Candidate Obama at fund-raiser April 9, 2007. Soros is seated to the right.
(PIC: Michael Edwards)
STROLL DOWN MEMORY LANE Obama came to town to deliver a speech at a charity dinner for "children in poverty" at the pricey, exclusive Mandarin Oriental Hotel----but also to pursue another, less high-minded, but more momentous, objective: to begin the process picking Hillary Clinton’s pocket.
The conference room belonged to George Soros. After talking to Soros for an hour about his 2008 bid for the White House, Obama walked down the hall and found assembled a dozen of the city’s heaviest-hitting Democratic fund-raisers: investment banker *Hassan Nemazee, Wall Street power Blair Effron, private-equity hotshot Mark Gallogly, hedge-fund manager Orin Kramer. Most had been big-time John Kerry backers in 2004. Most had a connection to the Clintons. All were officially uncommitted for 2008.
* Charges of fraud, dated September 2, 2009 stated that "Hassan Nemazee to obtain a $100 million loan, represented to HSBC that he had $89 million in Treasury Notes, with a current market value of more than $125 million, in a specified brokerage firm account; submitted a supposed agreement from the brokerage firm with forged signatures, false addresses, and false telephone numbers; used a mail drop; and submitted fabricated brokerage statements." Nemazee defrauded a total of three banks--- including Bank of America---- out of $292 million in loan proceeds.