The Obama administration’s Friday afternoon hyper-political move to push back its decision on the Keystone Pipeline until after this year’s elections had the intended impact of burying the news over Easter weekend. And it has brought out the typical Monday-morning analysis now that the media has caught up with it.
The analysis is not favorable for the man with the self-proclaimed “biggest investment” in the President’s decision to continue stopping the job-creating Keystone project – Tom Steyer.
As the Wall Street Journal notes, “The Koch brothers may get the media attention, but the billionaire getting the most political bang for his buck is Tom Steyer. The hedge-fund politico has pledged to raise $100 million to help Democrats keep the Senate, and on Friday he received a major return on his investment when the State Department again delayed its decision on the Keystone XL pipeline.”
Maybe that’s why Harry Reid is not taking to the Senate floor to again attack a billionaire using his money to buy political favor – in this case the favor is to help Majority Leader Reid keep his job.
The President’s motives were just as clear to the folks at CNBC: “there are at least 100 million reasons why the president has held up the decision. Those reasons live in the bank account of hedge fund manager Tom Steyer.”
Of course, this is all consistent with the hypocritical “Courage Pledge” which Steyer took (and published last Thursday, so every good liberal knows which way to turn if they want his campaign money) to portray his environmental absolutism as “in the best interest of our kids.” Typical Democrat positioning – don’t look at my personal motives, it’s for the children.
Perhaps Steyer thought his pious posturing would encourage some people to overlook how he acquired the money he now plans to give to liberals who support his extreme ideology – but a couple other outlets this morning reported on just that, and it’s… a little dirty.
The folks at Powerline provide a glimpse into Steyer’s shadowy hedge fund, Farallon Capital, reporting that it turns out that a major source of its multi-billion-dollar success has been investing in…wait for it…coal. The title of a report mentioned in the story includes a sobriquet which Steyer probably doesn’t use to describe himself, but is accurate nonetheless: “Hypocrisy & Hedge Funds: Climate Change Warrior Tom Steyer’s Secret Life as Coal Investment Kingpin.”
Additionally, the Washington Free Beacon highlights a Texas case that alleges fraud was another component of Farallon’s success –fraud perpetrated right here in Washington, at what was formerly known as the SuperMall in Auburn.
Wonder if any of this investigating into Steyer’s shady background will prompt our own state’s Public Disclosure Commission to finally look into Steyer’s own false disclosures about his financial activities in Washington State last year, before he starts his investment cycle again here in 2014.
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