I do want to go into more detail about the other two -- one about Bill Clinton's flights on Jeffrey Epstein's flight, and one about Uranium One. There is no substance to either story; they are of interest solely as propaganda exercises. But I am particularly interested in Uranium One because it resembles the allegations that Republicans are now making about Joe Biden. Both stories contain some of the same errors about how Washington works. Although neither ginned-up scandal definitively proves that Biden is innocent, they are significant background and ample proof that we should treat such stories with skepticism.
Bill Clinton, Jeffrey Epstein, and the "Lolita Express"
Both Bill Clinton and Donald Trump had long histories of promiscuity and some association with the disgraced billionaire Jeffrey Epstein, notorious for luring teenage girls to his private island for sexual abuse by powerful men, who Epstein could then blackmail. Clinton flew on Epstein's plane while traveling on behalf of the Clinton Foundation, while Trump went to Epstein's parties. There is no evidence that either man engaged in sex with underaged girls procured by Epstein.
During 2016, an unidentified woman filed a lawsuit against Donald Trump, alleging that he raped her at one of Epstein's parties when she was 13 years old. This surfaced briefly in the leftwing media during the 2016 election, but was largely dropped after the decidedly left-of-center outlets the Guardian, Daily Beast and even Jezebel investigated further and raise serious questions about the story's accuracy. (See Network Propaganda, pp. 91-92).
Matters were altogether different on the right (see pp. 92-97). Network Propaganda notes that Fox first raised the issue on March 13, 2016, the day before the New York Times ran a story about Trump's crude behavior toward women. It is accepted journalistic practice to call the subject of such a story ahead of time, so Trump knew what was coming and presumably alerted Fox. As with the rape story, several mainstream publications criticized the New York Times piece, and it never went anywhere.
The underlying basis for these stories were flight logs for the Epstein plane that showed Bill Clinton took 26 flights on the plane -- none of them to Epstein's private island or any of his other residences (he had homes in Manhattan and Palm Beach and a ranch in New Mexico). So, was sexual activity taking place on Epstein's plane? It seems a safe assumption that there was no sexual activity on at least 20 of the flights. Clinton's Secret Service guards were present. We also have the account of one of Epstein's captives who saw Clinton onboard one of Epstein's flights that no sexual activity took place.
Network Propaganda then goes on to show how the six trips without Secret Service present were then described as six trips to Orgy Island (contradicted by the flight logs). Later stories claimed over 20 trips to the island, six involving Hillary. Actual number of trips to the island, as shown by flight logs: None. Network Propaganda goes on to say that no rightwing outlet ever questioned any of these stories, even though many were clearly false.
Epstein was found hanging in his jail cell on August 10, 2019. Immediately, stories began circulating that it was not suicide. And most of these stories automatically assumed that Hillary Clinton was the prime suspect.
Uranium One
Far more relevant to the workings of the federal government (the "deep state") and to current accusations against Joe Biden were accusations against Hillary Clinton in the Uranium One scandal (addressed in Network Propaganda, pp. 166-187). The original accusation was "Hillary Clinton’s State Department approved the transfer of 20 percent of America’s uranium holdings to Russia, while nine investors in the deal funneled $145 million to the Clinton Foundation."
The accusation originates with Clinton Cash, a book that (correctly) identified donations to the Clinton Foundation, (correctly) identifies decisions by the US government when Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State, and then draws very dubious connections between the two. The largest such accusation involved the sale of Uranium One.
Prior to 2007, Frank Guistra, a Canadian businessman, was CEO and major shareholder of Uranium One. In 2007 (at which time George W. Bush was President and Condaleeza Rice was Secretary of State), Guistra sold his stake in Uranium One, stepped down, and donated $131 million of the total $145 million. This is a very large portion of the Clinton Foundation's total assets. Nonetheless, the donor had no ties and no interest in Uranium One at the time the deal was made. Eight other donors with ties to Uranium One made donations to the Clinton Foundation ranging from $250,000 to $5 million. Only one of these donors was a Russian (Sergey Kurzin, donated $1 million). All but one of these donations took place before the Uranium One deal and, indeed, before Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State. It is true that Bill Clinton took a $500,000 speaking engagement in Russia while the deal was going on, which is not a good look.
In 2009, Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State and followed the Obama Administration's policy of seeking to improve relations with Russia. Part of that policy included approval of approval of the Russian state-owned company Rosatom increasing its interest in Uranium One from 17% to 51%. To be clear (1) this would give Rosatom a controlling interest in Uranium One, (2) Rosatom was not licensed to export uranium, only to receive profits, (3) the US is a uranium importer, but finally (4) uranium is nonetheless a strategic material and special approval is required to allow a foreign investor to acquire an interest in US uranium.
The State Department is, in fact, one of nine agencies to approve such a transfer. All nine such agencies approved the deal. Nor did Hillary made the decision on behalf of the State Department. That decision was made by Jose Fernandez, Assistant Secretary of State for Economic, Energy and Business Affairs, who said that Hillary made no attempt to influence him, either in favor or against the deal. In short, Hillary's sole role in the sale of Uranium One was one of passive acquiesence. She took no active role, let alone leading role in the sale. Her alleged fault was not being a lone dissenting voice protesting the sale.
None of which is to say that Hillary Clinton should be exempted from criticism. There are serious questions any time anyone in high office runs, or has a spouse run, a major enterprise, including a charitable foundation. And one can certainly question the wisdom of the Obama Administration's attempted "reset" of relations with Russia. A "normal" Republican candidate might say, "The Clinton Foundation creates too many conflicts of interest. The Clintons should choose -- the office, or the foundation." Or "Hillary Clinton was part of the Obama Administration's failed policy of appeasement of Russia." These accusations would be true. Pre-Trump, that latter accusation would be a Republican staple.
But there is an obvious problem with Donald Trump making either of these accusations. Does it make sense to say that the Clinton Foundation creates conflicts of interest -- so you should choose Trump, who has more conflicts of interest than any candidate for President ever thought of before?* Or to denounce Hillary for participating in Obama's failed policies of appeasement of Russia, so you should elect an even more pro-Russia candidate?
A normal candidate can afford to stick to normal lines of attack. One so defective as Trump can do so only by extraordinary catastrophizing of his opponents.
*Actually, he has argued exactly that, so maybe.
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