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October
05
2016

It's Time We Crush the Putrid Roach Motels of Philanthro-Crony-Capitalism, Starting with the Clinton Foundation
Charles Hugh Smith

Philanthro-crony-capitalist corruption in the U.S. has reached levels that put Lower Slobovia to shame.
Granted, the fantasy of philanthrocapitalism is appealing: take a bunch of fabulously successful entrepreneurial billionaires, grant their foundations tax-free status, and then unleash them on the world as philanthropists who will solve problems by applying the incentives of capitalism.

While this sounds great in a TED talk, the ugly reality is that it was philanthrocapitalism's criminal predatory twin, Philanthro-Crony-Capitalism, that was unleashed. To illustrate how Philanthro-Crony-Capitalism works, let's visit the charmingly corrupt and venal nation of Lower Slobovia.

Former President Paytoplay starts a non-profit charitable foundation, which starts business right as Former President Paytoplay's wife is appointed Secretary of State for Lower Slobovia.

Since we know Lower Slobovia is corrupt, we know how this goes. Dictators, corporations, cartels, etc. who need favors from Lower Slobovia make huge "donations" to the Paytoplay Foundation, and like magic, their favors are granted by the government of Lower Slobovia.

Sadly, there is no corrupt Lower Slobovia or corrupt Paytoplay Foundation. There is however a corrupt USA and corrupt Clinton Foundation, which you can read about here: Putting the Clinton Foundation in Context: Corruption Plain on the Face of It (Amy Sterling Casil)

"I am not only qualified to assess the Clinton Foundation, I am also in a position that enables me to do so without fear of harming people in need. Any nonprofit professional in the U.S. can look at the Foundation’s own statements, tax filings and financial reports and see there is something wrong. No one who works for a nonprofit right now should do so because of the Clinton penchant for revenge and clear signs there are problems in tax and law enforcement that could lead to harm of their organization or clients. Ethically, they ought not comment because they will put their organizations or those they are charged to serve at-risk.
Since I don’t work in the nonprofit field any longer and know I will never be able to return to it, I am free to write these articles. There are only two things I can identify at which the Clinton Foundation excels: putting cash in the bank and spending it.

The Clinton Foundation isn’t a charitable organization. Charles Ortel calls it the 'biggest charity fraud ever attempted.'

As a side note, my organization was contacted regarding building actual housing in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake. We had only a few meetings before being told “don’t bother, the Clinton Foundation will be leading the efforts.” This effort ended up being about 20 moldy, substandard trailers laced with formaldehyde, provided by the same company that also constructed substandard, poisonous emergency housing after Hurricane Katrina. You will read articles to this day in major publications that blame Haitians. The company that did this to our country in New Orleans, and to Haiti, is owned by Berkshire Hathaway/Warren Buffett."

It's time we crush the putrid roach motels of philanthro-crony-capitalism, starting with the Clinton Foundation. But don't stop there--crush them all, from the Trump Foundation to the Ford Foundation and all the way down the line.

Here's an idea: you make money, you pay the taxes on that income, and you do what you want with the remaining dough, just like any other citizen--no tax breaks for self-serving Crony Philanthropy:

From Crony Capitalism To Crony Philanthropy? (Forbes.com)

World’s Second Largest Private Foundation Denies Crony Philanthropy
Crony Philanthropy Archives

Here's another idea: you want to establish a charity or foundation? Fine, but the books are completely transparent 24/7 on the web, or your corrupt philanthro-crony-capitalist fraud is shut down. Every donation, every expense, every paycheck, every travel voucher--every one, posted on the web for all to see. If the foundation is caught keeping anything secret that should have been transparent, you go to jail--yeah, you, the founder.

The crony-capitalist and philanthro-crony-capitalist corruption in the U.S. has reached levels that put Lower Slobovia to shame. We either crush the putrid roach motels of philanthro-crony-capitalism now or surrender entirely to pay-to-play racketeering.

Join me in offering solutions by becoming a $1/month patron of my work via patreon.com.
My new book is #8 on Kindle short reads -> politics and social science: Why Our Status Quo Failed and Is Beyond Reform ($3.95 Kindle ebook, $8.95 print edition)For more, please visit the book's website.

At readers' request, I've prepared a biography. I am not confident this is the right length or has the desired information; the whole project veers uncomfortably close to PR. On the other hand, who wants to read a boring bio? I am reminded of the "Peanuts" comic character Lucy, who once issued this terse biographical summary: "A man was born, he lived, he died." All undoubtedly true, but somewhat lacking in narrative.

I was raised in southern California as a rootless cosmopolitan: born in Santa Monica, and then towed by an upwardly mobile family to Van Nuys, Tarzana, Los Feliz and San Marino, where the penultimate conclusion of upward mobility, divorce and a shattered family, sent us to Big Bear Lake in the San Bernadino mountains.

The next iteration of family took us to the island of Lanai in Hawaii, where I was honored to join the outstanding basketball team (as benchwarmer), and where we rode the only Matchless 350 cc motorcycle on the island, and most likely in the state, through the red-dirt pineapple fields to the splendidly isolated rocky coastline. In 1969-70, this was the old planation Hawaii, where we picked pine in summer beneath a sweltering sun.

We next moved to Honolulu, where I graduated from Punahou School and earned a degree in Comparative Philosophy (i.e. East and West) at the University of Hawaii-Manoa. The family moved back to California and I stayed on, working my way through college apprenticing in the building/remodeling trades.

I was quite active in the American Friends Service Committee (Quakers) and the People's Party of Hawaii in this era (1970s).

I next moved to the Big Island of Hawaii, where my partner and I built over fifty custom homes and a 43-unit subdivision, as well as several commercial projects.

Nearly going broke was all well and good, but I was driven to pursue my dream-career as a writer, so we moved to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1987 where I worked in non-profit education while writing free-lance journalism articles on housing, design and urban planning.

Within a few years I returned to self-employment, a genteel poverty interrupted by an 18-month gig re-organizing the back office of a quantitative stock market analyst. I learned how to lose money in the market with efficiency and aplomb, lessons I continue to practice when the temptation to battle the Monster Id strikes.

Somewhere in here my first novel was published by The Permanent Press, but alas it fell still-born from the press--a now monotonous result of writing fiction. (Seven novels and I still can't stop myself.)

I started the Of Two Minds blog in May 2005 as a side project of self-expression, and in an unpredictable twist of evolutionary incaution, that project has ballooned into a website with about 3,500 pages that has drawn almost 20 million page views.

The site's primary asset may well be the extensive global network of friends and correspondents I draw upon for intelligence and analysis.

The blog is #7 in CNBC's top alternative financial sites, and is republished on numerous popular sites such as Zero Hedge, Financial Sense, and David Stockman’s Contra Corner. I am frequently interviewed by alternative media personalities such as Max Keiser, and am a contributing writer on peakprosperity.com.

 

www.oftwominds.com