Click Here to Access Hundreds of Fresh News & Opinion Articles

-Classics of Liberal Thinking

-archives of articles by our

  regular contributors

-Progressive Radio Links

-OpEdNews.Com Site Map

Bush Brothers Inc.

Excerpt from Bush Unplugged: The True Patriot’s Guide To George W. Bush

By Marc Umile

www.Bushunplugged.com

 

There’s an overwhelming amount of documented evidence in books, articles and internet sites jammed with published reports from highly credible sources, easily accessible to the average citizen, detailing the highly questionable, unethical and often illegal business dealings involving three generations of the Bush dynasty. In Bush Unplugged I’ve documented the more egregious business dealings of George Bush and his brothers, and how two generations of Bushes have made millions from illegal and/or fraudulent scams that ultimately cost working folks and taxpayers billions of dollars. This no money down approach to getting rich quick at the public’s expense became the hallmark of the Bush brother’s business careers, and examined as a whole they speak volumes about the Bush gang’s attitudes toward average working folks. Here are but a few documented highlights culled from the Bush brother’s illicit money trails.

In 1990 George W. came under SEC investigation for an obvious, illegal insider stock trade while he was sitting on the board of Harken Energy, his fourth failed oil company. The fortunate son of the 41^st president walked away clean with close to $900 thousand in “profits” (almost four times the amount of the deal that got Martha Stewart hung out to dry) and used a portion of these ill-gotten proceeds to buy himself a disproportionate slice of the Texas Rangers baseball team. In a craftily orchestrated swindle that boggles the mind, Bush and his “Rangers” instituted a series of highly inventive corporate welfare scams and government sanctioned, private land seizures to build themselves a new ballpark and increase the value of their franchise three-fold.

While Bush was governor in 1998 his Rangers flipped the ball club for a staggering profit—as planned. Governor Bush’s personal take amounted to almost $15 million, while working Texans, the taxpayers and fans who footed with the bill, received nothing in return for their $200 million in public subsidies. As for the landowners… “Anybody, who was in their way, they just ran them over,” said Bucky Fanning, whose 10-acre family horse ranch was seized by the Bush-Rangers in 1991. “I used to be a Rangers fan, but then they stole my property.” It’s interesting to note that top dollar donors to the Bush campaign earn the designation of “Ranger”.

Not to be outdone by his older brother, Jeb Bush came under federal scrutiny three times between 1985 and 1992 for his involvement in crooked business deals with criminal elements who ripped the federal government, read taxpayers, blind. In 1985 Jeb was involved in a Savings and Loan scandal that led to the collapse of Florida Thrift and ultimately cost taxpayers $285 million. Soon after the Feds targeted Jeb for lobbying a federal authority on behalf of a business client whom owned a giant HMO and was accused of $100 million in Medicare fraud, racketeering, wiretapping and ultimately jumping bail and fleeing the U.S. In 1988 Brother Jeb entered into a partnership with a waterpump manufacturer who used $24 million in government loans to bribe Nigerian government officials. All tolled this stacks up to over $400 million in taxpayers dollars!

It’s been well documented that Jeb worked closely with this cast of characters and made off with over $5 million in unpaid loans and kickbacks from these three deals alone. In October 2002, just one month before Jeb’s re-election as Florida’s governor, the Miami Herald reported … “While Jeb Bush has not been implicated in any bribe-paying, the lingering Nigerian affair bears many of the hallmarks of the puzzle that is his 20-year career in business. More than once, Bush, with little or no investment of his own money, has made in a single deal the kind of profit most people don’t see after years of work.”

Not to be outdone by his two older brothers, in 1985 the notorious Neil Bush became a head director at Silverado Savings & Loan in Denver, Colorado. Three years later the federally insured S&L went bust from being pushed recklessly beyond its lending limits leaving taxpayers to pick up the $1 billion tab. Federal banking regulators found that young Neil had engaged in “multiple conflicts of interest” as director of Silverado by approving over $132 million in loans to his own business partners.  That would be JNB for Bush International—an oil and gas exploration company.

Neil reportedly received $550 thousand in salaries from JNB and a $100 thousand personal loan from one of his partners that received funds loaned from Silverado—which was subsequently forgiven and never to be repaid, as per standard operating procedure for Bush & Co.

While these paragons of virtue were feeding at the public trough, Bush Senior was either serving as Reagan’s VP or as President himself, and each time his fortunate sons walked away unscathed from crimes that would’ve landed most folks in jail.

Now, some of us may see a familiar pattern among siblings here and begin to grow just a little suspicious. Whereas other folks might see patterns within patterns on top of patterns and experience some sense of alarm or outrage. And then there are those who somehow find within themselves this special innate mechanism that allows a person to turn a blind eye or a deaf ear to disturbing information that conflicts with deeply held beliefs. When this mechanism kicks in, a seemingly random search takes place for some other more comfortable, substitute truth as a means to avoid that which is painfully obvious. Cognitive dissonance is the term psychologists use to describe this behavioral malady, and opinion polls would suggest that this ‘turn a blind eye’ approach to living is a rather widespread cultural phenomenon in George Bush’s America. Either that or a good portion of us just needs to do a little more reading.

Message to the Dems and their 527 proxies —use it or loose it in November! We can only imagine what the Republicans would do if they could dish this kind of dirt on your man John Kerry and his kin.

Excerpted from Bush Unplugged: The True Patriot’s guide To George W. Bush, By Marc Umile www.bushunplugged.com