ already (well, i’d read of Obama’s ‘swipes’ at Hillary re India but not that it resulted from a blind-trust selloff–btw, I wonder how much that contributed to the stock market woes :-)]

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/06/15/2008-clintons-stock-sell-off/#more-1871

June 15, 2007, 9:18 am
2008: Clinton’s Stock Sell-Off
By Michael Falcone

In an attempt to clear Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s path toward the Democratic party’s presidential nomination of any potential conflicts of interest, Bill and Hillary Clinton have dissolved a blind trust that once held millions of dollars of the couple’s assets. The Times’s Patrick Healy reports on the details of the Clinton’s investments and on the politics behind the sell-off:

The Clintons liquidated the trust — valued at $5 million to $25 million — and are leaving the proceeds for now in cash in an effort to eliminate any chance of ethical problems or political embarrassment from their holdings as Mrs. Clinton runs for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, their advisers said. By disposing of all their stocks, Mrs. Clinton was seeking to avoid potential conflicts of interest that might arise from legislation that she votes on in the Senate, as well as avoid holding financial stakes in companies and industries — like Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation, the owner of Fox News — that could draw criticism from some Democratic voters.

The campaign of Illinois Senator Barack Obama seized the opportunity to take a swipe at Mrs. Clinton:

Shortly after the Clinton campaign released the financial information, the campaign of Senator Barack Obama, the Illinois Democrat, circulated to news organizations — on what it demanded be a not-for-attribution-basis — a scathing analysis. It called Mrs. Clinton “Hillary Clinton (D-Punjab)” in its headline. The document referred to the investment in India and Mrs. Clinton’s fund-raising efforts among Indian-Americans. The analysis also highlighted the acceptance by Mr. Clinton of $300,000 in speech fees from Cisco, a company the Obama campaign said has moved American jobs to India.

By: JackD

JackD — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 16:30:25 +0000

I googled “revealing details of blind trusts” and came up with an 8/13 AP story about Mitt Romney’s trusts and their administration: http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/070813/romney-wealth.html?.v=2.

It’s an interesting example. I recall seeing some similar stories on Illinois state office holders in the past but don’t have the details.

By: zinya

zinya — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 01:37:28 +0000

Has this ever happened? that a candidate ‘suffered’ because of specifically ‘blind trust’ holdings? I don’t recall such ‘news’ ever. I guess I just don’t see how anyone ever comes to know about such things once they’ve gone ‘blind’ … I don’t recall the media ever badgering someone in politics to release blind-trust info. Am I just forgetting? Seems like it would take a pretty blatant suspicion on the part of the media — like, say, Tom DeLay claiming he doesn’t have any investments in cockroach companies [:-)] — that would get the media badgering him to reveal a blind trust [and good luck with that]…

capito. sort of.

By: JackD

JackD — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 01:16:23 +0000

Zinya,
You’re not obtuse. The topic is arcane. Noone can demand the details of a candidate’s blind trust, it is true, but a candidate can be intimidated, badgered, bullied, and embarassed into releasing the information or the information can be leaked. If it turns out that, unbenownst to the candidate, the trust has holdings in some politically incorrect activity, the candidate will suffer for not having prevented that.
If they don’t set up the trust, they have to personally monitor each transaction which will absorb time they would rather spend differently.
Then too, if the blind trust utilizes mutual funds instead of direct investments such as Edwards’ investment in the hedge fund that had an interest in the subprime lender, that is an additional buffer of “I didn’t know”. Edwards had to get out quickly because it was hard to argue that he shouldn’t have known even if he didn’t.
Capiche?

Jack