Bribes and Kickbacks

Kent Conrad on the advise of James Johnson called Angelo Mozilo to receive a loan for $1,070,000 at well below normal loan rates and fees. He did this a second time a few weeks later, and received a second loan for $96,000,00.

Donna Shalala received two loans from Countrywide through contact Angelo Mozilo. The first for $338,685 and the second for $202,300. The intrest rates on both loans were floated down.

Chris Dodd received two loans. The first was $506,000 for a refinance of a house in Washington, the second was for $275,042 for a refinance of his home in Connecticut. The total amount of money he would have saved over the life of the loans was $75,000.

Conrad clams: “I never met Angelo Mozilo” and “I have no way of knowing how they categorized my loan. I never asked for, expected or was aware of any special treatment. From what we have been able to determine, it appears that we were given a competitive rate”

Kent Conrad outed that he did in fact call Angelo Mozilo just prior to receiving his discounted loan even though he claimed previously that he had never met him.

loan for $1,000,000 to refinance home in Washington, and saved $13,000 from point reductions. borrowed $1,300,000 to refinance California home and saved $24,000 from point reductions.

Borrowed $3,000,000 to buy a new home in California.

Alphonso Jackson borrowed $346,331 for a refinance of a home in Virginia.

Alphonso Jackson received a loan for $308,000 for a new home in South Carolina.

Kati Marton then wife of Richard Holbrooke took out $1,400,000 dollars to refinance two of their homes. Point reductions were around 1.25 or a savings of $15,000.

Kati Marton then wife of Richard Holbrooke took out a second loan for $1,200,000 dollars to refinance a home in Colorado. Point reductions were around 1.25 or a savings of $15,000.

David Holebrooke son of Richard Holbrooke took out a loan for $559,500 and received a half-point decrease to refinance a home in New York. Then received a second point reduction on another loan for $428,000 to buy another level of the New York building they live in. Total cost savings $54,000.

Dodd’s spokesman Bryan DeAngelis states “the Dodds have said from the beginning, they did not seek or expect any special rates or terms on their loans and they never received any; they were never offered special or sweetheart deals and if anyone had made such an offer, they would have severed that relationship immediately,”

Chris Dodd flip-flops on former comments about not getting any special treatment from Countrywide.

Despite both of them lying about details of the loans they received both Dodd and Conrad are cleared by the Senate ethics committee. The AP article states that the committee says that in the future the seniors should “avoid the appearance of sweetheart deals”.

Rick Perry appointed Enron executive Max Yzaguirre to the position of Texas Public Utilities Chairman. The day after the appointment Perry received a $25,000 contribution from the Ken Lay the CEO of Enron. This gave Enron a key position in the deregulation of Texas energy that was passed in July 2002 (right on the heals of Yzaguirre’s entry to his post). Yzaguirre did not fully disclose that he was a former Enron Vice President to the public until November 15. With the timely $25,000 contribution to Perry it seems he would be well informed of Yzaguirre’s previous position with Enron. According to Texas law it is illegal to appoint anyone to this office if they had served as an executive at any energy company in the past two years - therefor this appointment was breach of law.

Texas Utilities Code - Section 12.053. Membership Qualifications: A person is not eligible for appointment as a commissioner if the person: (1) at any time during the two years preceding appointment: (A) personally served as an officer, director, owner, employee, partner, or legal representative of a public utility, affiliate, or direct competitor of a public utility; or (B) owned or controlled, directly or indirectly, stocks or bonds of any class with a value of $10,000 or more in a public utility, affiliate, or direct competitor of a public utility;

In his 2002 gubernatorial race Perry received $200 thousand dollars from Enron. Not long after Perry received the money Enron collapsed. After five months of calls for him to return the money he returned $85 thousand stating the rest had already been spent.

According to Rose Mary Woods (Nixon’s secretary) Richard Nixon received an unmarked envelope from Dwayne Andraes full of one hundred dollar bills totaling $100,000 dollars. Woods states that it stayed in Nixon’s vault until the investigation of the Watergate scandal at which time Nixon quickly gives the money back.

When Bush started trailing Clintion in the presidential election he started spouting that the government needed making subsidies for ethanol. ADM being the largest possible benefactors gave him $400,000 dollars in a single night fund-raising dinner.

In a turn of “convenient” timing ADM gives Clinton $100,000 dollars, just days before Clinton mandates that 30% of gasoline in America’s largest cities must contain ethanol by 1996. This made for a grand total of $270,000 dollars in contributions from the family that owns ADM.

Ianieri was known to receive two kickbacks with the total amount of around $200,000 for "improperly obtaining and rewarding favorable treatment" according to feds.

Ianieri also pleaded guilty to creating fraudulent purchase orders to the Air Force that he knew were as court documents state "false, fictitious and fraudulent".