The Obama-Corzine connection

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Hot Air:

In other words, Corzine looks an awful lot like the so-called 1% that the Occupy Movement despises.  Democrats, especially Barack Obama, had hoped to ride that class-warfare populism to electoral victory in 2012, or at least ride it long enough to avoid electoral disaster.  However, as the Washington Post reported earlier this week, they’re going to have to ride a very long way to distance themselves from MF Global, and especially Jon Corzine himself (via Newsalert):

The bankrupt financial company MF Global, now under federal investigation for possibly misusing clients’ money, is one of the top sources of contributions for President Obama’s reelection, complicating the campaign’s effort to turn public anger at Wall Street into a political advantage.

Employees of the company have given $108,650 to Obama’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee, according to federal records. MF Global’s chairman and chief executive, former New Jersey governor Jon Corzine, has raised at least $500,000 for the campaign and the DNC as a “bundler,” or volunteer fundraiser.

Rumors at one point had Corzine under consideration as a potential member of Obama’s administration, especially after the midterm debacle:

MF Global recently made a bond sale with an unusual clause, saying the interest rate on the bonds would rise 1 percent if Corzine ended up being appointed to a post in the Obama administration. There has been speculation that he could be in line for Treasury secretary if the president is reelected.

If MF Global raided customer accounts to float its own trades, that will likely result in a very public, and very messy, fraud trial for company executives — including Corzine.  That will prove very, very embarrassing for Obama himself, who personally campaigned on Corzine’s behalf in 2009 when the then-governor tried fending off a challenge from Chris Christie.  Seth Mandel reminds us at Commentary how much Obama personally vouched for Corzine’s integrity:

Like many of us in public life today, Jon is a leader who’s been called to govern in some extraordinary times. He’s been tested by the worst recession in half a century — a recession that was caused by years of recklessness and irresponsibility and a do-nothing attitude. It was caused by the same small thinking that has plagued our politics for decades — the kind of thinking that says we can afford to just tinker around with our problems, we can put off the tough decisions, defer the big challenges. We can just tell people what they want to hear instead of what they need to hear.

Well that’s not the kind of leader that Jon Corzine is.

Recklessness?  Irresponsibility?  Gee, that sounds like the best-possible case for MF Global.

And let’s not forget that Obama recruited Corzine as his unofficial liaison to Wall Street donors:

President Obama is desperately putting his Wall Street stock in an unlikely old buddy.

The beleaguered president has recruited former Goldman Sachs head honcho Jon Corzine to shore up re-election funds from the banking industry, which is furious over Obama’s financial regulations.

Corzine, the former governor of New Jersey who was blasted out of office by Republican Chris Christie in 2009, has attended secret meetings with the president and has been working on Obama’s 2012 campaign for months, The Post has learned.

The Democrat, who now leads Manhattan-based brokerage MF Global, has been tasked with scraping up the very little banking-industry support Obama can still get.

If the money doesn’t turn up, Corzine could sink Obama’s entire class-warfare strategy.  He’s going to have to explain how he endorsed someone who could become nearly as toxic as Charles Keating or even Bernie Madoff, and most of that explaining will have to go to the very Occupiers he has encouraged for most of the last few weeks.

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As OWS forms circle-jerks drum circles Obama has been double-crossing criss-crossing the nation, talking like a born-again populist while raking in big money from the 1%ers.

Imagine if OWS had spent the past two months trying to find and support a primary challenger to Obama, or “occupying” 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue with the goal of convincing Obama to not run for reelection.

Instead of accomplishing something the left has been occupied with chasing their tails.

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