March 23, 2006

Barbara Bush Donates to Katrina Fund Lovely. She also specifies that the "undisclosed amount" must go to education. Spiffy. Specifically, to her son Neil's company. Oh.

Neil traveled the world, meeting with dignitaries and important business people (with Secret Security detail, of course) to fund the company, Ignite Learning. Of course, Ma could just invest in the company. But where's the tax break compassion in that? In February 2004, the Houston school board unanimously agreed to accept $115,000 in charitable donations from businesses and individuals who insisted the money be spent on Ignite. The money covered half the bill for the software, which cost $10,000 per school. Mmm. I think Bush Crime Family is a little harsh. They do seem nice.

posted by petebest 18 years ago
  • Nice tax break for her, nice piece of business for shrubbro. People of Babs class have just been so rich for so long that they are no longer capable of seeing the utter moral failure of such a gesture.
  • and I think you read Froomkin.
  • Now, now, pete. Crime family? That implies that someone was ever caught and put to trial. Sure, Neil was fined in the S&L mess, but that was just a settlement. And his sex tours of Thailand may have been completely on the up and up. And the fact he hangs out with Rev. Moon doesn't imply anything at all.
  • FuckBush Oh, wait. Did I say that before?
  • I don't read Froomkin, but maybe I should. Walter F. Roche Jr. writes in the Los Angeles Times: "As President Bush embarks on a new effort to shore up public support for the war in Iraq, an uncle of the commander in chief is collecting $2.7 million in cash and stock from the recent sale of a company that profited from the war. "A report filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission shows that William H.T. Bush collected just under $1.9 million in cash plus stock valued at more than $800,000 from the sale of Engineered Support Systems Inc. to DRS Technologies of New Jersey." His company experienced record growth as a result of expanded U.S. military contracts, some awarded on a no-bid basis.
  • I had contemplated putting froomkin's column up as a FPP. It is an everyday read for me, and a good source of white house sadness.
  • So basically she's funnelling the money through the Katrina fund to make it look like she's doing something altruistic. Nice.
  • Well, then things are working out very well for all of them, aren't they?
  • well I think it's really nice of her to invite the homeless 'refugees' of new orleans to eat cake!
  • absolutely fucking shameful and disgusting
  • FuckBush Oh, wait. Did I say that before? Oh, A lot of women did that already. "The women, he said, simply knocked on the door of his hotel room, entered and had sex with him. He said he did not know if they were prostitutes because they never asked for money and he did not pay them". Oh ho. Don't you all love a candid, innocent answer?
  • Happens to me all the time. Oh, excuse me, that's the door.
  • And may we have a comment from the His Holiness, Pope Bush, on the behavior of his brother? FuckBushFamily
  • .com?
  • They're all as pure as the driven scum.
  • Sorry like the principle but no longer believe in the altruism of anyone even closely associated with politicians....... In particular the names Bush and Blair develop a curious allergic reaction. Hell Cherie has now made more than half a fortune travelling the globe and telling the rest of the world how correct her husband was. Shameless use of induced cause to generate revenus for private wealth - I no longer belive in the altruism of statesmen ( yeah ok taken me this long and i am really really stupid!!!!) Problem is how do i recognise a genuine benefactor anymore? (yeah even an iguana with a family history back to george washington could figure this one out) Of course being able to trav=ce a lizards family tree back to the foefathers is a problem in itself
  • Phew, I'm glad we've never had grubby corruption in the UK.
  • How about the headline - Barbara Bush - philanthropist. 2nd headline - Charity begins at home.........at least that would be close to accurate!
  • More on the Neilster - oy In the annals of the modern presidency, few things have become more familiar than the errant presidential sibling milking his brother's good name for a few -- or more than a few -- bucks. These days that task has fallen to Neil Bush, the 46-year-old younger brother of the president, who's circling the globe, under the protection of the Secret Service, looking for big shots in the world of international politics and finance who might want to invest a couple million dollars in an interactive education software company that no one seems to have heard of. Bush, you may remember, raised eyebrows last January by telling a Saudi Arabian audience that the "U.S. media campaign against the interests of Arabs and Muslims, and the American public opinion on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, could be influenced [by] a sustained lobbying and PR effort." Long before that, in the late 1980s, Neil Bush made bigger news for his controversial role as a director of Silverado Savings and Loan, which collapsed and cost taxpayers roughly $1 billion. (Federal regulators accused Bush of various conflicts of interests, but he was never charged. A civil suit against Bush and other Silverado officers was later settled for $26.5 million.)
  • She has the same consequence ethic the rest of her family has. Hitler had the same ethic, funnily enough, as did Lenin and Stalin and Mao.
  • Did an audio track of "Fortunate Son" come up on each link in this thread for you guys too?