THE AUDACITY OF OPPO:

To Avoid Conflicts, Clintons Liquidate Holdings (PATRICK HEALY, 6/15/07, NY Times)

The disclosure forms have new details about Mr. Clinton’s investments and advisory role with funds in the Yucaipa Companies, a privately held California equity firm controlled by Ron Burkle, one of Mr. Clinton’s best friends and one of Mrs. Clinton’s top fund-raisers.

Mr. Clinton has assets of $100,001 to $250,000 in one Yucaipa investment, Garrard Worldwide Holdings Inc., a retail jeweler with a flagship store in London. He has an additional $15,001 to $50,000 in Brazilian Renewable Energy Company Ltd., which produces sugar-cane-based ethanol in Brazil.

Mr. Clinton also has $15,001 to $50,000 in Easy Bill Ltd., an India-based company that works on electronic transactions and business services for Indians.

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.

A copy of the document was obtained by Mrs. Clinton’s campaign, which provided it to The New York Times. The Clinton campaign has long been frustrated by the effort by Mr. Obama to present his campaign as above the kind of attack politics that Mr. Obama and his aides say has led to widespread disillusionment with politics by many Americans.

Asked about the document, Bill Burton, a spokesman for Mr. Obama, said: “We did give reporters a series of comments she made on the record and other things that are publicly available to anyone who has access to the Internet. I don’t see why anyone would take umbrage with that.”

Asked why the Obama campaign had initially insisted that it not be connected to the document, Mr. Burton replied, “I’m going to leave my comment at that.”

There's nothing wrong with a pol dumping opposition research with the press...unless he's running around pretending he's not a typical pol....

Posted by Orrin Judd at June 18, 2007 12:38 PM