How The Clintons SOLD OUT OHIO: New Developments-Anthrax, Radioactive Waste, & Post Katrina Waste

[mod mom]

SOME OF YOU HERE MAY WONDER WHY I AM SUCH A VOCAL OPPONENT OF THE CLINTON CAMPAIGN. SEN CLINTON SPEAKS OF HER LIFETIME COMMITMENT TO HELPING CHILDREN, YET IN MY STATE OF OHIO, THEIR POLITICAL ASPIRATIONS TOOK THE FRONT SEAT OVER WHAT WAS BEST FOR THE ENVIRONMENT, CHILDREN AND AN IMPOVERISHED REGION. I HAVE POSTED THREADS BEFORE ON THE EAST LIVERPOOL TOXIC WASTE INCINERATOR, BUT A DIARIST ON DAILY KOS RECENTLY FOUND DISTURBING NEW FACTS ON THE INCINERATOR. FIRST, HERE IS THE WELL RESEARCHED KOS PIECE:

Ask Hillary About This Tonight. I Dare You.
by Zwoof

Thu Jan 31, 2008 at 03:40:46 AM PST

-snip

While I was writing the original piece on the history of this foul project, a new ruling from the Ohio EPA allowed this incinerator, located 1,100 feet from an elementary school, to accept even more hazardous waste (anthrax, radioactive waste, infectious medical waste and mixed hazardous waste from Hurricane Katrina) than the original permit that was shrouded in corruption and approved by the Clinton Administration

Clinton and Al Gore promised the residents of East Liverpool, Ohio that they would not allow this incinerator originally approved by Bush '41 to operate. However, a Clinton EPA appointee, recommended by his classmate Hillary Clinton, approved the permit.

This is a tangled tale of corporatism, broken promises and an environmental disaster waiting to happen.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/1/31/21045/9822/688/446786

NEW RULING:

Ohio EPA Approves Permit Modification
For East Liverpool Incinerator
Ohio EPA has given final approval for Von Roll America, Inc., to receive, manage and incinerate waste not previously taken at its hazardous waste incinerator located at 1250 St. George Street in East Liverpool.

The permit modification allows the facility to receive and manage mixed infectious and hazardous waste. Typical wastes could include vaccines containing mercury; sharps containing chemotherapy drugs; growth plates and Petri dishes containing hazardous components; and tissue and organs from small lab animals preserved in ethanol or formaldehyde.

Ohio law requires that any infectious waste that also is hazardous waste be managed as hazardous waste. While the permit modification allows Von Roll to accept mixed infectious and hazardous waste, the facility will continue to be prohibited from accepting and treating waste that is only infectious.

On February 21, 2007, Ohio EPA held a public meeting in East Liverpool to discuss the draft permit modification. Comments presented at that meeting and during the public comment period were considered prior to final approval. Ohio EPA's written response to public comments is available online at: www.epa.state.oh.us/dhwm/von_roll_america_inc.html.

Issuance of the final permit modification can be appealed to the Environmental Review Appeals Commission (ERAC), 309 S. Fourth Street, Room 222, Columbus, Ohio 43215. Many appeals must be filed within 30 days of the issuance of the final permit; therefore, Ohio EPA recommends that anyone wishing to file an appeal contact ERAC at [phone] for more information. The appeal must be in writing and a copy must be received by the Ohio EPA director within three days of filing with ERAC. Further appeals can be made through civil courts.

The permit modification and related materials are available for review at the Carnegie Public Library located at 219 East Fourth Street, East Liverpool, and at Ohio EPA's Northeast District Office in Twinsburg by first calling [phone].

http://www.epa.state.oh.us/pic/nr/2008/january/VonRoll.html

Richard Wolf questioned: “…whether or not Anthrax is going to be incinerated.”

Response 2:
Yes, VRA will be authorized under this permit modification to manage anthrax, if it meets
the definition of a mixed infectious and hazardous waste (MIHW). MIHW is defined as
infectious waste that is also hazardous waste. In order to be managed as MIHW, waste
must be both infectious waste and hazardous waste simultaneously. If a waste stream
contained a mixture of untreated anthrax and hazardous waste with hazardous waste
codes, then VRA could request to manage the waste under this permit modification
request. Based upon Ohio EPA knowledge of waste generation, it is unlikely waste
streams containing both anthrax and hazardous waste will be generated.

-SNIP
During the hearing, it was clarified that the citizen was referring to the fact that examples
of possible mixed infectious and hazardous waste streams were provided on two
occasions. The examples provided were not identical on those two occasions, and the
citizen wondered why.

In the VRA news release for their public information meeting held on February 13, 2006,
VRA provided possible examples of MIHW including “...mixtures of these materials are
found during environmental cleanups such as those following the hurricanes that
pounded the Gulf Coast states. It is not uncommon in these and other disasters that
chemicals would be co-mingled with pharmaceuticals and other medicinal materials”.

In the Ohio EPA news release dated February 9, 2007, entitled Ohio EPA Schedules
Public Meeting Concerning East Liverpool Incinerator, examples included “...vaccines
containing mercury; sharps containing chemotherapy drugs; growth plates and Petri
dishes containing hazardous components; tissue and organs from small lab animals
preserved in ethanol...”.

pdf found here: http://www.epa.state.oh.us/dhwm/pdf/VRAResponsivenessSummary-101507.pdf

HERE IS SOME BACKGROUND ON THE SITE OF THE EAST LIVERPOOL OH TOXIC WASTE INCINERATOR:

The Problem

The Waste Technologies Industry, Inc. incinerator is located in the floodplain of the Ohio River in East Liverpool, Ohio. The surrounding area is elevated on a bluff, such that incinerator's stack is level with the windows of local buildings. The incinerator is located about 300 feet from homes and just 1100 feet from an elementary school. The location of the facility has been intensely criticized by citizens, scientists, and government officials alike. East Liverpool is located at the juncture of Ohio, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania, approximately 35 miles from Pittsburgh.

Waste Technologies Industry, Inc. (WTI)


WTI has also gained significant political support, as one of the original partners in the corporation was Jackson Stephens. Stephens, an Arkansas investor, was known as a significant contributor to Reagan, Bush, and Clinton campaigns.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

The EPA has been accused of having bias in favor of WTI and carrying out decision-making activities without required public participation. The agency also violated rules established in RCRA during the WTI permit application process. EPA admitted such wrong-doing at a hearing before the House Judiciary Committee's subcommitteeon Administrative Law and Government Relations, as well as the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

-SNIP
http://www.umich.edu/~snre492/mcormick.html#Key%20Actors

The incinerator failed its March 1993 test burn.<6> Among other shortcomings, its efficiency rating for burning mercury was only 7 percent, as opposed to the required 99.99 percent.

An April 1993 inspection of the facility revealed numerous violations. For example, employees had failed to store some of the hazardous waste in closed containers and were not monitoring the underlying soil conditions, although cracks had already appeared in the incinerator's foundations.

In late June, after a three-year investigation, the Ohio attorney general issued a heavily censored report concluding that, yes, because of all the ownership changes, under state law the incinerator permit was invalid after all. Nonetheless, on August 24, the U.S. EPA ruled that although Von Roll wrongfully failed to register the 1989 ownership change, this did not invalidate the incinerator's operating permit. The EPA just fined Von Roll $64,900 for failing to modify the permit.

On July 28, an EPA whistle-blower charged two senior EPA administrators with fraud for allowing the incinerator to operate despite the decision of the Ohio attorney general. In a memo to U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno, Hugh Kaufman, whose job is to act as an internal watchdog at the EPA, claimed that Deputy Administrator Robert Sussman and Region 5 Director Valdus Adamkus modified the incinerator's permit to grant it "temporary authorization" to operate, even though they knew the permit was legally invalid. He called for a criminal investigation into Sussman, Adamkus, and the "business entities" running the incinerator. (The federal Justice Department has had no comment on Kaufman's charges.)<7>

-snip

http://www.ohiocitizen.org/campaigns/wti/motherjones.html

Clinton Will Not Fight Toxic-Waste Incinerator

By KEITH SCHNEIDER,
Published: March 18, 1993

More than three months after Vice President-elect Al Gore vowed to block the opening of the nation's newest hazardous-waste incinerator, the Clinton Administration said today that it would not oppose the owner's plan to begin commercial operation of the plant, probably next month.

The decision, which was disclosed today by top officials at the Environmental Protection Agency, came a day after a Federal appellate court in Cincinnati cleared the way for the incinerator in East Liverpool, Ohio, to begin accepting tons of toxic wastes.

-SNIP

But legal experts and a top official of the Environmental Protection Agency said the Federal hazardous-waste law gave the E.P.A. the authority to bar the incinerator from operating and could have halted a test burn that the incinerator's owner, Von Roll Inc., needed before it could begin commercial operation.

The Administration's decision represents a setback for Mr. Gore, who has made a specialty of environmental issues. The Vice President campaigned in the Ohio River Valley with Mr. Clinton last year and twice promised to investigate how one of the country's largest toxic-waste incinerators was built near the center of a densely populated community, where its emissions could blow onto a school, hundreds of homes and several churches.

-snip

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE4DC1F39F93BA25750C0A965958260




WHY WOULDN'T THE CLINTONS ACT TO STOP THIS TOXIC WASTE INCINERATOR?:

Stephens Inc. was founded by Witt Stephens, a state legislator's son who parlayed a Depression-era belt-buckle, Bible, and municipal-bond business into an immense personal fortune. After his retirement in 1973, the company was run by his shy younger brother, Jackson (a classmate of Jimmy Carter's at the Naval Academy). Witt Stephens and Stephens Inc. did much to create the economic paradox that is modern Arkansas: a desperately poor state with a scant 2.3 million inhabitants that is nonetheless home to a number of wealthy companies. Without the financial assistance of the Stephens brothers, Sam Walton might have ended his days as the most innovative merchant in Bentonville. Stephens money was also important to the fortunes of enterprises as various as Tyson Foods and Linda Bloodworth-Thomason, the television producer and reigning First Friend. Stephens Inc. is an important client of the Rose law firm, whose chairman, C. Joseph Giroir, made Hillary Rodham Clinton a partner. And back in 1977, Stephens assisted BCCI's infiltration of the American banking system by brokering the latter's purchase of National Bank of Georgia stock held by Bert Lance, former President Jimmy Carter's friend and disgraced budget director.

Jackson Stephens (who turned over the reins to his son, Warren, in the late eighties) and his firm were both substantial contributors to the campaigns of Presidents Reagan and Bush (to the tune of at least $100,000 in 1980 and 1989), but they have been closer still to Bill Clinton (whom Witt Stephens had been known to call "that boy").

On two occasions, once when Clinton was running for reelection in Arkansas in 1990 and again in March 1992, when his battered presidential campaign was broke, the Stephens family saved Clinton's bacon with an infusion of money. Indeed, it may not be too much to say that their Worthen Bank's emergency $3.5 million line of credit saved the presidential campaign from extinction. --L.J.D.

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/1993/11/davis.html


LEAGUE OF CONSERVATION VOTERS GAVE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION A C- FOR THEIR FIRST YEAR:

Washington, D.C. - The League of Conservation Voters (LCV), the self-described political arm of the environmental movement, has given President Clinton a middling grade of "C-plus" overall for "not working up to potential" during his first year in office.

In particular, the League criticized the Clinton Administration for failing to halt Waste Technologies Industries' controversial hazardous waste incinerator in East Liverpool, Ohio.

-snip

http://wasteage.com/mag/waste_fewer_onsite_hazwaste/

SO WHY DID THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION TURN THEIR BACKS ON THIS CASE?

[OzarkDem]

1. Same crap they tried to use against Gore in 2000

So glad they helped Bush win Ohio back then. :sarcasm:

How do you feel about Obama imitating Sen Voinovich and covering up for the utilities and their nuclear power plants until they nearly had a meltdown? At least Voinovich didn't walk away with a fat paycheck for doing it.

[EFerrari]

2. Damn true cr@p!

:sarcasm:

[mod mom]

3. Gore got blamed read the NYT piece I posted in the OP. Gore promised to act on this

but once Clinton got in, they turned their backs.

[catgirl]

4. If this is true, then it's not crap.

It's significant. Hillary Clinton has favored corporations (votes) over
the welfare of children many times. Ask people from Buffalo, NY. (Tata).
Ask people from VT, NH, and MA. (air polluters) The list goes on.

We don't need a president who will do anything to advance an agenda
at the expense of the people.

[mod mom]

6. Read how leveymg's post connects with this:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x4537802

[blm]

12. I almost missed that - thanks for heads up.

Looks like it just got moved though.

[mod mom]

5. Ozark, read this impassioned acceptance speech from a mother/nurse turned activist:

Here is a portion of activist/mother, Terri Swearingen's acceptance speech for the Goldman Environmental Prize, given April 14, 1997:



I am not a scientist or a Ph.D. I am a nurse and a housewife, but my most important credential is that I am a mother. In 1982, I was pregnant with our one and only child. That's when I first learned of plans to build one of the world's largest toxic waste incinerators in my community. When they began site preparation to begin building the incinerator in 1990, my life changed forever. I'd like to share with you some of the lessons I have learned from my experiences over the past seven years.

One of the main lessons I have learned from the WTI experience is that we are losing our democracy. How have I come to this sad realization? Democracy is defined by Merriam Webster as "government by the people, especially rule of the majority," and "the common people constituting the source of political authority." The definition of democracy no longer fits with the reality of what is happening in East Liverpool, Ohio. For one thing, it is on the record that the majority of people in the Ohio Valley do not want the WTI hazardous waste incinerator in their area, and they have been opposed to the project from its inception. Some of our elected officials have tried to help us, but the forces arrayed against us have been stronger than we or they had imagined. Public concerns and protests have been smothered with meaningless public hearings, voodoo risk assessment and slick legal maneuvering.

Government agencies that were set up to protect public health and the environment only do their job if it does not conflict with corporate interests. Our current reality is that we live in a "wealthocracy" big money simply gets what it wants. In this wealthocracy, we see three dynamics at play: corporations versus the planet, the government versus the people, and corporate consultants or "experts" versus common sense. In the case of WTI, we have seen all three.

The second lesson I have learned ties directly to the first, and that is that corporations can control the highest office in the land. When Bill Clinton and Al Gore came to the Ohio Valley, they called the siting of the WTI hazardous waste incinerator next door to a 400 student elementary school, in the middle of an impoverished Appalachian neighborhood, immediately on the bank of the Ohio River in a flood plain an "UNBELIEVABLE IDEA." They said we ought to have control over where these things are located. They even went so far as to say they would stop it. But then they didn't! What has been revealed in all this is that there are forces running this country that are far more powerful than the President and the Vice President. This country trumpets to the world how democratic it is, but it's funny that I come from a community that our President dare not visit because he cannot witness first hand the injustice which he has allowed in the interest of a multinational corporation, Von Roll of Switzerland. And the Union Bank of Switzerland. And Jackson Stephens, a private investment banker from Arkansas. These forces are far more relevant to our little town than the President of the United States! And he is the one who made it that way. He has chosen that path. We didn't choose it for him. We begged him to come to East Liverpool, but he refused. We begged the head of EPA to come, but she refused. She hides behind the clever maneuvering of lawyers and consultants who obscure the dangers of the reckless siting of this facility with theoretical risk assessments.

-snip

http://www.ohiocitizen.org/campaigns/wti/et0897s17.html

[blm]

11. Clinton's actions here SCREWED OVER Gore in Ohio and caused the backlash of

many enviros back then, not just Greens.

Gore ended up being smeared wrongly for CLINTON'S wrongdoings.

You want to go on record and say what Clinton did on this was RIGHT or even ethical?

This is the EXACT SAME Jackson Stephens who BROUGHT the goddam BCCI bank into this country with Poppy Bush.

The exact same Stephens who staked WalMart and made the cozy deals with Chinese industrialists and their prison labor to undercut US manufacturing jobs.

Get real.

[mod mom]

18. The Kos Diary outlines the "Behind the Scenes in Washington":

Behind The Scenes In Washington
When Clinton became president, he appointed Carol Browner head of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
Ms. Browner then sent a small cadre of scientists to court in Cleveland, Ohio, to serve as expert witnesses on behalf of Waste Technologies, Inc. (WTI).
Because a memo to Ms. Browner from one of her staff was leaked to Greenpeace (a plaintiff in the lawsuit trying to shut down WTI), Ms. Browner's staff were forced to admit under oath that after Ms. Browner took office on January 20th, EPA conducted a secret risk assessment on the WTI incinerator.

EPA's secret risk assessment revealed that the incinerator would be1000 times more dangerous than EPA had estimated in the risk assessment they released to the public.
New EPA appointee Browner recused herself from the issue, because her husband had connections to anti-WTI activists that opposed the incinerator. She left the matter in the hands of Robert Sussman, Deputy EPA Administrator.
After moving into Pennsylvania Avenue, Hillary had the opportunity to hook up with an old classmate.

The EPA Deputy Administrator Robert Sussman that eventually approved WTI's application was a law school classmate of Bill and Hillary Clinton.
Sussman had previously acted as legal counsel to the Chemical Manufacturing Association, at a time when two of its biggest clients, Du Pont and BASF, were negotiating contracts to supply two-thirds of the waste to WTI." The Nation Magazine
-snip
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/1/31/21045/9822/688/446786

[nonconformist]

15. I remember when this was used to trash Gore, too.

Interesting it's coming out again...

[mod mom]

17. The new modifications just came out Jan 9, 2008

http://www.epa.state.oh.us/pic/nr/2008/january/VonRoll.html

[blm]

22. Trashed Gore UNFAIRLY. It was Clinton's wrongdoing and Gore paid for it in Ohio

and with his reputation with environmentalists at the time.

They expected he would have some say with Clinton, but who was GOING to have more say in Bill's decisions, Gore or the guy who bankrolled Bill's political career in Arkansas and his primary campaign?

[mod mom]

7. Gotta run. If someone here can find legitimate fault with this please let me know.

I'm not looking to dish out bs but to expose how this absurd plant was opened.

[mtnester]

8. No fault mod mom at all

however, most regular voters in Ohio will read this and go...Huh?

Then skip right out to shop, buy lattes and visit the mall.


Too complex and does not really fit into the daily lives of most Ohioans. Now, if this was about how someone was directly responsible for their home's devaluation..then they might read the rest of the article....IF they had the time.

Most voters (and sad to say the one's in our state of ohio included) live on sound bites and two sentences.

[mod mom]

9. Unfortunately things like this are important aren't always available in sound bites.

[mtnester]

10. I know

that is why sometimes things that are important fly right over head

Like right now in Ohio, there is ONE thing on everyone's mind for the next 24 hours

Snow


You see?

[mod mom]

13. That was the problem with the Kerry campaign. the issues are more complicated than

can always be expressed in a 5 second sound bite, but as soon as I am contacted (if not before) I will be canvassing the same low income Af Am precincts (Drivers Park and Linworth) I did in 2004.

I have a friend who is a political reporter and am working contacts to get this story out in MSM where it belongs. It makes me sick to my stomach that this "deal" was done. All those who live in the vicinity as well as all those down river will be effected. UFB!

[blm]

19. The corpmedia makes SURE the public can't wrap their brains around these issues and

that is to the benefit of the fascists and their agenda.

[mod mom]

21. Mix that w the attention span and interest of the typical American look what you

get. :mad:

I just had a heating repairman come to check my furnace. I was watching the vote on FISA and he asked what I was watching. His replay after I told him was the usual " I have nothing to hide but that doesn't seem right" . I reminded him we have a constitution that should protect our rights.

[Dems Will Win]

14. Lets not forget the Clintons NAFTA

How many Ohioans lost their job because of that and now have run out of TANF cash benefits for the needy because the Clintons passed 5-year limit on a crummy family assistance program!!

[mod mom]

16. who benefitted from NAFTA?

White House Had Ended System of Checking Foreign Guests

By TIM WEINER
Published: February 3, 1997

Ten years ago the Reagan White House adopted a rule about foreign businessmen, lobbyists and consultants who wanted to get in to see the President without the blessing of their embassies: they shouldn't.

But President Clinton's aides did not follow that rule. In their eagerness to raise campaign money, they invited friends of the President's fund-raisers -- including China's biggest arms merchant, favor-seeking Indonesian businessmen, a reputed Russian mobster and other dubiously credentialed dealmakers -- to meet with Mr. Clinton. Nor did the White House check the suitability of Americans invited by the Democratic National Committee to meet the President, allowing, among others, a twice-convicted felon to sip coffee with Mr. Clinton.

-snip

And that is why nobody on the White House political team saw fit to ask the National Security Council staff a year ago about a man named Wang Jun, who showed up on a guest list for a White House coffee with the President. The question of exactly how Mr. Wang got into the White House has a simple answer: ''Nobody ever asked anybody,'' a National Security Council official said.

So, at the behest of a tireless political fund-raiser from Arkansas, Charlie Yah Lin Trie, Mr. Clinton wound up sipping coffee with Mr. Wang, who runs the Chinese Government's weapons manufacturing and procuring agency, which is involved in secret arms deals around the world. These coffees for fund-raisers and donors began as a way to raise morale among party loyalists after the Democrats' disastrous showing in the 1994 election. By 1995, they became a way to reward big donors and prospect for new ones, according to Democratic fund-raisers.

-snip

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C01E2DC103DF930A35751C0A961958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all


A federal grand jury has indicted 14 people and a Georgia company in a scheme to smuggle several million dollars worth of automatic weapons into the United States from China. The indictment came after federal agents smashed an arms smuggling ring that they said involved two government-run Chinese munitions firms. The following press release and affidavit outline the building of the government's case.

U.S. Department of Justice

United States Attorney
Northern District of California

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

MAY 23, 1996

MASSIVE SEIZURE OF NEW AUTOMATIC WEAPONS
ILLEGALLY SMUGGLED BY PRC WEAPONS PRODUCERS

SAN FRANCISCO - Michael J. Yamaguchi, United States Attorney
for the Northern District of California; Rollin B. Klink, Special
Agent in Charge, United States Customs Service, San Francisco; and
Paul Snabel, Special Agent in Charge, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco,
and Firearms, announced today the largest seizure of fully
operational automatic weapons in the history of U. S. law
enforcement. The weapons were illegally smuggled into the United
States from the People's Republic of China (PRC) during the course
of a federal investigation of an alleged arms trafficking conspiracy
involving Chinese nationals, Chinese resident aliens, and U. S.
citizens, a number of whom represented PRC owned and controlled
munitions manufacturing facilities. The illegal importation of the
weapons into the United States is in violation of the Presidential
Embargo on the importation of weapons and munitions designated on
the United States Munitions List, and U. S. law regarding the
importation, possession, and sale of illegal weapons.

On March 18, 1996, agents of the United States Customs Service
and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms seized 2000 AK-47
type fully automatic 7.62mm machine guns. These are military
assault weapons commonly used by the military around the world.
The weapons, which had both Chinese (Norinco) and Korean
markings, had been smuggled into the United States in a container on
board the COSCO ship, Empress Phoenix. Included with the
weapons were approximately 4000 30-40 round ammunition
magazines. It is estimated that the weapons had a street value of more
than four million dollars.

The seizure of the weapons was the culmination of a sixteen month
investigation of high ranking officials, based in both the United
States and the PRC, of POLYTECH and NORINCO, PRC
controlled munitions manufacturing corporations. Hammond KU,
age 49, a Taiwanese resident alien, residing in Soquel, California,
first came under suspicion when information was developed that he
had several thousand Chinese manufactured weapons, in crate.
labelled POLYTECH and NORINCO, stored in his warehouse in
Soquel, California. KU paid federal agent-, acting in an undercover
capacity, to illegally import into the United States, more than 20,000
AK 47 rifle bipods.

-snip
http://www.courttv.com/archive/legaldocs/misc/smuggle.html


New York Times, May 17, 1998



How Chinese Won Rights to Launch Satellites for U.S.

(BY JEFF GERTH AND DAVID E. SANGER)
On Oct. 9, 1995, Secretary of State Warren Christopher ended a lengthy debate within the Clinton Administration by initialing a classified order that preserved the State Department's sharp limits on China's ability to launch American-made satellites aboard Chinese rockets.

Both American industry and state-owned Chinese companies had been lobbying for years to get the satellites off what is known as the `munitions list,' the inventory of America's most sensitive military and intelligence-gathering technology. But Mr. Christopher sided with the Defense Department, the intelligence agencies and some of his own advisers, who noted that commercial satellites held technological secrets that could jeopardize `significant military and intelligence interests.'

There was one more reason not to ease the controls, they wrote in a classified memorandum. Doing so would `raise suspicions that we are trying to evade China sanctions' imposed when the country was caught shipping weapons technology abroad--which is what happened in 1991 and 1993 for missile sales to Pakistan.

-snip

Other powerful Chinese state enterprises also had multibillion-dollar stakes in getting access to American satellites. Among them was the China International Trade and Investment Corporation, whose chairman, Wang Jun, gained unwanted attention in the United States last year when it was revealed that he attended one of Mr. Clinton's campaign coffee meetings in the White House. The day of Mr. Wang's visit, Mr. Clinton, in what Mr. Rubin said was a coincidence, signed waivers allowing the Chinese to launch four American satellites--though they were unrelated to the business interests of China International Trade.

-snip

http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/news/china/1998/h980618-prc5.htm

[geiger]

20. uh oh.

[blm]

23. uh oh for that Ohio firewall. Obama should USE this.

.