Socialism, the Radical American Democrat Party, and the Wealth of Their Elites

JUST WHAT IS SOCIALISM ??? We all use the term every day to describe what we don't like about what the Democrat Party is trying to do with America. What do we mean? Merriam-Webster defines "socialism" as : "1 : any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods. 2a : a system of society or group living in which there is no private property. : b a system or condition of society in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state. 3 : a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done." • In America, Democrats like to talk about "democratic socialism," which Merriam-Webster defines as a type of "social democracy" : "1 : a political movement advocating a gradual and peaceful transition from capitalism to socialism by democratic means 2 : a democratic welfare state that incorporates both capitalist and socialist practices." • In fact, any form of socialism rests on the belief that the government should control the means of production and the workers who do the producing. So, it tends to move toward communism in the sense that under communism there is no private property and all means of production and workers are the property of the state. • Compare this with "liberal democracy," which operates under the principles of liberalism -- the word once meant traditional free-market conservatism, but its popular meaning has shifted dramatically to the Left. Traditionally, "liberalism" meant protecting the rights of the individual, generally enshrined in law, officially recognized, and protected, and in which the exercise of political power is limited by the rule of law and power is transferred by the vote of citizens. • • • THE RESULTS OF SOCIALISM IN EUROPE. Money and Markets posted an article by JT Crowe last Thursday with the title "France Is the Socialist Future All Americans Should Dread." Crowe says : "Socialism always fails, and a lot of time is being spent these days trying to explain to a generation of young voters why that is always the case. Not only does socialism fail from an economic standpoint, but oftentimes it also is a source of pain and oppression for the masses. And yet here we are, with Senator Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and those among the far left making socialism more acceptable and even chic in some circles....An August Gallup poll even showed that Democrats are more positive about socialism than capitalism. When hearing so much talk about how awful Venezuela and Cuba are, how is this possible?" • Crowe uses the European models provided by The American Institute for Economic Research -- the Cuban Model, the Swedish Model, and the French Model. • Explaining the Cuban Model, Crowe says that younger Americans don't understand "how Venezuela and Cuba ended up being such horrible places (in some cases, we even have to explain that yes, indeed, these are horrible places). Until Venezuela was in the news on a regular basis because of the approach of its people toward starvation...there were plenty of intellectuals praising the system. And let’s not forget the praises or lack of condemnation for the oppressive regime that is Cuba coming from many world leaders after Fidel Castro finally died." • The Swedish Model probably pleases Sanders, says Crowe, "because when they talk about socialism, they aren’t talking about expropriating property rights, nationalizing all businesses, or eliminating all but one -- the state’s -- television channel. They aren’t talking about Venezuela or Cuba. Instead, they are talking about Denmark and Sweden....It is true that Sanders and his people fail to understand that socialism exists on a spectrum. On one side you have the dictatorships, while on the other side you have the social democracies. Both sides of the spectrum use oppression and compulsory taxation to achieve their goals. But the degree to which they do so varies a great deal....No one seriously ever thinks of French president Emmanuel Macron as a despot (even though his own people happen to call him tyrannical on a regular basis) in spite of the gigantic size of the French state and the enormous amount of taxes extracted by the regime....Yet, it is also true that all varieties of socialism fail to achieve their goals for the same reason: All varieties attempt, to one degree or another, to substitute the decisions of government planners for those of private citizens interacting in competitive markets. And in doing so, all varieties of socialism suffer from the insurmountable knowledge problem." • The French Model. Crowe states : "What Sanders and AOC actually have in mind is a regime more like that of France. When Sweden and Denmark each had in place a regime closer to what Sanders is talking about, the results were so bad that each of these countries put in place pretty dramatic free-market reforms. These two countries are by no means libertarian paradises, but thanks to large spending cuts and lower taxes, they aren’t the hot mess that they once were. France is, though, such a mess. That’s because there is one aspect in particular that the AOCs and Sanderses of the world fail to mention to their followers... : All of the goodies that they believe the American people are entitled to receive in fact come at a great cost -- and so the only way to pay for these goodies is with oppressive and regressive taxes (i.e., taxes heaped on to the backs of the middle class and the poor). France was once a role model for what big government can do for its people. But it has become an embarrassing example since 'The Gilets Jaunes' took to the streets to demonstrate against the insane amount of taxes they pay. These guys aren’t upper class. They are the people who have until now supported the policies that are inevitable when you have the government providing so many services and involved so deeply in so much of the economy." • JT Crowe quotes the Wall Street Journal on taxes : "The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) released its annual Revenue Statistics report this week, and France topped the charts, with a tax take equal to 46.2% of GDP in 2017. That’s more than Denmark (46%), Sweden (44%) and Germany (37.5%), and far more than the OECD average (34.2%) or the US (27.1%, which includes all levels of government). France doesn’t collect that revenue in the ways you might think. Despite the stereotype of heavy European income taxes on the rich, Paris relies disproportionately on social-insurance, payroll and property taxes. Social taxes account for 37% of French revenue; the OECD average is 26%. Payroll and property taxes contribute 3% and 9%, compared to the OECD averages of 1% and 6%." Crowe adds : "As a reminder, the payroll tax is very regressive; it consumes a larger share of low and middle class earners than rich people. In addition : Then Europe adds a regressive consumption tax, the value-added tax. In France, VAT and other consumption taxes make up 24% of revenue, and that’s on the low side compared to an OECD average of 33%. Consumption taxes often fall hardest on the poor and middle class, who devote a greater proportion of their income to consumption. To be sure, the spending is also more regressive in France in that the biggest share goes to the middle and low-income earners. But it is a stupid system in which you tax one group to redistribute to that same group." • For JT Crowe, the bottom line is this : "All those people in America who currently fall for the socialism soup that AOC and Sanders are selling need to realize that if their dream came to pass, they, not the rich -- not the bankers and politicians -- will be ones suffering the most from the high taxes, high unemployment, and slow growth that go hand in hand with the level of public spending they want. Everyone would suffer, of course. But those who will be screwed the most are definitely those at the bottom." • • • SOCIALISM AND THE "ELITES." Nathan Bryant says in Medium : "Socialism itself is elitist. It does not eliminate the upper class -- to the contrary, it just increases its exclusivity....Only an exceptionally elite class of perhaps a few hundred government bureaucrats has access to the very best of everything." • The Daily Bell published an editorial titled "A Note on Socialism as Elitism," by Tibor Machan on January 03, 2013. Machan made the point that "...free people tend at times to overrate the work and products of their fellows....The suggestion advanced in turn is that we should have a central governing body of people who will make certain that such mistakes do not happen -- even if it takes the use of firing squads to accomplish this noble result....The body of select people is no less a body of people than the body of people that makes up the free market place!....We are asked to believe that some people are inherently different from the rest of us. We are told that the select group -- the leaders of socialist/egalitarian governments via their schemes of distribution and equalization -- is immune from the errors of the rest of us. That the likes of Ralph Nader, Chuck Schumer, Joe Biden, et al., are really inherently better and wiser folk than are we all is what the citizenry is supposed to accept! The conclusion is interesting. Because starting from a desire for equality -- fair pricing, lessening the frequency of over- and underestimation of work, etc. -- we are led to the establishment of public policies that grant some people the legalized position of institutionalizing their (elitist) errors....The simple fact is -- known since the time of Thomas Aquinas -- that we are best off taking the risk with the free market. The 'utopian vision' of perfect judgments needs to be abandoned. We should all try to implement the best judgments we can make, at least within our own market activities, and maybe even in cases where our help is asked for or freely accepted. It is futile to argue that market decisions could not be better than they are. But it is far sillier to hold that institutionalizing the will of some of us can produce a guaranteed utopia. In that path lies disaster -- and we are now tasting its beginnings in our own land. You don’t have to play by the rules of the corrupt politicians, manipulative media, and brainwashed peers." • In saying that governmental elites cannot do better than, or as well as, the free market, Machan is also driving home the truth that the notion of elites making choices for an economy or social system stems from the belief of those elites themselves that they really are a superior class, that they know better than we do what is rigfht for us as a society and nation. In the past in America, we called them Democrats, and they have now morphed into radical socialist-marxist Democrats. • • • SOCIALIST-DEMOCRAT ELITISM IN AMERICA. Let's make the story of socialist elitism a little more personal for Americans. It begins by recognizing that the Democrat elites have for many years felt no compunction in using their elevated political status for personal financial gain. The current college entry scam is merely the latest version of it. For some time, we have been reading about the children of the Democrat elites doing VERY well VERY early in their careers -- many of us would say suspiciously well and suspiciously early. • But, one example stands out, although the mainstream media has rarely touched the story. • The New York Post, on March 15, 2018, published an article by Peter Schweizer titled "Inside the shady private equity firm run by Kerry and Biden’s kids." In the article, Schweizer discussed the little-noticed private equity firm run by the sons of Democrats Joe Biden and John Kerry, as detailed in the NYPost's exclusive first excerpt of "Secret Empires." • Schweizer states : "Joe Biden and John Kerry have been pillars of the Washington establishment for more than 30 years. Biden is one of the most popular politicians in our nation’s capital....As he reminds the American people on regular occasions, he has little wealth to show for his career, despite having reached the vice presidency. One of his closest political allies in Washington is former Senator and former Secretary of State John Kerry. 'Lunch Bucket Joe' he ain’t; Kerry is more patrician than earthy. But the two men became close while serving for several decades together in the US Senate....So their sons going into business together in June 2009 was not exactly a bolt out of the blue. But with whom their sons cut lucrative deals while the elder two were steering the ship of state is more of a surprise." • Here are the details, as told by Schweizer : "What Hunter Biden, the son of America’s vice president, and Christopher Heinz, the stepson of the chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations (later to be Secretary of State), were creating was an international private equity firm. It was anchored by the Heinz family alternative investment fund, Rosemont Capital. The new firm would be populated by political loyalists and positioned to strike profitable deals overseas with foreign governments and officials with whom the US government was negotiating." • Schweizer explains the operation : "Hunter Biden, Vice President Joe Biden’s youngest son, had gone through a series of jobs since graduating from Yale Law School in 1996, including the hedge-fund business. By the summer of 2009, the 39-year-old Hunter joined forces with the son of another powerful figure in American politics, Chris Heinz. Senator John Heinz of Pennsylvania had tragically died in a 1991 airplane crash when Chris was 18. Chris, his brothers, and his mother inherited a large chunk of the family’s vast ketchup fortune, including a network of investment funds and a Pennsylvania estate, among other properties. In May 1995, his mother, Teresa, married Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts. That same year, Chris graduated from Yale, and then went on to get his MBA from Harvard Business School. Joining them in the Rosemont venture was Devon Archer, a longtime Heinz and Kerry friend. The three friends established a series of related LLCs. The trunk of the tree was Rosemont Capital, the alternative investment fund of the Heinz Family Office. Rosemont Farm is the name of the Heinz family’s 90-acre estate outside Fox Chapel, Pennsylvania. The small fund grew quickly. According to an email revealed as part of a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation, Rosemont described themselves as 'a $2.4 billion private equity firm co-owned by Hunter Biden and Chris Heinz,' with Devon Archer as 'Managing Partner.' The partners attached several branches to the Rosemont Capital trunk, including Rosemont Seneca Partners, LLC, Rosemont Seneca Technology Partners, and Rosemont Realty. Of the various deals in which these Rosemont entities were involved, one of the largest and most troubling concerns was Rosemont Seneca Partners [NOTE that Canada Free Press states that Chris Heinz was not a managing partner of Seneca Partners**]." • Schweizer tells us : "Rather than set up shop in New York City, the financial capital of the world, Rosemont Seneca leased space in Washington, DC. They occupied an all-brick building on Wisconsin Avenue, the main thoroughfare of exclusive Georgetown....less than a mile from John and Teresa Kerry’s 23-room Georgetown mansion, and just two miles from both Joe Biden’s office in the White House and his residence at the Naval Observatory. Over the next seven years, as both Joe Biden and John Kerry negotiated sensitive and high-stakes deals with foreign governments, Rosemont entities secured a series of exclusive deals often with those same foreign governments. Some of the deals they secured may remain hidden. These Rosemont entities are, after all, within a private equity firm and as such are not required to report or disclose their financial dealings publicly. Some of their transactions are nevertheless traceable by investigating world capital markets. A troubling pattern emerges from this research, showing how profitable deals were struck with foreign governments on the heels of crucial diplomatic missions carried out by their powerful fathers. Often those foreign entities gained favorable policy actions from the United States government just as the sons were securing favorable financial deals from those same entities." • Schweizer used China as his main example : "Rosemont Seneca joined forces in doing business in China with another politically connected consultancy called the Thornton Group. The Massachusetts-based firm is headed by James Bulger, the nephew of the notorious mob hitman James 'Whitey' Bulger. Whitey was the leader of the Winter Hill Gang, part of the South Boston mafia....James Bulger’s father, Whitey’s younger brother, Billy Bulger, serves on the board of directors of the Thornton Group. He was the longtime leader of the Massachusetts state Senate and, with their long overlap by state and by party, a political ally of Massachusetts Senator John Kerry. Less than a year after opening Rosemont Seneca’s doors, Hunter Biden and Devon Archer were in China, having secured access at the highest levels. Thornton Group’s account of the meeting on their Chinese-language website was telling : Chinese executives 'extended their warm welcome' to the Thornton Group, with its US partner Rosemont Seneca chairman Hunter Biden (second son of the now Vice President Joe Biden).' The purpose of the meetings was to 'explore the possibility of commercial cooperation and opportunity.' Curiously, details about the meeting do not appear on their English-language website. Also, according to the Thornton Group, the three Americans met with the largest and most powerful government fund leaders in China -- even though Rosemont was both new and small. The timing of this meeting was also curious. It occurred just hours before Hunter Biden’s father, the vice president, met with Chinese President Hu in Washington as part of the Nuclear Security Summit." • Schweizer stated : "There was a second known meeting with many of the same Chinese financial titans in Taiwan in May 2011. For a small firm like Rosemont Seneca with no track record, it was an impressive level of access to China’s largest financial players. And it was just two weeks after Joe Biden had opened up the US-China strategic dialogue with Chinese officials in Washington. On one of the first days of December 2013, Hunter Biden was jetting across the Pacific Ocean aboard Air Force Two with his father and daughter Finnegan. The vice president was heading to Asia on an extended official trip....it was the visit to China that had the most potential to generate conflict and controversy....For Hunter Biden, the trip coincided with a major deal that Rosemont Seneca was striking with the state-owned Bank of China....Vice President Biden, Hunter Biden and Finnegan arrived to a red carpet and a delegation of Chinese officials. Greeted by Chinese children carrying flowers, the delegation was then whisked to a meeting with Vice President Li Yuanchao and talks with President Xi Jinping. Hunter and Finnegan Biden joined the vice president for tea with US Ambassador Gary Locke....What was not reported was the deal that Hunter was securing. Rosemont Seneca Partners** had been negotiating an exclusive deal with Chinese officials, which they signed approximately 10 days after Hunter visited China with his father. The most powerful financial institution in China, the government’s Bank of China, was setting up a joint venture with Rosemont Seneca....The Bank of China is an enormously powerful financial institution....The Bank of China is government-owned, which means that its role as a bank blurs into its role as a tool of the government. The Bank of China provides capital for 'China’s economic statecraft,' as scholar James Reilly puts it. Bank loans and deals often occur within the context of a government goal. Rosemont Seneca and the Bank of China created a $1 billion investment fund called Bohai Harvest RST (BHR), a name that reflected who was involved. Bohai (or Bo Hai), the innermost gulf of the Yellow Sea, was a reference to the Chinese stake in the company. The 'RS' referred to Rosemont Seneca. The 'T' was Thornton. The fund enjoyed an unusual and special status in China. BHR touted its 'unique Sino-US shareholding structure' and 'the global resources and network' that allowed it to secure investment 'opportunities.' Funds were backed by the Chinese government. In short, the Chinese government was literally funding a business that it co-owned along with the sons of two of America’s most powerful decision makers....In 2015, BHR joined forces with the automotive subsidiary of the Chinese state-owned military aviation contractor Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) to buy American 'dual-use' parts manufacturer Henniges. AVIC is a major military contractor in China. It operates 'under the direct control of the State Council' and produces a wide array of fighter and bomber aircraft, transports, and drones -- primarily designed to compete with the United States. The company also has a long history of stealing Western technology and applying it to military systems. The year before BHR joined with AVIC, the Wall Street Journal reported that the aviation company had stolen technologies related to the US F-35 stealth fighter and incorporated them in their own stealth fighter, the J-31. AVIC has also been accused of stealing US drone systems and using them to produce their own. In September 2015, when AVIC bought 51% of American precision-parts manufacturer Henniges, the other 49% was purchased by the Biden-and-Kerry-linked BHR." • AND, Canada Free Press took the story further in an April 11, 2018, article titled "Biden's Nepotism and Hypocrisy in Ukraine," written by James A. Lyons, Jr., Admiral, USN (ret). Admiral Lyons notes : "It would be hard to name another sitting vice president whose reckless nepotism impacted another country, as Biden did with Ukraine. Vice President Biden routinely complained about 'backsliding' over Ukraine’s fight against corruption, while at the same time, his son, Hunter, with no background in the gas industry, earned a huge salary as a consultant to gas mogul Mykola Zlochevsky’s Burisma Holdings, which is mired in allegations of corruption. This example of nepotism is, as reported in the Washington Post, a problem for US soft power as Hunter Biden’s appointment 'looks nepotistic at best, nefarious at worst.'....Prior to Burisma, Hunter Biden teamed up with his Yale roommate, Devon Archer to create Rosemont Capital and Rosemont Seneca. Their first forays were in China, including in a nuclear company under FBI investigation. But the good times did not last, as Archer was charged in May 2016 with 'conspiracy to commit securities fraud' against Native Americans....Author Oliver Bullough asked in The Guardian : 'Hunter Biden is an undistinguished corporate lawyer, with no previous Ukraine experience. Why would a Ukrainian tycoon hire him?' It would be duplicitous to deny there was a link between Biden and his son in Burisma. There cannot be any reason other than that his father was vice president as to why Hunter Biden was hired in April 2014, only two months after the success of the Euromaidan Revolution....Burisma is the third largest gas producer in Ukraine, controlling a quarter of private gas production. Nevertheless, it is not viewed by the Ukrainian government as a legitimate gas company. Meanwhile, Burisma’s close ties to oligarch Igor Kolomoisky place it beyond the pale for President Poroshenko, who clashed with the tycoon after he brought armed paramilitary thugs into downtown Kiev. The entangled web of Biden and son in Ukraine’s corruption is made more curious by the coincidence of dates when Biden visited Ukraine. During one of those visits in early 2016, a criminal investigation into stolen IMF credits to the tune of $1.8 billion was closed down by Ukraine’s prosecutor’s office. This $1.8 billion was only a part of the $5.5 billion reportedly laundered by Kolomoisky through PrivatBank over a ten-year period. The massive fraud uncovered by a Kroll Associates investigation was launched at the request of President Poroshenko." • MRC NewsBusters brought the Hunter Biden story up to date in a March 21, 2019, article by Ryan Foley, who reports that : "On Wednesday's Ingraham Angle, host Laura Ingraham covered the paperback release of a book written by Peter Schweizer that revealed 'that a private equity firm managed by the son of former Vice President Biden struck a deal with China’s state-owned bank in 2013 at the same time that Biden was in the country to meet with President Xi Jinping.' Not surprisingly, the rest of the media did not share her interest in covering this story. Ingraham interviewed Schweizer, who explained that Vice President Biden’s son Hunter Biden travelled to China with his father in December 2013 before mentioning that ten days after they returned from the trip, 'Hunter Biden’s small private equity firm called Rosemont Seneca Partners gets a $1 billion private equity deal with the Chinese government, not with the Chinese corporations, with the Chinese government.' After highlighting how Biden went 'soft on Beijing' following his overseas trip, Schweizer accused China of 'buying off Biden through his son.' " • Schweizer told Ingraham that "the trial of Biden’s business partner enabled him to gain access to the financial records of Rosemont Seneca Bohai, a 'pass-through' [entities with US tax 'pass throughs' to their principals] where most of the money ended up going to the former Vice President’s son." Schweizer proceeded to outline in detail “the money going into the account,” which included “$3.1 million from corrupt Ukrainian oligarchs,” “$1 million from the Chinese,” “moneys from a Kazak oligarch, and “$1.2 million from some LLC from a Swiss bank that’s been implicated in money laundering.” • Ingraham pointed out, as reported by Foley, "that the media and the left have spent the past two years accusing President Trump of being bought off by the Russians and yet the same media haven't shown the same interest in the Biden family’s ties to China and other shady foreign government officials. Ingraham concluded the segment by noting the “stunning lack of curiosity on the part of CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, Washington Post, New York Times.” Based on the media’s almost cheerleader-like coverage of Biden’s possible presidential run, it makes perfect sense why this story "just gets buried,” as Ingraham put it. • • • DEAR READERS, Democrat socialist Elites ??? We know about the stories that made the internet media about Senator Feinstein's ties to China. An April, 2018, Politico exposé reported : "According to four former intelligence officials, in the 2000s, a staffer in Senator Dianne Feinstein’s San Francisco field office was reporting back to the MSS [China’s Ministry of State Security, its intelligence and security apparatus]. While this person, who was a liaison to the local Chinese community, was fired, charges were never filed against him. (One former official reasoned this was because the staffer was providing political intelligence and not classified information -- making prosecution far more difficult.) The suspected informant was ‘run’ by officials based at China’s San Francisco Consulate, said another former intelligence official. The spy’s handler ‘probably got an award back in China’ for his work, noted this former official, dryly." In 1979, reports The Federalist : "Feinstein, then mayor of San Francisco, established a 'sister city' relationship with Shanghai, one of the earliest and most robust such relationships in US-China history. Soon after, Feinstein led a mayoral delegation to China joined by her husband, investor Richard Blum, a trip they took together many times over the ensuing years as the relationship between both Feinsteins and China grew. During the 1980s, as mayor of San Francisco, Feinstein developed a close friendship with Shanghai Mayor Jiang Zemin. This substantially enhanced Feinstein’s foreign policy profile, and created an important linkage to the US government for China’s Communist Party (CCP). Just as Feinstein rose to a prominent position in foreign affairs and national security in the US Senate, first on the Foreign Relations Committee and later as chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Jiang rose to the top of Chinese leadership, serving as chairman of the Central Military Commission, general secretary of the CCP, and president of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Under Jiang’s leadership, the PRC initiated a brutal crackdown against practitioners of Falun Gong, including mass imprisonments, beatings, torture, rape, organ harvesting, and murder, and engaging in alleged human rights atrocities against Tibetans. Feinstein never renounced her friendship with Jiang, in spite of these acts. Feinstein and Jiang reportedly visited each other regularly in the 1980s, with Jiang once spending Thanksgiving in San Francisco with Feinstein and her husband....In 1986, Feinstein and Jiang designated several corporate entities for fostering commercial relations, one named Shanghai Pacific Partners. Feinstein’s husband served as a director. His financial position was relatively small, less than $500,000 on one project, the only such position in China the Feinstein family held when Feinstein entered the Senate in 1992. ‘They said that Feinstein’s consistent support for China’s interests cannot help but benefit her husband’s efforts to earn profits there.’ That project, however, which Blum’s firm participated in alongside PRC state-run Shanghai Investment Trust Corp., was one of the first joint ventures between San Francisco and Chinese investors, reportedly 'cited by Chinese officials as a testament to the friendly business ties between Shanghai and San Francisco that Feinstein had initiated.' Subsequently Blum’s investments in the Middle Kingdom mushroomed. In May 1993, Feinstein expressed her strong support on the Senate floor for continued trading with China. Contemporaneously, her husband was seeking to raise up to $150 million from investors, including himself, for a variety of Chinese enterprises. In August 1993, Feinstein and her husband visited Beijing for extensive meetings with Chinese leaders at President Jiang’s invitation. As the Los Angeles Times reported in a 1994 exposé on Feinstein’s husband’s business ties and the potential conflict of interests they presented : 'Such encounters are fondly remembered when deals are clinched back in China, according to American experts in Chinese business practices. They said that Feinstein’s consistent support for China’s interests cannot help but benefit her husband’s efforts to earn profits there.'....under his Newbridge Capital investment company...the fund invested in several state-owned and Chinese government-linked businesses. Blum’s firm’s largest holding -- at the time his China investments began to draw scrutiny in 1997 -- was its stake in Northwest Airlines. The then-estimated $300 million position was poised to significantly appreciate in value, as Northwest happened to be the sole airline operator providing nonstop service from the United States to any city in China. When questioned on his China investments, Blum pledged to donate future profits from the holdings to his nonprofit foundation to help Tibetan refugees, thereby 'remov[ing] any perception that I, in any way, shape or form benefit from or influence my wife’s position on China as a US Senator.' But these conflict of interest issues persisted....In 2004, Newbridge Capital purchased an 18% stake in Shenzhen Development Bank, the first time a foreign company took effective control of a Chinese lender. From 2001 to 2005, Feinstein served as chair of the Senate Military Construction Appropriations Committee. During this time, defense companies in which Blum’s firms were invested signed billions of dollars in military contracts approved by Feinstein’s committee. This suggests a parallel pattern in the Feinstein family’s political and business dealings that adversaries like China surely could have sought to exploit. When pressed on conflicts of interest, however, on multiple occasions Feinstein has flippantly responded by rhetorically asking what she could do to satisfy those raising the issue, short of getting divorced....Few American officials could have been as potentially exposed to the PRC’s skilled intelligence service as Feinstein. Here we have not only proof of a spy, but real evidence of consistently pro-Chinese policy that at very best created the appearance of a financial conflict of interest." • The Democrat Socialist Elites exist, and they profit from their positions. But, their propagandist mainstream media will continue to make it difficult for ordinary Americans to have the facts about them and their politically-acquired personal wealth.