Wednesday, January 23, 2008

The Clintons: "stealing from children to reward Indonesian billionaires"

 
Investors Business Daily has a startling story of Clinton shenanigans that are doubly outrageous. Not only did the Clintons facilitate the illicit contribution of over $1 million from an Indonesian coal syndicate, but -- in an apparent quid pro quo -- Bill Clinton locked the door to the the world's largest coal field, conveniently located in Utah. The field could have contributed greatly to American's energy independence.

Hillary Clinton called President Bush's talks with the Saudis about increasing oil output "pathetic." But it's not as pathetic as her co-president husband locking up billions of tons of clean coal in exchange for political contributions...

A large part of America's energy dependence on foreign sources can be traced to Sept. 18, 1996, when President Bill Clinton stood on the edge of the Grand Canyon on the Arizona side and signed an executive proclamation making 1.7 million acres of Utah a new national monument.

...In fact, the declaration of 1.7 million Utah acres as a national monument, [deprived] an energy-starved U.S. up to 62 billion tons of environmentally safe low-sulfur coal worth $1.2 trillion and minable with minimal surface impact, was a political payoff to the family of James Riady.

He's the son of Lippo Group owner Mochtar Riady. James was found guilty of — and paid a multimillion dollar fine for — funneling more than $1 million in illegal political contributions through Lippo Bank into various American political campaigns, including Bill Clinton's presidential run in 1992.

Clinton took off the world market the largest known deposit of clean-burning coal. And who owned and controlled the second-largest deposit in the world of this clean coal? The Indonesian Lippo Group of James Riady... The Utah reserve contains a kind of low-sulfur, low-ash and therefore low-polluting coal that can be found in only a couple of places in the world. It burns so cleanly that it meets the requirements of the Clean Air Act without additional technology.

...a large portion of the coal-rich Kaiparowits Plateau within the monument belonged to the children of Utah. When Utah became a state in 1896, ...a trust fund was created to collect and hold all the revenues directly for the benefit of schools. [Now], the schools stand to lose as much as $1 billion over the next 50 years. Phyllis Sorensen, head of the Utah chapter of the National Education Association, called Clinton's action a "felonious assault" and "stealing from the schoolchildren..."

Sarah Foster has additional info as does the Newsmax archives from 2001.

Update: Linked by Mitchell Langbert. Thanks!

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