By Peter Galuszka
This year’s bizarre gubernatorial race has had stories beyond belief. There’s Jonnie, Maureen, Todd, Ken and Bob. And there’s also Terry, Xiaolin and Benjamin.
The tantalizing tales of the first group need not be repeated. They, of course, involved tardily disclosed stock holdings, a wife not telling husband about stock buys, big-time and secret real estate loans, Fifth Avenue shopping sprees, the $190,000 car, the Rolex, catered Thanksgiving dinners and so on.
The other involves a more complicated tale of GreenTech autos, a business venture involving Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe.
The former is actually fairly straightforward. The second one is a lot more complex.
So, we have ABC News to thank for the most detailed perspective yet on GreenTech which seems a mess but not exactly a scandal, no matter how hard Ken Cuccinelli, the GOP gubernatorial candidate tries to spin it.
As the ABC story notes, there was plenty wrong with the predecessor company to GreenTech involving businessmen Xiaolin Wang and Benjamin Yeung who were fighting it out in court over investments before McAuliffe ever got on the scene.
And it isn’t clear what McAuliffe actually did that was so bad, other than lobby to get business executives legal visas. I mean, if you are going to do business with foreign national and it is a global economy, you need visas. Trying to get them can be a pain. But doing so is not exactly a crime. Just ask me. I had to get Soviet visas for people, myself included, for years.
True pain in the butt. And (full disclosure), I have also lobbied to get foreign nationals U.S. visas. It was fully legal. If Ken Cuccinelli wants to make a TV, ad about me, good luck.
On the other hand, owning stock and not disclosing it in a company owned by Jonnie Williams who is the central figure in Giftgate is a horse of a different color, even though Cuccinelli has been cleared of wrong doing. We’re still waiting for word on Bob and Maureen.
As for McAuliffe, I see a lot of smoke and no fire. It seems that if he’s done anything wrong it was that he got mixed up in a bad business deal. But then, writing for Bacon’s Rebellion, while honorable, is a bad business deal. Details on request.
