Edwards PAC Paid $14,000 To Mistress

The plot thickens in the Edwards saga. Now crimes may have been committed


Edwards' associate explains payment to ex-mistress

WASHINGTON (AP) -- John Edwards' political action committee paid his mistress $14,000 after she stopped working for it to obtain 100 hours of unused videotape she had shot for his unsuccessful presidential campaign, an associate told The Associated Press on Thursday.

The woman, Rielle Hunter, already had been paid $100,000 for the programs.

The explanation -- which Edwards' advisers declined to discuss on the record -- is the first effort to justify the payment in April 2007 to Hunter. That payment came months before Edwards' chief fundraiser quietly began sending money himself to the pregnant woman.

Edwards last week acknowledged he had an affair with Hunter in 2006. The former Democratic presidential contender and senator from North Carolina has denied any knowledge of those payments to Hunter from Fred Baron, Edwards' national finance chairman and a wealthy Dallas, Texas-based trial attorney. Baron also has described his payments to Hunter as a private transaction.

But the $14,000 payment to Hunter is significant because its source was Edwards' OneAmerica political action committee, whose expenditures are governed by U.S. election laws. Willfully converting money from a political action committee for personal use would have been a federal criminal violation.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/08/15/edwards.affair.ap/index.html#cnnSTCText

He'll probably argue that getting his member polished is a legitimate campaign activity.

Hang the sons a bitch out to dry. They would if he was a republican.

It would be nice to see Edwards get slammed for this, but it won't happen. Just ike the congressman from New Orleans, this is business as usual in Washington.

The days of investigative reporting are long gone. Unless the one being investigated is a Republican

They still don't investigate, they simply print all of the innuendo and allow public opinion to force the Republican from office. Democrats seem to feel that even after a conviction they have the right to rule though, go figure.

Blogosphere Leaves MSM in Dust Reporting on John Edwards Scandal
By P.J. Gladnick (Bio | Archive)
August 15, 2008 - 09:34 ET

Although the mainstream media has finally started to report on the John Edwards scandal now that he has admitted to an affair on ABC's Nightline following several reports by the National Enquirer, they continue to fall way behind in investigative reporting compared to the blogosphere. This is yet another reason why the public is relying more and more on the web for news rather than the MSM as NewsBusters editor, Matthew Sheffield, reported yesterday both here in NewsBusters and at the Washington Times. So what is the MSM excuse for being so far behind the ball in reporting on the Edwards scandal? According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the answer is money, not bias. Here is their defensive quote from a blog entry from Hollywood blogger, Sharon Waxman:

Here’s what I’ve learned over the years about tabloid journalism: it is usually the principals involved who provide the crucial details, for money. That’s why the information is so often on the nose.

How does the News of the World manage to be there just when Michael Jackson or Elizabeth Taylor leaves their plastic surgery appointment? It’s not by chance. Usually the doctor tips them off. Sometimes they even have the celebrity’s agreement.

My guess is that there is a simple reason why the mainstream media is unable to confirm the Edwards-Hunter affair during these past weeks. Because very few people knew what had been going on. Edwards’ staff didn’t know. Elizabeth Edwards didn’t know. The group may have been as small as three: Edwards, Hunter and her pal Bob McGovern.

One of those, in my view (and not Edwards), sold the information….


Money did pay a role in the initial investigation but how does Waxman and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution explain the fact that blogs, with limited monetary resources, are now able to scoop the MSM on this scandal on a fairly regular basis? One example of the MSM merely following the path paved by the blogosphere is this New York Times report yesterday that Edwards' finance chair, Fred Baron, not only paid Rielle Hunter and Andrew Young but also might have recommended their lawyers to them:

But what went unnoticed was that the two lawyers shared an important connection to Mr. Edwards that suggests they were part of an orchestrated effort to protect him, one that is continuing even after he admitted last week that he had an affair with Ms. Hunter but denied that he fathered her child. The lawyers are linked through Fred Baron, a wealthy Dallas lawyer and former finance chairman for the Edwards campaign who was a key player in the campaign’s response to the scandal. Mr. Gordon has worked with Mr. Baron on class-action personal injury cases,...


The Talkleft blog took offense at this "unnoticed" claim by the New York Times:

Unnoticed? The Times does not report that blogs such as Deceiver and Riehl World View have been reporting this for days.


http://newsbusters.org/blogs/p-j-gladnick/2008/08/15/blogosphere-leaves-msm-dust-reporting-john-edwards-scandal

What are they going to do to him anyway? His political career is over, and he may broken the law. Find out what happened with the $14G's and end it.

Pale Rider wrote:What are they going to do to him anyway? His political career is over, and he may broken the law. Find out what happened with the $14G's and end it.

He can get a gig at the Clinton Library

red states rule wrote:

Pale Rider wrote:What are they going to do to him anyway? His political career is over, and he may broken the law. Find out what happened with the $14G's and end it.

He can get a gig at the Clinton Library

Right... in bubba's "how to cheat on your wife" section...

Pale Rider wrote:

red states rule wrote:

Pale Rider wrote:What are they going to do to him anyway? His political career is over, and he may broken the law. Find out what happened with the $14G's and end it.

He can get a gig at the Clinton Library

Right... in bubba's "how to cheat on your wife" section...

Putside the Clinton Library