One of the interesting revelations included in the controversial new Vanity Fair profile of Bill Clinton is the disclosure of his close financial and personal relationship with California supermarket billionaire
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The article alleges a variety of questionable doings, and implicates Burkle as quite the actor in the broader Clinton drama. Obviously, the Clintonites are disputing that portrayal in a most vigorous fashion.
Interestingly, I caught up with a conservative who is also disputing the Vanity Fair portrayal. Christian Josi --a Washington based PR executive and former Executive Director of the American Conservative Union -- came to know Burkle as a teenager growing up in a political family in Southern California, and describes him as an "absolute prince and someone who has had a pretty huge impact on my life".
Josi, who is also an internationally known jazz singer, adds: "He's thanked in the liner notes of my first album from 1993. He encouraged me and even provided some financial support at a critical point in my career when I was totally poor, had a new wife and baby, and it was make or break. So...suffice to say there is a hell of a lot more to this guy than you would imagine by reading the increasingly frequent press reports."
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Josi adds: "I haven't spoken to him in about 15 years. Certainly not since I started bashing the Clintons for a living. He may not even want my vote of confidence but I am sufficiently pissed off by how he has been portrayed to feel the need to share my thoughts with you. So there you are."
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