The conservative blogosphere is buzzing about a potential bombshell -- Obama may have had an affair with a former staffer named Vera Baker. See here, here, here and here. According to the rumor, Baker has now been "exiled" to the Caribbean on Michelle Obama's orders.
Who is Vera Baker and is this story true? I don't know. Apparently, some of the uncertainty centers on whether Baker actually served on Obama's staff, in particular as finance director. Although this hardly constitutes proof of an affair, this 2004 piece from the National Journal confirms that Baker did in fact serve as Obama's finance director:
Congress Daily
Copyright 2004 National Journal, Inc.
April 29, 2004
HOME SWEET HOME. Doug Thornell says his experience as former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean's traveling secretary during the Democratic presidential campaign was "thrilling," but he's happy to be back in Washington. "It's nice to get to sleep in the same bed every night now," says the Silver Spring, Md., native, who returned to D.C. in mid-March after a vacation in California. Thornell just started his new job as a deputy political director at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. He replaced Vera Baker, who is now the national finance director for Illinois state Sen. Barack Obama's Democratic U.S. Senate campaign. Thornell shares the deputy political director title with colleague Jamie Linski, former assistant political director at the DSCC, who was promoted to the deputy slot.
And here is some additional background information on Vera Baker:
African American professionals can build prosperous careers in the capital city, especially those hoping to play a role in national politics. "There's a mentality here that there's enough for everyone; you're not competing for what feels like a limited number of opportunities," says 29-year-old Muthoni Wambu.
Like most Washingtonians, Wambu is a transplant. She left New York City's Upper West Side to study journalism at Howard University and then networked her way into a political fundraising job with the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. This was a new aspect of politics for Wambu, who soon discovered that it "brought together my strengths in a way that I'd never anticipated."
In 2000, Wambu and Vera Baker, another Howard alum, started Baker-Wambu & Associates. The firm has raised over $3 million for the campaigns of members of Congress and other politicians. "Washington is the best place for our firm to blossom and grow, and one of the only cities where two 24-year-old African American women [could have built a successful business] with pennies and a dream," she says.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
14 comments:
Thank you for the link. I will be adding you to my blogroll.
You're welcome. Thanks for adding me.
And, of course, please feel free to update your blog with the confirmation that Baker did in fact serve as Obama's finance director.
Hello Neocon Latina,
I'm an independent, and I also have a blog on blogger.com:
http://political-perspectives.blogspot.com/
I find it very disturbing that those who seem most willing to perpetuate the 'company line' propaganda on both sides have now largely become anonymous. Do you really exist or are you part of someone's campaign?
BTW - I lived in Colombia, my wife is Colombian and Colombians are not afraid to speak their mind. If you are who you say are, don't hide behind a handle.
The decorum of the political dialog in this country is in the gutter, is that where you'd like it to stay?
que estes bien...
Regards,
Stephen Lahanas
If you check out the Cape Caribbean website, it says Vera Baker previously worked with Alta Capital Group. In fact, she was managing director for municipal trading for that firm. Alta Capital Group, located in Chicago, was founded by Adela Cepeda, an old friend of Michelle Obama from the Leadership Greater Chicago program of 1993.
http://center.spoke.com/info/pES7UIc/VeraBaker
http://www.lgcchicago.org/fellows.aspx?class=1993
So BO has an alleged affair, and his alleged popsy is then made managing director at a municipal finance firm (an area she has no experience in) headed by a friend of BO’s wife?
Hi Stephen,
Of course I really exist. I wish I were part of McCain's campaign, but alas, I am not.
I don't see anything wrong with anonymity. It's the ideas that count, not the person espousing them.
Who is Vera Baker and why did she go to Martinique. Is she the link to the Obama campaign and the fictitious donors found in the Obama finance records? Did she ever work with Tony Rezko helping Obama raise fund when he ran for his state offices. Did she and Rezko raise or move funds for his US Senate Run!
These are all viable questions that need to be answered. Rezko starts singing to Fitzgerald and Sunday the Cape Caribbean web site vanishes in to sunset as we started chatting about her on Free Republic with a lead from HillBuzz.
There are questions to be asked and answered. Why did here web site disappear yesterday when the posters of Free republic outted her web site and the possibility of her being tied to a credit card money factory for Obama in Martinique.
Was she Barack's love interest or just a Fundraiser bundler of soft money? She has ties and history raising funds for Barack and for the Congressional Black Caucus.
Why did the DNC allow the campaign to move from DNC HQ in DC to Chicago where David Axlerod and his minions could hide and control the dirty games that possibly have taken place with illegal contributions for across the world like the $35,000 from the Edwan Brothers in Ga. No that’s not Georgia but Gaza Strip in the Middle East. But we all know that Barack is a friend of Israel and that the Brother’s got carried away in the moment of donating $35,000 to Obama.
I hope that somebody has the sense to check bank accounts, credit card records and transaction prior to the election as this really reeks of money laundering. The FEC and other Government agencies need to make this a top issue before the election.
Did some of this Laundered money go to Acorn. Can an audit of Acorns sources of funds be tracked to domestic and foreign bank accounts? We already know that Obama’s Campaign gave acorn more then $800,000 for voter registration. Wanna bet its bigger dollars from offshore accounts?
So yes this is a smoking gun! Does it involve Rezko ,Axlerod and Obama I bet it does. Does the Main Street Media pick it up! Probably not as we are just bloggers and speculators of what occurred and don’t have any power to do much about it unless we spread the word to our friends and fellow bloggers on the net. Please make your voices heard on the net.
(You can see screen shot links of the Vera Baker web site at the Freerepublic site http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2105150/posts)
HillBuzz thanks for fighting the good fight!
Hello,
Yes, there has been a long tradition of Americans who use an alias when writing on political matters, but what I was trying to highlight is that what you're presenting looks a lot more like character assassination than political discourse.
So, if you're a supporter of McCain, why not debate the issues instead? Senator McCain has offered a lot of interesting ideas and presents a strong case - why do you feel it is necessary to disseminate scandals? (which is something I do not favor on either side, let me make that clear).
Stephen,
I'm just an individual with my own core belief about Obama. My opinions don't matter as the Main Street Media is bought and paid for by the Messiah's SS troopers. America will be a different country after November 4th unless its citizens wake up and understand that while the Republicans might not be perfect players and part of the problem today that the Democrats are a bigger reason why the country is in the tank. Nancy Pelosi,Barney (happy)Frank and the rest of the Democrat congress has let American's down in a worse manner. They stand in the way of telling the truth. Most Americans don't want to hear the truth but its the policies of their party. You can take and take away from the Middle Class and the Wealthy paying taxes and redistribute their dollars but then watch the jobs go away.
Democrats and bad choices have created the problem and corruption in America. More so then the Republicans but please know we have blame too.
Electing a socialist with all kinds of baggage will not help America.
Stephen,
Part of the reason I started this blog is because I am profoundly disturbed by the prospect of an Obama presidency. What you view as "character assassination", e.g., pointing out Obama's close relationships with racists, terrorists, anti-Semites, former PLO members, etc. -- I view as the fundamental reason why Obama should be nowhere near serious power, let alone the presidency. Now, if there is something inaccurate about what I post, feel free to point that out. But merely characterizing factual statements as "character assassination" won't do.
This is rumour is undoubtedly leaked by the Obama camp in an attempt to cover up his affair with Larry Sinclair whose testimony can be found on youtube.
Obama’s Secret Campaign Cash: Has $63 Million Flowed from Foreign Sources?
Sunday, October 19, 2008 6:28 PM
By: Kenneth R. Timmerman
http://www.newsmax.com/headlines/obama_illegal_donations/2008/10/19/141979.html
As Barack Obama reaped a stunning $150 million in campaign donations in September, bringing his total to more than $600 million, new questions have arisen about the source of his amazing funding.
By Obama’s own admission, more than half of his contributions have come from small donors giving $200 or less. But unlike John McCain’s campaign, Obama won’t release the names of these donors.
A Newsmax canvass of disclosed Obama campaign donors shows worrisome anomalies, including outright violations of federal election laws.
For example, Obama has numerous donors who have contributed well over the $4,600 federal election limit.
Many of these donors have never been contacted by the Obama campaign to refund the excess amounts to them.
And more than 37,000 Obama donations appear to be conversions of foreign currency.
According to a Newsmax analysis of the Obama campaign data before the latest figures were released, potential foreign currency donations could range anywhere from $12.8 million to a stunning $63 million in all. With the addition of $150 million raised in September, this amount could be much more.
When asked by Newsmax about excess contributions, Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt said that contributions already identified as excess had been returned and that those the campaign was just learning about -- either through news accounts or from the Federal Election Commission -- “will be returned.”
“Every campaign faces the challenge of screening and reviewing its contributions,” LaBolt said. “And we have been aggressive about taking every available step to make sure our contributions are appropriate, updating our systems when necessary.”
But many of the donors Newsmax canvassed said they had “never” been contacted by the Obama campaign or seen any refunds, even though their contributions went over the limit months ago.
In all, Newsmax found more than 2,000 donors who had contributed in excess of the $4,600 limit for individuals per election cycle.
Such donations, if not returned within 60 days, are a clear violation of federal campaign finance laws.
Lisa Handley, a stay-at-home mom from Portland, Ore., recalled giving $4,600 to the Obama campaign by credit card, contributions she made because “I love Obama,” she said.
According to FEC records, however, she gave an additional $2,300 to the campaign, putting her over the limit.
The Obama campaign reported that it had “redesignated” the excess money, which could mean that it had contributed it to a separate party committee or a joint fundraising committee, which have higher limits.
But if that happened, it’s news to Handley. “No one ever contacted me to return any of the money or told me they were redesignating some of the money,” she said.
Ronald J. Sharpe Jr., a retired teacher from Rockledge, Fla., appears in the Obama campaign reports as having given a whopping $13,800.
The campaign reported that it returned $4,600 to him, making his net contribution of $9,200 still way over the legal limit.
But there’s one problem with the Obama data: Sharpe doesn’t remember giving that much money to the Obama campaign in the first place, nor does he recall anyone from the campaign ever contacting him to return money.
“At the end, I was making monthly payments,” he told Newsmax. The Obama campaign records do not show any such payments.
Many donors refused to answer questions about the political campaign contributions appearing in their name when they learned that the caller was from a news organization.
John Atkinson, an insurance agent in Burr Ridge, Ill., refused to discuss his contributions, which totaled $8,724.26, before numerous refunds.
Atkinson and others gave in odd amounts: $188.67, $1,542.06, $876.09, $388.67, $282.20, $195.66, $118.15, and one rounded contribution of $2,300.
Sandra Daneshinia, a self-employed caregiver from Los Angeles, made 36 separate contributions, totaling $7,051.12, according to FEC records. Thirteen of them were eventually refunded.
In a bizarre coincidence, those 13 refunded contributions -- for varying amounts such as $223.88 and $201.44 -- added up exactly to $2,300, the amount an individual may give per federal election.
Also giving in odd amounts was Robert Porter, an accountant for the town of Oviedo, Fla. Porter gave a surprising $4,786.02 to the Obama campaign.
In all, Newsmax found an astonishing 37,265 unique donors to the Obama campaign whose contributions were not rounded up to dollar amounts. That amounts to more than 10 percent of the total number of unique donors whose names have been disclosed by the Obama campaign to the public.
Of those, 44,410 contributions came in unrounded amounts of less than $100. FEC regulations only require that campaigns disclose the names of donors who have given a total of $200 or more, so that means that all these contributors were repeat donors.
Another 15,269 contributions gave in unrounded amounts between $101 and $999, while 704 of the unrounded contributions were in amounts of more than $1,000.
Campaign finance experts find the frequent appearance of unrounded contributions suspicious, since contributors almost invariably give in whole dollar amounts.
One expert in campaign finance irregularities offers a possible explanation.
“Of course this is odd. They are obviously converting from local currency to U.S. dollars,” said Ken Boehm, the chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center.
“The overwhelming number of large dollar contributors -- and even small donors -- are in even dollar amounts,” he told Newsmax. “Anyone who doubts that can go to FEC.gov and look through the campaign contribution data bases. You will not find many uneven numbers.”
Boehm said he had rarely seen unrounded contributions in his 30 years as a lawyer doing campaign finance work.
“There’s always the odd cat who wants to round up his checkbook, but they are very rare,” he said.
Richard E. Hug, a veteran Republican fundraiser in Maryland who who raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004, and spearheaded the successful 2002 gubernatorial race for Bob Ehrlich that brought in a record $10 million, told Newsmax that unrounded contributions were extremely unusual.
“I’ve never seen this in all my years of raising money for political candidates,” he said. “The first thing it suggests is foreign currency transactions -- contributions from foreign donors, which is clearly illegal.”
Top Republican fundraiser Steve Gordon, who has raised $65 million for GOP candidates over the past 30 years, told Newsmax that such contributions in uneven amounts would be “pretty unusual.”
“You might have a rounding process if there was some kind of joint event, but since all appears to be on the Internet, it’s pretty unusual. At the very least, it would need to be explored.”
LaBolt attributed the uneven amounts to the online “Obama store,” which sells T-shirts and other campaign items.
“Contributions made to the Obama store often produce totals that are not exact dollar amounts,” he said.
But the campaign has never produced any accounting for proceeds from its online store, which virtually shut down several weeks ago after Newsmax and news organizations revealed that Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and other foreigners had made large purchases there.
The Republican National Committee has filed a complaint against the Obama campaign for “accepting prohibited contributions from foreign nationals and excessive contributions from individuals,” which incorporated reporting from Newsmax and other news organizations.
“Their responses to FEC inquiries have often been inadequate and late,” RNC general counsel Sean Cairncross told Newsmax.
The Obama camp claims to have 2.5 million donors in all. But until now, they have kept secret the names of the overwhelming majority of these money-givers. According to a Newsmax analysis, the Obama campaign finance records contain just 370,448 unique names.
Even accounting for common names such as Robert Taylor or Michael Brown, which can signify multiple donors, Obama’s publicly known donor base is less than 20 percent of the total number of donors the campaign claims to have attracted. But the identity of the other 2 million donors is being kept secret.
As of the end of August, those secret donors have given an incredible $222.7 million to Obama, according to the FEC -- money whose origin remains unknown to anyone other than Obama’s finance team, who won’t take calls from the press.
While no exact figures are available, if the same percentage of potential foreign contributions found in the itemized contribution data is applied to the total $426.9 million the Obama camp says it has taken in from individuals, this could mean that Obama is financing his presidential campaign with anywhere from $13 million to a whopping $63 million from overseas credit cards or foreign currency purchases.
The sum of all unrounded contributions in the itemized FEC filings for the Obama campaigns comes to $6,437,066.07. That is the actual amount of money that appears to have been charged to foreign credit cards that the Obama campaign has disclosed.
If the same ratio applies to the unitemized contributions, which are again as large, then the Obama campaign may have taken as much as $13 million from foreign donors.
However, the donors who made those unrounded contributions gave a total of $31,484,584.27, meaning that as much as $63 million may have come from questionable sources.
Both presidential campaigns are required to submit detailed fundraising reports for September on Monday.
© 2008 Newsmax. All rights reserved.
BTW - I lived in Colombia, my wife is Colombian and Colombians are not afraid to speak their mind. If you are who you say are, don't hide behind a handle.
I too have lived in South America, and I too know that Colombians are not reticent, as you said, Stephen.
But neither are they stupid, nor foolhardy.
After the Joe the Plumber situation, where he was eviscerated by liberals and media for merely daring to ask a simple question, the kind of transparency you seek ironically is that much more difficult today.
So please save your entreaties to NeoConLatina to unmask herself, and though the following may be seen as churlish, do ask your wife to further your Spanish lessons.
Your sign-off shouldn't have been so familiar by tuteando NCL when you don't know her.
NCL, thanks for your fine work. I'll keep an eye on your blog.
Cheers,
Victoria
Since a post said that "Obama should be nowhere near the presidency," I can't help but point out the following: Neither congressmen nor presidential candidates are given a background check. I'm of the opinion that Senator Obama could not pass the background check required to be a presidential bodyguard. Not in a million years. Don't believe there's no background checks? Here's a link to a Congressional Report on the subject: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/secrecy/RS20748.pdf
First it starts by targeting a group as "other." You call them a derogatory, dehumanizing label that separates them from you and you begin the process of making them nonhuman. We saw this in Nazi Germany, and in Rwanda, and in every other place where hatred displaced compassion, and lies substituted for truth and reason. Then comes the systematic, purposeful use of a system of communicating that dehuminization to people with free floating hatred and a need for a target. In Germany, Jews were called rats, and in Rwanda Tutsi's were called roaches. In America the target of hatred has been anyone with skin that isn't white, or that prays to a God by a different name, or whose sexuality (determined by God), is feared. And fear is at the basis for hate. Lies, character assassination, defamation, snarling, brutal, ugly hatred and fear. It sickens me and many others who really want an America that holds itself to it's highest values.
I feel proud of Senator Obama for having the courage to look this ugliness in the face and defy it. I feel sorry for those, so consumed by hate that they would cut off their own noses to spite their faces. When offered the prospect of health care and a decent life, they reject it because someone who sanctions their fear and hatred, told them it is socialism and that's something to be feared. Ignorance, fear, hatred.
God help America.
Post a Comment