Obama’s illegal campaign contributions?
Breitbart.com calls it a bombshell.
And it should be, it should be:
…[T]he Obama.com website is not owned by the president’s campaign but rather by Obama bundler Robert Roche, a U.S. citizen living in Shanghai, China. Roche is the chairman of a Chinese infomercial company, Acorn International, with ties to state-controlled banks that allow it to “gain revenue through credit card transactions with Chinese banks.”
There’s more.
The unusual Obama.com website redirects traffic directly to a donation page on the Obama campaign’s official website, my.barackobama.com, which does not require donors to enter their credit card security code (known as the CVV code), thereby increasing the likelihood of foreign or fraudulent donations. The website is managed by a small web development firm, Wicked Global, in Maine. One of Wicked Global’s employees, Greg Dorr, lists on his LinkedIn page his additional employment with Peace Action Maine and Maine Voices for Palestinian Rights. According to the GAI report, 68 percent of all Internet traffic to Obama.com comes from foreign visitors.
Please read the whole thing.
There’s also this:
The FEC does not require basic security for Internet donations. And in the case of the Obama campaign the gate appears to be wide open. You need to use the CVV security code on your credit card to buy an Obama hoodie, but not to make a donation. And there is very real evidence that the campaign is not using the address verification system (AVS) in any real way. There are simply too many contributions they accept with either no zip code or an incorrect zip code. To make matters worse, donations under $200 don’t even need to be disclosed. Twenty years ago that might not matter but in the era of robo-donations its a huge problem.
I think it’s especially telling that you need the CVV security code to buy merchandise, but not for donations. I can’t quite think of any reason for that except to make sure the former are on the up-and-up and to wink at (or facilitate) fraud in the latter.
It’s a tired cliche, but I have to say it again: imagine if these facts were true of the Romney campaign. Then you would see them in screaming headlines on the front page of every newspaper. The candidate would be dogged with reporters questioning him about it at every turn. But since it’s Obama—and since this sort of thing was already known about Obama’s website back in 2008 (minus the names, as I recall), to the sound of chirping crickets—I wonder whether this bombshell will fail to explode.
That’s one of the scariest things about the Obama phenomenon—the complete and utter abdication of any sense of responsibility or fairness on the part of the press, to a degree previously unattained. I would be very happy to be proven wrong on this prognostication, by the way; very happy.
Neo,
You wrote:
I would be very happy to be proven wrong on this prognostication, by the way; very happy.
Ain’t gonna happen.
🙁
Jamie Irons
Might the Freedom of Information Act apply in this case?
“Locks are for honest people” so a loophole will always be found and ideologues can always rationalize any illegal action as justified by the ends sought.
First full disclosure to determine the actual facts, then legislation to close this loophole.
And this is coming right on the heels of many headlines about Obama’s “near record” September haul of campaign donations, such as the WaPo:
“Obama close to raising $1 billion after near-record September tally”
in which they note:
“..Obama has raised nearly half his money through small donations…”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/decision2012/obama-raises-181-million-in-september-record-for-2012/2012/10/06/d6c1aa20-0fc2-11e2-a180-7d0c112201c9_story.html
You would think that a journalist would have the intellectual honesty to say, hey wait a minute, shouldn’t we connect the dots here?
But I agree, this came up around election time in ’08 and sank like a stone, just like Obama’s reversal on taking private monies instead of public, etc.
And just as an aside…Acorn International, really? Wicked Global? Interesting “optics” there.
Here’s a tune we can both march to! If anyone can actually a build sound case for impeachment of Obama, I get to see the Democratic organization disgraced. And the ensuing riots would get the collapse going while it is still early enough to avoid a long civil war.
CV: In Maine, the word “wicked” has a different meaning.
I actually read the 90ish page report that was linked on those sites this morning. One of the most telling points (to my mind) is that the middleware provider that processed the credit card transactions actually charged a HIGHER rate on each donation if the site did not employ the CVV and AVS protections against fraud. The study authors estimated that this cost the Obama campaign over 7 million dollars in surcharges on those donations. I’m hard-pressed to think of a reason not to use those protections which is not nefarious in nature.
ain’t going to change a single vote.
“the sound of chirping crickets” — yes, unless or until, via Fox and talk radio etc., it seems to be doing some damage. In that case the MSM will attempt to debunk the charges and discredit those making them. I was really astonished when the Swift Boat campaign against Kerry started in 2004. Rather than expressing concern about the charges and investigating them, the MSM response was to attack the Swift Boaters and make the case for Kerry’s version of the story.
Neo,
I have many Boston-raised relatives and can’t believe I forgot about the use of “wicked” as a superlative!
It certainly has interesting connotations in this particular situation, however 🙂
The media’s behavior with regards to the Swift Boat case and at the same time their justification of the “Fake but Accurate” meme in the Texas Air National Guard story is what ultimately clinched me as a changer.
I hate the bias in the media. With a passion. Unfortunately, Doodad Pro is going nowhere again this time. Why wouldn’t Obama use the same tactics again? He paid no price (other than $7 million in additional fees) in 2008. Why not do it again?
Ends justifies the means. Freakin’ hate that the media will let him get away with it again.
Neo said: “it should be”…southpaw says Ha! Go back and read the Klavan article you linked in your article on PJ media!
As soon as th MSM sees the report with the Breitbart tagline, you know they will instantly dismiss the entire episode. I have to go along with Barry here… I rarely use the word “hate”, but the media certainly deserves every bit of it. The list of buried stories regarding this president is so long, that those of us who know them all just get tired of even trying anymore to get the word out.
There’s got to be a way to break through the MSM wall to the general public, but damned if I know how to do it.
It is like we are living in a Bond movie, and Obama is the henchman of some super villain.
It is like we are living in a Bond movie, and Obama is the henchman of some super villain.
Gyorgi Blofeld?
“That’s one of the scariest things about the Obama phenomenon–the complete and utter abdication of any sense of responsibility or fairness on the part of the press, to a degree previously unattained. I would be very happy to be proven wrong on this prognostication, by the way; very happy.”
Forget about “happy” for you will not be proven wrong.
I have a tangential question (maybe I missed it on another thread): Is the media bias as important as we all seem to think it is?
We seem to get information pretty well without the help of Big Media outlets. Most of us seem aware that there is a similar non-corporate news structure for those who like Progressive reporting. Limbaugh like to taunt CNN & MSNBC for their small and shrinking audiences. The NYT can’t keep subscribers. Who do we think is actually trapped in the Big Media narrative?
I guess that’s two questions…
physicsguy, here are a few ways of breaking up the leftist oligarchy: 1) eliminate federal tax breaks for news media (new media does not get this break right? that is not fair), 2) reallocate broadcast tv bands, 3) withhold federal funding to all educational institutions that do not agree to take ‘affirmative steps’ to eliminate discrimination against conservatives and libertarians. Measure ‘outcome.’ If liberals make up more than half of faculty and student populations, they are overrepresented.
“Who do we think is actually trapped in the Big Media narrative?”
The inaccurate Romney ‘47%’ minus 10% = 37%. Those are the lost souls trapped.
“3) withhold federal funding to all educational institutions that do not agree to take ‘affirmative steps’ to eliminate discrimination against conservatives and libertarians. Measure ‘outcome.’ If liberals make up more than half of faculty and student populations, they are overrepresented.”
I beg to differ… eliminate all federal funding to and interference with education. Get DC out of the classroom K through graduate school. What do politicians inside the beltway, D or R, know about educating students??? Absolutely nothing!
I’m afraid you won’t be proven wrong on this one. This will be swept under the rug just the way they’ve done with every other weaselly thing Obama has done.
Undermining democracy (ACORN, foreign fundraising, illegal votes) to make Democracy better. It’s doubleplusungood.
foxmarks: it sure is with nearly every Democrat I know (and I know a lot of them). Most get pretty much all their information from the NY Times, Boston Globe, NPR, New Yorker, CNN, and trust those sources implicitly. They would never watch Fox or read conservative sources, and disdain them.
}}}} The FEC does not require basic security for Internet donations.
Anyone got a clue why it is THIS is justifiable in any way?
My MiL is a Democrat who voted for Obama in ’08 but she will probably sit out the election this time.
She gets her information from the TV, primarly PBS, because she thinks it is balanced.
She does not trust the internet.
She tends to trust the “authority” of a talking head. She thinks Romney is a lier, because of what she’s seen on TV and because she does not trust Republicans. The 47% comment pissed her off.
Part of her lack of support for Obama in ’12 is due to talking to my wife and me. So i’m not sure how representative she is of Democrats.
In my MiL’s case, I think she would have trouble sorting the internet for solid info, she is prone to emotional arguments and her logic is often very weak. She is the kind of person who needs an objective media, if such a thing existed.
“the complete and utter abdication of any sense of responsibility or fairness on the part of the press”
This, as you state is very, very scary for our future. We can only hope they lose influence faster than they consolidate and institutionalize their bias. The phrase “utter abdication” is a very, very strong one but not an exaggeration. I think I’ve also used the phrase “dereliction of duty to the American people” in this regard, which is entirely accurate, as well. The press has been absolutely shameful the past few years.
Parker- the first thing we have to do is kill all the journalists.
Then the lawyers?
Personally, I do not want to kill anyone unless it is absolutely necessary. Instead, I prefer shunning and public humiliation.
All of this was uncovered and put on public display in the 2008 presidential election and no one of authority or MSM influence paid attention. Why would anyone think the public, media, or authorities would give a damn this time around?
Is the media bias as important as we all seem to think it is?
Of course it is, because the media frame issues in the minds of the cognitively disenfranchised. If the media cover something, it is newsworthy to that segment. If they do not, it is not.
Contrast Fast and Furious with Watergate. The latter had no effect on the election, which was a landslide, and only became noteworthy after a year of incessant banging by the NYT and WaPo. The former, despite being as an attack on 2nd amendment rights intrinsically much more sinister. and also more far-reaching, with international ramifications) has flown below the radar of the average American for several years now, because the media have buried it deeper than whale crap in favor of covering Lady Gaga’s antics.
QED.
If the Breitbart article is accurate, and I don’t see any particular reason to doubt it, the 0bama campaign’s actions are wrong on so many levels it’s tough to know where to begin. Maybe not illegal, but wrong. I’ll just touch on two: First, as noted above, opening the campaign to fraudulent donations. Maybe the campaign looks at that at a feature, not a bug, but if they lose, it might not go so well for them afterwards. Ordinary criminal activity is also a big problem in China with, you guessed it, credit card fraud being near the top of the list. A CVV won’t stop all fraud, but it’s another hurdle that a counterfeiter or fraudulent user who does not have the genuine credit card has to get over. Second, I have no desire to have my credit card data routed through a processing center in China. I claim no insight into whether Chinese telecom companies like Huawei and ZTE pose a security threat to the US, but some in the US national security community believe they do, and have said so publicly, so it would seem prudent to think this conclusion is based on something other than an irrational fear of the “Yellow Peril”. Thus, I prefer to keep my credit card info out of the grubby hands of the PRC. I could go on, but that’ll do for a start.
A lot is bring made of the Ccv number, but the big thing for me is the non-use of the address verification system. I just donated with my Canadian credit card to obama’s campaign using the name ‘Fraud Artist’ and address at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington DC, 20500. This is ridiculous. I live in Canada. I am all Canadian. I’ve never even been to dc and my name is clearly not fraud artist. Still good enough to accept a $5 donation.
Tried the same donation for Romney and, surprise, could not donate.
“Occam’s Beard Says:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:08 pm
It is like we are living in a Bond movie, and Obama is the henchman of some super villain.
Gyorgi Blofeld?”
Obama’s Bond Girl (Hint: #4), From Ramallah with Love… Who was the first international figure Obama thought to call his first day in office? Why, Mahmoud Abbas of course, a planner and the paymaster of the Munich Olympics massacre… and implications of murder in Chicago, say knowlegeable sources, about when people talk too much, like certain choir directors, etc….. The Democrats have a long tradition of taking care of business, especially since LBJ…
Still good enough to accept a $5 donation.
Maybe 0bama’s excuse will be that he thinks Canada is one of the 57 states. Yeah, that’s it.
They tried to make a big deal about some girl in one single registration location. She was apparently not-so-subtly trying to register R not D…. nothing “evil” about it, just a clueless young Romney supporter working as a recruiter for the local election office.
It was like some massive, nationwide conspiracy…
Given Obama’s re-election and a complicit press; the left will finally find the fascist dictator they were always looking to find in GW Bush.
James from Canada – I remember reading in 2008 that many conservatives were donating $1 testing out just how lax the security was. There were no checks at all – none. And the web developers I work with tell me that credit-card software comes with all security settings at the highest level by default. You must deliberately relax the restrictions. This was definitely deliberate, and I was up in arms in 2008 on why McCain didn’t call him on it.
My method for getting past the MSM firewall is to write short, one-subject letters to the editor. I mention the Obama scandal that was buried along with the most important facts, then encourage people to do their own research. I’m careful not to word it in a way that they’re ignorant, because I realize most people don’t have the amount of time that I do in front of a computer. And I keep them to one subject so that I don’t sound like I’m ranting (although I am). I figure if I change one vote, and we all do the same, it might make a difference, especially here in the battleground state of PA.
the complete and utter abdication of any sense of responsibility or fairness on the part of the press
or is it
the complete and utter abdication of any sense of responsibility or fairness on the part of the electorate
???
” Second, I have no desire to have my credit card data routed through a processing center in China.”
Just a thought – would the location of the firm in China provide any protection from investigation? FOIA, for example? Or something of that ilk?
Francesca – that’s good. I’ll need to remember use that
Obama & Co. pulled this same shit in 2008 and got away with it, why would you expect them to do anything different this time around?
Wolla Dalbo: the sad thing is that I don’t think anyone expected them to do any different this time around.
I don’t even expect that MSM will do anything different this time around—they will most likely ignore it again. It’s shocking, but I suppose no one should be shocked any more. Just outraged.
In this story, no one needs to believe Breitbart or any other second hand party. We can download the full report for ourselves.
http://campaignfundingrisks.com/full-report/#.UHSW6y7Af5R