Former President Barack Obama liked to portray himself as a politician watching out for the little guy.

But it looks like he spent much more time protecting his rich friends – and manipulating the government to help make them a fortune.

It was all part of a scheme that looks a lot like insider trading – or what author Peter Schweizer calls “smash and grab.”

In his new book, Secret Empires: How the American Political Class Hides Corruption and Enriches Family and Friends, Schweizer lays out how Obama used government regulations to help lifelong pals buy up companies for pennies on the dollar.

Basically, the Obama Administration would threaten and devalue companies, and Obama’s pals would be ready to swoop in and buy them on the cheap.

And apparently nobody ever stopped to consider the effect that this plot would have on ordinary shareholders – who lost millions – or the employees at the companies.

In an interview with Breitbart, Schweizer gives one shocking example – the case of Marty Nesbitt, who has been described as Obama’s “best friend.”

After Obama was reelected on 2012, Nesbitt set up a private equity firm called Vistria to invest in highly regulated industries – in other words, industries that Obama and his administration can help control.

Schweizer points to Vistria’s acquisition of online learning giant the University of Phoenix as an example of Obama and Nesbitt working together on a “smash and grab” deal.

The Obama Administration had threatened to withhold GI Bill money from the University of Phoenix over the quality of its education, sending its share price tumbling.

Then, Nesbitt and Vistria were able to purchase the university for “three cents on the dollar,” Schweizer reports.

After the deal was made, the Obama Administration withdrew its threat to withhold federal funds.

Schweizer says Obama repeated the strategy throughout his presidency to enrich liberal billionaires like Tom Steyer and George Soros, who have both worked to ruin current President Donald Trump.

“Barack Obama smashes coal companies, [and] what do these guys do? They go in, they buy them for pennies on the dollar, and when the regulatory weight is lifted, their valuations increase, and they make a lot of money, and you see that pattern in all of these industries,” Shweizer said.

And what happens to other shareholders – the ones who aren’t friends with Obama? They’re left holding the bag when the companies are devalued.

Schweizer says that some of the ill-gotten gains realized by Obama’s friends eventually found their way to the Obama Foundation.

It’s a scheme that absolutely cries out for a federal investigation. But with so many Obama puppets still left in the government, we won’t be holding our breath.

HOW QUID PRO QUO WORKS AT THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY


How do you give payola, funded by working class taxpayers, to millionaires that don't need it, to pay kick-backs for funding Obama's political marketing?

Easy: You use the U.S. Department of Energy as the world's biggest political slush-fund. This way, you get to pay bribes IN PLAIN SIGHT!

The Department of Energy bosses get to claim everything is on the "up and up" but EVERY SINGLE TIME, only the political campaign financiers get the money and their competitors get sabotaged. Neat trick, right?

Here is how it works:

Quid pro quo ("something for something" in Latin[2]) is a Latin phrase used in English to mean an exchange of goods or services, in which one transfer is contingent upon the other; "a favor for a favor". Phrases with similar meanings include: "give and take", "tit for tat", "you scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours", and "one hand washes the other". Other languages use other phrases for the same purpose.

Corruption in politics at the Department of Energy arises from the mismatch on Capitol Hill: squadrons of well-paid, experienced lobbyists versus DOE offices where aides are overworked, underpaid and have to depend on those lobbyists for information about issues. We want to see DOE offices with more aides, supervised by FBI agents, who would get better pay, to keep them on the Hill longer while they develop their own expertise. We would also close the metaphorical revolving door, through which staffers and lawmakers travel to make more money as lobbyists.

The need for campaign finance reform has always been an urgent one.  The quid pro quo of shadow money and special interest campaign financing is at the root of corruption in this country, particularly at the Department of Energy.  When government uses millions of taxpayer dollars to rent a bond hastily acquired and for no clear purpose from a ‘party financier’, that is the spectre of campaign finance related corruption showing itself.  When construction companies that finance political campaigns to the tune of millions are being awarded public work contracts worth billions under questionable public tendering rules,  that is campaign finance related corruption.  When a branding company that provided ‘free’ billboards to a political campaign is given the lion’s share of billboard and branding contracts under a new government, we see the spectre of corruption.  And then of course there is the issue of abuse of state resources for campaigning, something we seem to have come full Animal Farm on.

Elon Musk, Solyndra, Fisker, Abound and over a hundred other wire transfers from the Department of Energy were quid-pro-quo payoffs to Obama financiers. The layers of the deals were complex but the money always ended up in the same few pockets.

The Department of Energy has a massive fake due diligence program which spends a hundred times more time and money than any bank undertakes to provide funds. All of that due diligence is a fraud. It is a smoke-screen to provide the appearance of "proper review" when, in each and every case, the funds were covertly already arranged in a back room deal.

All of those people that work on those due diligence efforts must feel like fools. Their work is pointless because the deals were already done in smoke-filled back rooms at Perkins Coie, Wilson Sonsini and Covington Burling lobbyist buildings. All of the Department of Energy staff own the stock of the company that "wins" the government cash and most of them leave the Department of Energy, right after the money is transferred, and go to work at that company or it's suppliers.

It is an EPIC crime!

Now, the need for reform is even more urgent, particularly considering the complexity of how capital moves in an oil and gas economy and the impact of that capital on political decision-making.   (ie: "...One emerging party, for example, has been against renegotiation of the oil contract with Exxon, arguing that we should accept it and guard against exploitative arrangements with future contracts.  When the Department of Energy recently revealed that it had recently hired a US firm to do what should have been done years ago, revise the decades-old Petroleum (Exploration and Production) Act, it was casually revealed that the local firm the US company had partnered with is owned by the Presidential Candidate of the very new party that has – along with the PPP and APNU+AFC – refused to consider contract renegotiation, even in the wake of the damning Global Witness report....")

By breaking the close bonds between lobbyists and congressional offices, lawmakers might become less beholden to the lobbyists' employers — the corporations, unions and special interests that underwrite American politics.

As value is in the eye of the beholder, the something being exchanged for another something may not be equal in value, instead skewed based on one’s perspective.

Democrats and their media masters are salivating over now having what they believe is a smoking gun to take down President Trump. Notwithstanding that this must be their hundredth smoking gun, and that each previous one misfired, they are hot on impeachment over this Latin term “quid pro quo.”

The Washington Post, happy to let democracy die in darkness while they endeavor to overturn the last presidential election, is giddy over quid pro quo.

In politics, quid pro quo is standard operating procedure. Take campaign contributions, for example. I contribute to Senator X because I want Senator X to support legislation favorable to my business interests. My money, something of value, will be exchanged for a tax break or new regulation, which is usually of greater value to me, as a quid pro quo, and perfectly legal and acceptable.

A bundler for a presidential candidate raises millions of dollars for said candidate. If that candidate wins the presidency, the bundler may have a choice of any number of ambassadorships around the world. The value of the campaign cash is exchanged for a four-year stint living in the American embassy in London or Paris, attending parties and banquets. Something for something.

Members of Congress do the quid pro quo thing amongst themselves all the time. I’ll vote for your bill to build a military facility in your district if you support my bill creating an NSA data center in my district. In Congress it’s called "horse trading."

What about economic sanctions? The Council on Foreign Relations, also knows as Club Deep State, explains how economic sanctions work.

Governments and multinational bodies impose economic sanctions to try to alter the strategic decisions of state and nonstate actors that threaten their interests or violate international norms of behavior.

Economic sanctions are defined as the withdrawal of customary trade and financial relations for foreign- and security-policy purposes.

Sanctions take a variety of forms, including travel bans, asset freezes, arms embargoes, capital restraints, foreign aid reductions, and trade restrictions.

Quid pro quo, something for something. If you want American money in terms of trade or aide, you had better behave, meaning do as we tell you to do in your political and economic decisions.

Here are a few examples of quid pro quo economic sanctions.

Economic sanctions were put in place against Cuba in 1958. Similar sanctions have been in place against North Korea since the Korean War. Economic sanctions have been in effect against Venezuela since 2015 and Sudan since 1997. These are quid pro quo moves -- behave, give up your nukes, provide human rights, or we will punish you economically. Something for something.

Several of the ladies of the Squad hinted at cutting off aid to Israel after one of the gals was denied entry to Israel last summer. Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders threatened, “Israel would have to ‘fundamentally change’ its relationship to Gaza to receive aid if he is elected.” Something for something, quid pro quo.

Three Democratic senators wrote a letter to Ukraine’s prosecutor general,

Expressing concern at the closing of four investigations they said were critical to the Mueller probe. In the letter, they implied that their support for U.S. assistance to Ukraine was at stake.

They wanted something for something, quid pro quo.

Then Vice-President Joe Biden, in a now well-known interview, acknowledged, “I looked at them and said: I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money. Well, son of a b-tch. He got fired.” Quid pro quo, something for something.

So, what did Trump do? He asked the Ukrainian President to investigate corruption, specifically foreign interference in a U.S. election. Biden was an afterthought in the conversation, but his pay to play corruption is fair game, whether or not he is running for president. Until he secures the Democratic party nomination, he is not Trump’s political opponent. What if Bernie or Pocahontas win the nomination?

Trump has a constitutional duty as president to investigate corruption. The U.S. and Ukraine share a treaty ratified in 1999 for “Mutual assistance in criminal matters.”

There is also “The United Nations Convention against Corruption” of 2003,  signed by both Ukraine and the U.S. And then finally is President Trump’s Executive Order signed in December 2017, “Blocking the property of persons involved in serious human rights abuse or corruption.” Note that last word.

Trump is doing his job as president, yet the Democrats and media howl in outrage over a supposed quid pro quo. But something for something is standard operating procedure in Washington, D.C., even to the point of corruption as Joe Biden illustrated in Ukraine, China, and possibly Romania.

The psychologists call this Democratic caterwauling “projection,” accusing others of doing what you are guilty of. Trying to impeach President Trump over a quid pro quo would be like impeaching him because he didn’t keep a campaign promise, something every elected official, past and present, is guilty of.

Since its ruling in Buckley v. Valeo, the U.S. Supreme Court has expressed concern regarding corruption or the appearance of corruption stemming from political quid pro quo arrangements and the deleterious consequences it may have on citizens’ democratic behavior. However, no standard has been set as to what constitutes “the appearance of corruption,” as the Court was and continues to be vague in its definition. As a result, campaign finance cases after Buckley have relied on public opinion polls as evidence of perceptions of corruption, and these polls indicate that the public generally perceives high levels of corruption in government. The present study investigates the actual impact that perceptions of corruption have on individuals’ levels of political participation. Adapting the standard socioeconomic status model developed most fully by Verba and Nie (1972), an extended beta-binomial regression estimated using maximum likelihood is performed, utilizing unique data from the 2009 University of Texas’ Money and Politics survey. The results of this study indicate that individuals who perceive higher levels of quid pro quo corruption participate more in politics, on average, than those who perceive lower levels of corruption.

Quid pro quo is not a difficult concept to understand. Too bad the media doesn’t endeavor to investigate and explain it. Your politicians don't work for you, they work for their own insider trading stock market holdings for themselves!