Lester Crown and Barack Obama

"Lester Crown is a Chicagoan with a net worth of four billion dollars. He owns a large stake in and is a former president and board chairman of defense contractor General Dynamics. He also has held large holdings in Hilton Hotels, Maytag (now Whirlpool), and the Chicago Bulls and New York Yankees.

Crown was an early supporter of Barack Obama’s candidacy first for the U.S. Senate, and then for president. He is one of the first and one of his most prodigious fundraisers. As the Obama presidential campaign website says, the candidate “… systematically built a sophisticated, and in many ways quite conventional, money machine.” The Crowns were an integral part of that machinery. One of Lester Crown’s children, James Crown, personally bundled $500,000 in campaign contributions for Obama and served as chairman of the Illinois fund raising effort. Lester Crown and his wife Renee hosted a fundraiser for Obama in 2007 at their home. The event invitation made it clear; their support for Obama was due to his support of Israel, its “right to exist“ and his willingness to strike militarily against Iran."  alethonews

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Lester Crown is a good and virtuous man.  In the days when i knew him well, I valued his friendshp highly.  i still have a very high opinion of him and his family, even if his German Shepherd did bite me once.  Nevertheless i think that he is mistaken about the need for a US war with Iran and I suspect that he has had some effect in causing the US to sponsor an all but hopeless negotiation between Natanyahu and Abbas.

I wish him and his well.  pl 

http://alethonews.wordpress.com/2010/08/20/israel-big-money-and-obama/

Comments

[Patrick Lang]

Anonymous

I am your idea of an anarchist? I have had a number of GSs starting with one in Deutschland when I was a kid during the occupation. This the first one that discerned the truth. pl

[psc]

Lester and family may be good and virtuous, but his "bundles" of millions are a large part of what is wrong with our country.

Mr. Crown can vote at each election, just as I can vote at each election. But my vote and his vote are not equal. Mr. Crown's millions, which politicians crave more than life itself, are able to muffle and extiguish the voices of the people.

One of the reasons President Obama was elected to "change" or reset our foreign policy. Mr. Crown seems to want a continuation of Bush's policies in the ME.

Bush's big backer was casino mogul Sheldon Adelson. Obama's big backer is Lester Crown. To me, they are the same man, both push for American wars against Israel's enemies.

Somehow, someway, political donations must be regulated so that these special interests are stopped. Probably won't happen 'til our country is flat broke and there are riots in the streets.

[William R. Cumming]

Actually there is a difference between anarchy and insurgency. I find PL to be of the latter category which is always in short supply even when nonviolent and just supplying truth to power.

[somebody]

German sheperds only bite if you say "fass".

[Fred]

PSC don't forget Kennyboy Lay - and Jack Abrhamoff. The latter was the master of 'bundling' donations. It is why Tom Delay became the Majority Whip in the house. Gingrich's right hand man. Regulating political donations won't be happening with the current conservative Supreme Court. The more money you have, the more equal you are.

One can always run for office, some of them are actually winnable, especially in times like this.

[Jose]

Lester Crown will have to stand in line of people FoolBama either misled, disappointed, or just plain deceived.

Trust me on this one, the line is long and growing everyday.

Does anybody expect either Israel or The USA to bomb a nuclear plant full of Russians based perceived needs of a special interest group?

[zanzibar]

What is it that Lester Crown and other such influential, "good and virtuous" men see that causes them to support military strikes against Iran?

I also don't get the neo-cons. They campaigned hard on the basis of false pretenses for us to invade Iraq only to benefit the Iranians. Now they want to strike Iran? And previously they were quite happy to trade arms with the Iranians to covertly fund the Contras.

Could someone please help me understand their strategy and how all this helps the Likudniks? I am confused.

[americangoy]

"Could someone please help me understand their strategy and how all this helps the Likudniks? I am confused."

http://americangoy.blogspot.com/2008/05/plan-all-along.html

And yes, they were this nuts that the neocons believed that America was so powerful it would use its military to remake the WHOLE of the Middle East.