Getting ahead in politics or business is all about who you know, it's said.
And nowhere is that more true, it seems, than in the Obama administration.
It's been widely reported that Barack Obama & Co. tossed billions in taxpayer stimulus funds at Democratic contributors and their green-energy startups.
The most notorious, of course, is Solyndra — which produced not a single job and ended up flushing more than a half-billion taxpayer dollars down the toilet when it went belly-up.
Now Fox Business Network Senior Correspondent Charles Gasparino reported in these pages this week the latest example of Obama crony capitalism: the curious case of James Biden.
AP
Joe Biden
Biden's inside connection is pretty obvious: His brother Joe is Obama's vice president.
Two years ago, Brother Jim landed a job as executive vice president of Hill International, a New Jersey-based company that specializes in construction projects in both the US and the Middle East.
Just how he got the job isn't all that clear: According to Gasparino, Brother Jim has a slim-to-vanishing business resume.
In fact, he co-owned a hedge fund with the VP's son that was marketed by Allen Stanford, later convicted of running a Ponzi scheme.
Yet shortly after Brother Jim came on board, Hill landed a $1.5 billion contract — one of its biggest ever — to build 100,000 tax-subsidized homes in Iraq.
Now, that's a little surprising, too. For one thing, Hill's construction projects have rarely involved housing.
For another, the company has reported losses since last year — it's out $60 million in payments that it's trying to recoup from the Libyan government — and its shares have tumbled 80 percent since 2008.
Did we happen to mention that Brother Joe is Team Obama's point man on Iraq?
Sure 'nuff is.
And the company's CEO, Irv Richter, admits that both the State Department and the Iraqi government helped Hill land the contract — though he insists that the White House connection played no part.
But Richter did concede that the Biden name probably opens doors when government business is at stake — though it hardly guarantees success.
Which is precisely why it's called "crony capitalism."
Something that was never to be found at the Obama White House.
No, not at all.
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