Perhaps this story is all coincidence. And yes right now it is just in the National Review Online. But it certainly has the appearance of a pretty big quid pro quo to me.
One of Obama’s Earmarks Went to Hospital That Employs Michelle Obama
Dan Riehl notes, via Amanda Carpenter, that in the list of earmarks he requested, $1 Million was requested for the construction of a new hospital pavilion at the University Of Chicago. The request was put in in 2006.
You know who works for the University of Chicago Hospital?
Michelle Obama. She’s vice president of community affairs.
As Byron noted, “In 2006, the Chicago Tribune reported that Mrs. Obama’s compensation at the University of Chicago Hospital, where she is a vice president for community affairs, jumped from $121,910 in 2004, just before her husband was elected to the Senate, to $316,962 in 2005, just after he took office.”
Looks like that raise was worth it.
The Globe ran a story last week about how John McCain excuses himself from any vote that is even tangentially related to the alcohol industry, given that his wife owns a pretty large Anheuser Bush distributorship. You would think at the very least Barack Obama would do the same when it comes to the hospital his wife works at.
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p>don’t forget to mention that george soros flew over the state of illinois that day, so naturally he had a hand in the evil doings too.
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p>i challenge you to search out the truth in the story. it’s easy to lazily smear by insinuation. got the chops to do real analysis, or will you settle for shoddy and shameful regurgitation of accusations?
received a promotion from Director to VP after Barack Obama was elected. So yes she received a promotion. It seems somewhat logical that the promotion was tied to who her husband was now no? Curry favor with the Senator? Note I’d say the same if the Senator was female and the husband got a sweet promotion.
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p>But that in and of itself is not the story. The story to me is that Obama did not recuse himself not only from a vote but inserted an earmark for his Wife’s employer. In Massachusetts that would be against the law, and it would be a pretty easy case to make before the ethics committee.
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p>It seems as though on the Federal Level as long as the vote “had a broad, general impact on his state or the nation”, there would be no conflict of interest. So I guess the question is does the earmark in question rise to that standard?
Rumors can really be investigated. We don’t have to churn up this kind of stuff. While you’re at it, I’m curious about McCain’s first marriage. I’d like to hear more about its demise.
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p>So too, I’m sure, would social conservatives.
….yourself a disservice by tossing around silly accusations about candidates marriages. Everyone knows that McCain met his now wife while still married to his first wife. It happened in the Pleistocene era so it is ancient history by now. Stooping to that level is beneath you.
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p>Sadly this story is not rumor mongering. Whether Michelle Obama’s promotion was tied to the allocation is not the meat and potatoes of the story. It is color commentary. And just the appearance of impropriety in that regard is relevant in relation to the real issue. The real issue, of course, is that the earmark was inserted in the first place. It, as EaBo pointed out, was for the benefit of his wife’s employer. Is that merely a rumor, or did it really happen? Seems that it happened and can’t so easily be poo-pooed away. And the “look a republican is less than perfect Adultery, Adultery” tactic is not going to divert attention. The earmark stinks coming from anyone and it wreaks coming from Mr. Ethic’s is My Bag, Baby New Kind of Politics. The bloom is starting to fall off the rose and he is looking more and more like your average everyday politician.
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He himself released his earmarks, he’s calling on others to do the same. Let’s see what the other candidate do about this request. I’ve voted and defended Hillary, that ended this week with Ferraro. I am now neutral. With a skeptical eye I don’t see much here. With the listing of all of his earmarks this is the best the NRO can do? Do you know what I mean?
…it is what it is. The earmark stinks, whether he released it or not. It may not be the worst thing ever, but given his position on ethics it is telling.
but a candidate will have to push that, I don’t think either Hillary or McCain will want to be pushing earmarks and how either will be releasing theirs. I don’t see them going there.
when people work hard and take on new responsibilities, they are sometimes (not often enough!) rewarded with a promoton and/or raise. FOr me to believe that her raise/promotion had abything to do with an earmark that didn’t materialize, you need to document that she was given these things without having earned them. Can you do that?
…the “Obama’s crazy, racist, God-damn-America minister” attack line. It’s far more sensational and substantive than this as-of-now post hoc attack.
Is where Obama used to teach law. You might mention that as another conflict of interest. Heck, maybe he should have recused himself from anything affecting the State of Illinois, just to be sure.
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p>Heaven forbid, after all, that National Journal readers should be interested in building hospitals — that would put them out of line with demonstrated Republican orthodoxy.
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p>Interesting, just by the way, that John McCain didn’t recuse himself from his recent flip-flop on torture: I guess he doesn’t have any conflict of interest when inconsistency and expediency are up for a vote.
…he taught at the University is irrelevant. Conflicts of interest are not mitigated by good will. The overall charitable nature of the grant is too not a mitigating factor. He made an earmark for the benefit of his wife’s employer and then voted on it. That is ethically challenged. He of all people should know better. Considering the fact that the money was intended for a hospital, filing the earmark in the first place would perhaps be excusable, assuming full disclosure of the conflict was made, but voting for it crosses the line.
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From what I can tell, he was done work to provide funding to more than just Univ of Chicago. Noticed he also listed other hospital projects for funding:
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p>Alton Memorial Hospital
Children’s Memorial Medical Center
Swedish Covenant Hospital
Northwestern Memorial Hospital’s Prentice Woman’s Hospital
Children’s Hospital of Illinois
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p>Did Michelle work for those hospitals as well? The Univ of Chicago project would have increased capacity by 1/3, in an area that it’s needed. Instead what you see is that he has identified some health care needs in the area that he thought were good to bring funding.
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p>What you don’t say is that this information came from Barack himself, who was pushing for openness and transparency in government and freely release all of his earmark requests. I hate that transparency stuff, don’t you? BTW, do you have John McCain’s anywhere so we can make a comparison? Also, do you think it’s ever going to happen? That’s your first question. Maybe the NRO could do some digging and get McCain to release his lists. It’s just a simple phone call…! Have at it.
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p>By the way, the NRO’s last line, about Michelle, even though she had the position before the earmark, while they are trying to imply something else:
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p>Um, the earmark was rejected. Nice work guys!!!
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..else he may have done is really irrelevant. Conflicts of interst are not viewed in the broad context but very narrowly. If his wife’s employer stood to benefit, he should not have voted.
what do you think should happen?
…should get filed away in the pile of information about what Obama has actually done as a politician for reference when people get too caught up in the Obama mythology. There are plenty of other things that will be coming to light in the coming weeks, not doubt. His record in the Illinois Legislature for one is very interesting. Can’t wait til that gets the scrutiny it deserves.
that’s not the issue with earmarks, for good or for ill, that’s not how earmarks work.
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p>Excepting the question about whether earmarks should exist at all, what you are suggesting is the UCMC should be made wholly ineligible for an earmark simply because Michelle Obama is one of 6,000 employees. If she did not benefit from the earmark (say as a contractor with a no-bid earmark funded contract) why should UCMC (the largest employer on the South Side of Chicago, and one of the foremost teaching and research hospitals in the US) be so exempt. Show me exactly how Michelle Obama has personally benefited from the 2006 earmark. (You can’t use the salary innuendo, because it conflates two jobs and then compares wages, sorry.)
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p>I used to review conflict of interest claims and decide whether or not there was cause to so find, to examine the facts of whether or not an employee or family member stood to improperly benefit from the (proposed)awarding of a corporate transaction under the control of the employee in question. And whether the service to be provided was unique and necessary and whether there were any other bidders who met the qualifications to provide those services. And so on and so on. In the real world it’s generally more complicated than your statement about conflict of interest suggests. If Barack Obama had earmarked money to the Michelle Obama Foundation (Michelle Obama CEO), then it would be pretty easy to find cause, but that’s not what happened. I know people don’t like nuance or details but that’s were the facts are, and to ignore them is neither fair nor responsible, in my opinion.
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p>Hillary Clinton has over 300 million dollars in earmarks for 2006, and she refuses to release those so we can examine them for “conflicts of interest”. John McCain has lobbyists transacting business on his campaign bus. The only candidate whose been open about what he’s done is Obama. Again this is the difference between talk of openness and changing government and actually doing it. Obama is still also the only one to release his tax returns. Clinton (who found a remarkable $5 million in cash to loan her campaign) and McCain have not. I look forward to their tax and earmark releases.
sigh. Any idea what the University of Chicago Medical Center is? Are you aware that it is considered one of 18 top hospitals in the US? And the only one in Illinois to so qualify? Did you know that it is a non-profit teaching and research hospital, with the UC Medical School. Were you aware that the UC and UCMC are the largest employer on the South Side of Chicago providing thousands of jobs to Illinoisans.
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p>I suggest that if you want to make a smear like yours stick, you have to provide evidence (not innuendo or coincidence) of actual quid pro quo, and you also have to prove that UCMC was not otherwise deserving of an earmark from the Senator from its state.
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p>As you may not realize from just reading the National Review, Michelle Obama was a manager (Director of Community Affairs) until May 2005 when on the strength of the programs which she created, developed and grew at a Director level, she was promoted to a senior managment position of Vice President. Normally compensation jumps when one moved from regular managment to senior managment. Since compensation for “highly compensated individuals” is normally well-regulated in a non-profit Univ system (even in the private sector), I believe you would be hard pressed to find that she is overly compensated for her level and experience within that organization. My guess is that she is actually not in the highest tier for her job level because of the job areas she oversees. So, to recap: the $121,910 per year was her salary as a Director, the $316,962 was her salary as a Vice President and member of senior managment. The article conflates the two jobs and then contrasts the salaries – pretty sneaky.
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p>Here’s a quid pro quo for you: Dick Cheney used to run Haliburton. When he joins W on the ticket, a lot of Haliburton folks (and their families) pony up to support the ticket. When he becomes VP and pushes hard for a war in Iraq, Haliburton gets no bid contracts for billions of US taxpayer dollars in Iraq, and Haliburton executives (and their families) get rich rich rich.
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p>And John McCain? I’d have more faith in your good words about him if he wasn’t allowing his campaign bus and auspices to be used as a private lobbying center for high priced lobbyists and embedded campaign advisors like Charlie Black.
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