OPINION:
Hillary Clinton is many things, many of them about greed and some of them corrupt, but one thing she is not is a socialist. She’s a crony capitalist, as she demonstrated once more in her Sunday night debate with Bernie Sanders, and proud of it. She has used her various government positions to build the Clinton family business, which is peddling influence, and her customers know they can count on her to deliver.
The Export-Import Bank, one of Hillary’s favorites, is one of Boeing’s favorites, too, and while the Ex-Im was designed to help American companies compete across the globe, it’s actually an institution to help a few major American corporations pad the bottom line. The largest domestic beneficiary of the Ex-Im’s largesse is Boeing, the aircraft colossus in Seattle which persuaded its friends of both parties in Congress to reauthorize the bank after Congress allowed its charter to lapse last year. Indeed, the Ex-Im is known on the Hill as “The Bank of Boeing.”
Boeing’s lobbyists and defenders argue that without such government assistance no one beyond America would buy Boeing’s planes, which have set the standard of the world for efficiency, style and reliability in the air. Aviators, economists and trade analysts of every partisan stripe dismiss the lobbyist claim as foolishness. Boeing reaps real benefits through the company’s dealings with the Ex-Im Bank, including executive pay and profits for Boeing shareholders.
These are benefits any good crony capitalist would fight to preserve, and corporations such as Boeing understand that the preservation of crony capitalism depends on investing in the right friends. The Clintons are just such faithful friends. Hillary lobbied for Boeing as secretary of State, despite ethics guidelines that circumscribe such assistance. Veronique de Rugy of the Mercatus Institute says its banking practices put the company on too “frequent reliance on the government for help negotiating overseas business.”
Boeing is nothing if not grateful. Boeing contributed $900,000 to the Clinton Family Foundation, and a senior vice president of Boeing served as a major fundraiser for the Ready for Hillary super PAC, set up last year to prepare for her coronation at the Democratic National Convention this summer in Tampa.
Miss De Rugy, who has spent more time than any other economist studying the Boeing/Ex-Im relationship, observes, accurately, that the interlocking Boeing-Clinton relationship is exactly “what cronyism is all about.
Huey Long, the famous kingfish of Louisiana who might have been on his way to the White House when he was stopped by an assassin’s bullet in 1936 in the rotunda of the Louisiana capitol in Baton Rouge, once explained that he didn’t have to buy legislators because it was cheaper to rent them. Renting a presidential candidate costs more than renting a candidate for a state legislature, no doubt, but Hillary Clinton’s dealings with Boeing, her steadfast support of the Bank of Boeing, and her eagerness to defend the indefensible is a reminder that Donald Trump isn’t the only presidential prospect who has mastered the art of the deal.
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