Spitzer Looking Into World Jewish Congress

[Rose Siding]

An odd series of money transfers ordered by the leader of the World Jewish Congress, the tiny nonprofit that has wrested billions in Holocaust restitution from banks, companies and governments in Europe, has provoked an informal inquiry by Attorney General Eliot Spitzer of New York, people contacted by Mr. Spitzer's office said.

Officials from Mr. Spitzer's office have been contacting organization insiders and others in the United States and abroad, and the organization appears to be working to head off a full-blown investigation.

Toward that end, Stephen E. Herbits, who has been hired by Edgar Bronfman Sr., the organization's chief patron, to overhaul governance and financial management, has traveled to Israel and Europe courting support for plans for better internal oversight of the organization.

The congress has formidable legal representation in the form of Robert Abrams, a former New York attorney general, and the Jewish Week reported yesterday that Mr. Herbits had been negotiating with Isi Leibler, the organization's senior vice president and most vigorous internal critic.

Mr. Leibler, who declined to comment, has demanded an independent audit of the organization and extensive reforms in governance and financial management.

http://nytimes.com/2004/12/31/national/31charity.html

[Paleocon]

1. Sounds like somebody didn't get his kick back???

:think:

[InvisibleBallots]

9. Spitzer is great

The greatest - his reputation makes me give him the benefit of the doubt. If he thinks these guys are scammers, chances are they are. Wait and see...

[shadowknows69]

11. I hope Elliot "Ness" Spitzer

has good home security. he makes people (not me) mad.

[TheWraith]

17. Sounds more like investigation of possible embezzlement to me. NT.

[lovuian]

2. Oh this is going to be good!!!

:bounce:

[Rose Siding]

3. lol

[Princess Turandot]

8. It's hard to say what this even is..

the only thing the article made me think was the possibility that someone had defalcated $$ from the organization into his own account.Can anyone say 'United Way'? People working for charities aren't exempt from committing theft, if that is what this is.

On the other hand, I once worked for an NPF which was investigated by the state's AG (I'm not speaking of Mr. Spitzer) on the basis of a bogus complaint by someone with political influence with the state's then administration. Reams of paper and a lot of lawyer fees later, it amounted to nothing at all, which was what it actually was. (The issue in question had occured long before I went to work for the place, so I had no personal interest in the outcome.)

[Name removed]

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[Isere]

5. Who do you mean?

Who are you referring to?

[NorthernSpy]

6. friends of Bush, I imagine.

That's who.

[Name removed]

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[Tinoire]

12. You wouldn't care to explain what a neo-lib is would you?

Let's first define terms and then we can pursue the delicate task of dissecting your oh so eloquent post.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

14. Neo-Lib?

Well, there is this toilet of a web forum, over yonder, when they hatched that phrase. You know it.

That's ok though. I pushed the button on this guy. He'll be pizza before long.

[Tinoire]

18. LMAO!

Du bist keine schiesskopf! Hope I said that right... meaning you are no sk! but I still love that moniker ;)

[MsMagnificent]

16. No it's not Karl

However there are a great deal of us who feel the Israeli's (NOT "Jews") have, as America has, squandered all of their good Karma in the world.

Being oppressed by someone/thing in the past doesn't give a blank check to one's own group to treat any other race or group of people in any brutal way they wish.
There's no credit card there, pre-stocked with victimization capital; there is nothing to expend.

Israel's Apartheid is far worse than South Africa's ever was, even if you just look at one category -- the body count.


BTW, the Palestinians and local arabs are semites also.

[Name removed]

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[DulceDecorum]

32. Israel's apartheid is far BETTER than South Africa's ever was?

Mean is mean is mean.

[Name removed]

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[readmylips]

34. Amen, Well Said...

The one's keeping the Israel's Apartheid alive are the westerner's form of kkkristianity. They've been brainwashed into all the nonsense about Jesus' land and the Jews as the chosen ones. Westerners believe that they must safe Jesus' land....heee...heee...what they're saving is hate and murder so that the US can have a strong hold in the region's oil. To hell with Israel and that murdering Sharon.

[Name removed]

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[Tinoire]

13. Oh BULL!! Elliot Spitzer is Jewish & a close friend of Alan Dershowitz

What (*& divisive, distractionary BULL.

DID YOU EVEN EXAMINE WHAT THIS CASE IS ABOUT? It's about poor Holocaust Jews having gotten RIPPED off by RICH people. Or do you not care about them?

Who are you trying to defend with these accusations here? THIEVES?

[NorthernSpy]

19. exactly

DID YOU EVEN EXAMINE WHAT THIS CASE IS ABOUT? It's about poor Holocaust Jews having gotten RIPPED off by RICH people.

Exactly! Rightwingers are corrupt defenders of privilege, and their current grip on power means that Spitzer will have his work cut out for him, to say the least. Reactionaries always side with the exploiter against the exploited. The people who actually suffered all the horrors have consistently gotten screwed out of compensation by those who presume to file actions in their behalf.

[Tinoire]

25. I hope this BLOWS up in their face

so it can expose the whole charade of stealing in the name of the victims and desecrating their memory.

[NorthernSpy]

15. why exactly are you leaping to such assumptions?

I assumed that the poster meant that political reactionaries control the courts. And as far as the highest court in the land is concerned, reactionaries clearly DO control it.

Isn't that just sort of obvious?

[DemFromMem]

20. Obvious? Yes

The original post was about a Jewish organization being investigated and the response was basically they have nothing to worry about because of who controls the courts.

The poster was either saying that Jews control the courts or we accept your strange conclusion that right wing reactionaries control the courts and that means somehow a Jewish organization gets off the hook. Are you saying that the Jews control the reactionaries? Or that reactionaries are somehow allied with the Jews? In any case, the post was offensive.

Jews don't control the courts either directly or indirectly and it should not be necessary to have to get into a debate on this subject.

[NorthernSpy]

26. where did the compsensation money go?

The poster was either saying that Jews control the courts or we accept your strange conclusion that right wing reactionaries control the courts and that means somehow a Jewish organization gets off the hook. Are you saying that the Jews control the reactionaries? Or that reactionaries are somehow allied with the Jews? In any case, the post was offensive.

Do you think that reactionaries don't control the courts?

As for the rest of your remarks, have you read Norman Finkelstein's book? It's called The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering, and it explores the fate of billions of dollars worth of compensation that never made it to the individuals who were owed it. Where that money went, and whose interests are served by keeping a lid on this have a lot to do with Spitzer's chance of success in bringing an action against the organization in question.

Jews don't control the courts either directly or indirectly and it should not be necessary to have to get into a debate on this subject.

Sweet, coming from the person who introduced the "Jewish control of the courts" meme in the first place...

:eyes:

[Tinoire]

27. So even pretending that your weak premise is unflawed

HOW, just how do you justify crying anti-Semitism when a JEWISH lawyer takies this to what YOU knee-jerkedly assumed are "Jewish-controlled courts"?

The twisted logic is what offends. The knee jerk use of talking point defenses is what offends.

The immediate accusation without even asking the poster for clarification is what offends.

[DemFromMem]

31. Irrelevant

The post was about who controlled the courts. It was not talking about the merits of the case nor was it talking about the religion of Spitzer. The post was obviously not just offensive to me, but to others who have read this thread. And trying to put us on the defensive by claiming hypersensitivity is not helpful.

Most people when they are called to the carpet on making bigoted statements try to work really hard to pretend that they were just misinterpreted. And if that won't work, then they issue the non-apology apology - "I'm sorry if my remarks may have offended anyone. That was certainly not my intention..." I'm sure that's what's coming next.

[Tinoire]

33. The post was in relation to this story. Did you even read this story

before commenting?

Most people when they are called to the carpet on making bigoted statements try to work really hard to pretend that they were just misinterpreted. And if that won't work, then they issue the non-apology apology - "I'm sorry if my remarks may have offended anyone. That was certainly not my intention..." I'm sure that's what's coming next.

You jumped to a conclusion without knowing the poster,without understanding what this story is about and without even having the common courtesy of asking the poster if they were inferring something nefarious. "I'm sorry if my remarks may have offended anyone. That was certainly not my intention..." I'm NOT sure that's what's coming next and that's unfortunate after flinging such an immediate & vile accusation of anti-Semitism when you obviously didn't even bother to understand the story.

YES this post is about who controls the courts. It was however your unfortunate conclusion that that could obviously only mean one thing even though this story is about a Jewish lawyer trying to get a wealthy Jewish AID group to release some of the funds it's been withholding from Jewish victims. Take the word Jew and Jewish out of that last sentence; maybe that will help.

Gotto go. There's enough misery in this world without getting embroiled in this non-issue. Good night.

[regnaD kciN]

39. "Strange conclusion"...?

...or we accept your strange conclusion that right wing reactionaries control the courts...

You find it strange to think that right-wing reactionaries control the courts?????

:crazy:

[11cents]

21. "Reactionary" would seem to have nothing to do with this case

Why think that the poster meant that political reactionaries control the courts when this doesn't seem to be a case that involves ideology, one way or the other? It does involve Jews, however. You don't have to leap to pick up on the poster's insinuation.

[Darranar]

22. Who, in your opinion, "controls the courts"? n/t

[Name removed]

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[Name removed]

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[Name removed]

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[JoFerret]

35. Spitzer is sure going to make some powerful enemies

on his ride to being Governor of NY and beyond. I like this fearless take-on-all-comers-and-evil-doers rep he is developing. After 8 years of Bush there will surely be a load of manure piled in the barn.

[PATRICK]

36. I remember the solicitous

concern of Sen. Al D'Amato on the holocaust restitution issue. That the Swiss are gaming the guilt riddled issue successfully. I add that
to the wondrous coincidence that most "victims" are extremely old or gone
and I don't even need to see nefarious Jewish plots but the same goodfellow hand in pocket thumb in pie behavior of the same people chumming up to Indian casino gambling.

And then comes the disappearing money. Sometimes it as simple as there is no such thing as an unthinkably shameful robbery and the more powerless the fleeced the more you want to get praised for pretending to help.

Con game conglomerates attract so many flies to the honey that it is better to swat the mess and count the vermin after.

[emad]

37. Today's Independent coverage:

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=597158

[durutti]

38. Everyone must read The Holocaust Industry.

It's about how the Nazi holocaust and its memory is exploited for political and economic gain, often by organizations claiming to speak for Jewry. Its author, Norman Finkelstein, is the son of holocaust survivors.