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Wednesday, August 06, 2008
Who are these Donors the WaPo Found?
Posted by: Amanda Carpenter at 1:00 PM
There's a curious story about John McCain in the Washington Post today I haven't been able to verify though normal FEC databases.

Take a look at the lede in this story "Bundler Collects from Unlikely Donors":
The bundle of $2,300 and $4,600 checks that poured into Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign on March 12 came from an unlikely group of California donors: a mechanic from D&D Auto Repair in Whittier, the manager of Rite Aid Pharmacy No. 5727, the 30-something owners of the Twilight Hookah Lounge in Fullerton.
Here's the rub. I can't find three out of these four donors on opensecrets.com, the online clearinghouse for donor information.

Here is what I can find:

-The donation record for Rite Aid General Manager Ibrahim Marabeh, who gave to Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani in 2007 and,

-The donation record for a man and a woman with the last name Abdalla who both manage a  Twilight Lounge. But Twilight Lounge managers  Nadia Abdalla and  Hisham Abdalla gave money to Clinton and Giuliani, too. Not McCain. And WaPo reporter Matthew Mosk cites a "Shawn Abdalla" in his piece, but I only see Hisham, not Shawn.

So what these donors really have in common is that they donated to Clinton and Giuliani, which is indeed "unlikely" as Matthew Mosk's article suggests, but maybe not in the way he reported. Mosk alleges there was some Norman Hsu-style bundling involved by an oil-trader named Harry Sargeant III, but I can't figure out what Mosk has to back it up.

The Washington Post claims these donations were made on March 12, several FEC reporting deadlines ago. This means it should be readily available.

Since this information is not easily found, the WaPo should have explained where it came from in their story.  Or it could be, this is just simply not true. And if that's the case they should apologize to the McCain campaign and promptly post a correction online and in tomorrow's paper.





View in ascending order View in descending order
John writes: Wednesday, August, 06, 2008 2:47 PM
Unlikely?
"So what these donors really have in common is that they donated to Clinton and Giuliani, which is indeed "unlikely" as Matthew Mosk's article suggests .."

I don't see what's unlikely about it. Rudy is to the left of the Democratic Party in most respects.
Virginia Patriot writes: Wednesday, August, 06, 2008 2:54 PM
Agreed John
Rudy is to the left of most Democrats, the only one running that was more to the left than Sen. Stick-In-The-Eye.
GM writes: Wednesday, August, 06, 2008 2:58 PM
Has Everyone Gone Nuts? - GM Roper
WaPo makes allegations, Carpenter pokes mile wide holes in the allegations and asks for clarifiation and Kimberly says its a Right Wing coverup?
Sherlock writes: Wednesday, August, 06, 2008 3:08 PM
Ethics violation
"And if that's the case they should apologize to the McCain campaign and promptly post a correction online and in tomorrow's paper."

A major newspaper apologize to a Republican?! Isn't that against the journalism code of ethics or something?
red_in_wa writes: Wednesday, August, 06, 2008 3:28 PM
Your fact checking of facts doesn't work
...I just checked opensecrets.org for my donations. I've had plenty across multiple candidates...how many showed up? Zip...nada...zilch.

a jacksonian writes: Wednesday, August, 06, 2008 3:29 PM
Checking other sources
Newsmeat (http://www.newsmeat.com/) usually has fuller listings and comes up with the same results for the names given.

Nor does Campaign Money (http://www.campaignmoney.com/), which has a bit harder search to go through.

Of the three, Newsmeat is my usual first touch for researching these as it has a good depth to its records, going back to the 1980's in some cases. After that OS and CM are about equal, each having search strengths and weaknesses. For current races they are basically the same, however, but it bears cross-referencing them to ensure that all bases are covered.

Time for WaPo to tell us where it got its numbers from.
Hal writes: Wednesday, August, 06, 2008 3:33 PM
The original article has been updated
Apparently WaPo has now acknowledged that the Marabeth and Abdalla donations were indeed made to other campaigns, not McCain's.

And can someone please tell Kimberly to chill already?
Aubrey writes: Wednesday, August, 06, 2008 3:35 PM
WaPo
How about they just made it up?
Cathy writes: Wednesday, August, 06, 2008 4:30 PM
Illegal Donations to Obama from Gaza
So the MSM is maligning McCain, not getting facts straight, yet the story of the Edwan brothers in Palestine contributing over $29,000 to Obama (illegally) is brushed under the rug?

Amanda, why is it not being reported here? WSJ Online, WND, Reuter's have it. Please correct me if I'm wrong, I just have not seen it.

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=71431

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2008/07/oba mas-gazan-co.html






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