Bacardi charged in Texas election scandal (Delay & rum trademark)

[Mika]

Bacardi charged in Texas election scandal
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/business/9736789.htm

A Texas grand jury has indicted Bacardi USA on charges of making a $20,000 illegal campaign contribution to Texas Republican state legislative candidates in 2002, in a case linked to House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's political fund-raising activities.

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The indictment comes as the rum maker is waging an international legal and political battle to gain the U.S. rights to the Havana Club rum trademark. The brand is now held by the Cuban government and French liquor giant Pernod Ricard in a joint venture, Havana Club Holdings. Bacardi scored a major victory in 1998 when a spending bill included language granting the company the U.S. rights to the name. But after the French government complained, the World Trade Organization ordered the United States to revise the law, known as Section 211, to bring it into compliance with WTO rules. The U.S. Trademark Trial and Appeal Office in January decided that Bacardi could not use the famed trademark. Bacardi is now suing to overturn the ruling. The company, which is owned by a Cuban exile family, has also been lobbying in Washington for another bill that would effectively grant it the trademark as well as satisfy WTO rules. DeLay has been a key backer of the legislation, which is going through both the House and Senate with bipartisan support.

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Bacardi's political action committee made unreported contributions to five members of Congress, including Sen. Bill Nelson and Reps. Lincoln and Mario Diaz-Balart. Four of those members, including Nelson and the Diaz-Balart brothers, signed on as co-sponsors of the trademark bill. The allegations were first reported by the Miami Daily Business Review.

''The Bacardi USA Inc. PAC has a pattern of flagrantly violating campaign finance laws,'' said Melanie Sloan, executive director of CREW, in a statement. ``How many times can one company make secret contributions to Tom DeLay before the government steps in?''

More.. (free reg req)
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/business/9736789.htm

[da_chimperor]

1. No more bacardi and coke for me n/t

[AndyTiedye]

4. I Get My Rum from Barbados - a Non-Member of the "Coalition"

despite considerable cajoling and bullying by the USA.

Barbados doesn't even have an army. They've got a very small coast guard
that mostly goes after smugglers, yet they got heavy pressure from
the Boosh regime to join the coalition of the "willing".

They told Boosh to get stuffed, probably the smallest country to do so.

[Tempest]

2. Bacardi and Jeb Bush

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,3604,950675,...

The latest round of the Havana Club legal battle centres on Florida governor Jeb Bush, brother of the president. Bacardi, with a US base in Miami, has given $200,000 to Florida Republicans since 1998 and Pernod-Ricard has submitted emails that purport to show that the governor put pressure on local trademark officials to back Bacardi in the dispute.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A46997-20...

A federal board reviewing a controversial trademark case has rejected a complaint alleging that intervention by Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) on behalf of Bacardi USA Inc. amounted to an improper one-sided, or ex parte, communication in a semi-judicial proceeding.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A5681-200...

At the behest of Rodriguez-Marquez and Bacardi, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) has been conducting a lobbying campaign to persuade the Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) to transfer the "Havana Club" trademark from Havana Club Holdings S.A., a joint Cuban-French venture, to Bacardi, a Florida-based company.

The lobbying has proven controversial for several reasons: Bacardi has been a major soft money contributor to the Florida GOP; Jeb Bush has promoted the company's interests to political appointees of his brother, President Bush, at the PTO; and the trademark case is a quasi-judicial proceeding with restrictions on "ex-parte" (or one-sided) communications such as those made by Jeb Bush.

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http://www.salon.com/politics/conason/2002/10/17/bush/i...

When Jeb isn't campaigning these days, he seems to be walking around with his hand outstretched to every special interest with a bank account. A month ago, the Washington Post caught him lobbying his brother's administration on behalf of the Bacardi liquor company. By then a $50,000 check to the Florida GOP from Bacardi (whose former professional lobbyist Otto Reich is now an assistant secretary of state) presumably had cleared.

[Mika]

3. Bacardi support for terrorists

Bacardi's smooth image soured by charges of death plots and terror
http://www.guardian.co.uk/cuba/story/0,11983,1189909,00.html

Yet a new investigation into a former head of the secretive dynasty that acquired vast fortunes from the rum has levelled fresh allegations involving links to international terrorists, assassination attempts and a plot to overthrow Fidel Castro's communist regime.

They include accusations that a former head of the Bacardi family bought a fighter-bomber to target Havana, plotted to kill Castro and is linked to a terrorist outrage that killed 73 air passengers.

Further allegations aired tomorrow include the involvement of members of the Bacardi family with the controversial Cuban American National Foundation. Based in Miami, where many of the Bacardi family fled after Castro nationalised their firm's assets in 1959, the foundation is mired in controversy.

During the 1980s Posada Carriles walked out of a Venezuelan jail disguised as a priest after being sentenced over the 1976 aircraft bombing. It has been claimed that foundation money was used to bribe the guards.

In 1997 a wave of bombings, which killed an Italian tourist, was launched on Havana hotels. Again Posada Carriles emerged as a suspect, claiming that he was bankrolled by the foundation. He later withdrew the claim and the foundation denies all charges.

Here's a story (google cache) of interest

THE PRESIDENT'S FAVOURITE TERRORISTS (terrorist cells in Florida)
http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:bqpk0rYDnEcJ:www.squall.co.uk/squall.cfm/ses/sq%3D2002021201/ct%3D2+bacardi+terrorists&hl=en

[struggle4progress]

5. kick

:kick:

[SoCalDem]

6. Bacardi, Enron, water rights, Florida = JEBBIE too

http://www.whoseflorida.com/plundering_florida.htm

JEB's outstretched hand...
..."When Jeb isn't campaigning these days, he seems to be walking around with his hand outstretched to every special interest with a bank account.

A month ago, the Washington Post caught him lobbying his brother's administration on behalf of the Bacardi liquor company. By then a $50,000 check to the Florida GOP from Bacardi (whose former professional lobbyist Otto Reich is now an assistant secretary of state) presumably had cleared.

Then yesterday, the St. Petersburg Times reported that Jeb had signed a bill hindering the removal of highway billboards by local communities in Florida, just one week after the Florida GOP took a couple of checks totaling $25,000 from an outdoor advertising mogul. Those checks had no influence on the governor's behavior, as his spokespersons assured the press in each instance.

Of course not. By the way, here's a cool picture of Karl Eller, the gentleman who wrote those two checks that had nothing to do with the billboard legislation. He's smiling because he was picking up a Steuben glass eagle from the Outdoor Advertising Association of America, for winning its "lifetime achievement award."
... from Joe Conason's Journal 10/17/02 at:
http://www.salon.com/politics/conason/2002/10/17/bush/index.html
... posted by galloway, 10/21/02

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Florida's Bush/Enron Connection Timeline
March 7, 2001 -- Enron Lobbyist Bill Bryant e-mails Gov. Jeb Bush requesting a meeting between Enron chairman Ken Lay and Gov. Jeb Bush to discuss energy deregulation.

March 7, 2001 -- Gov. Jeb Bush e-mails Bryant back saying "I would love to meet with Ken."

April 17, 2001 -- A 2 p.m. phone call between Gov. Jeb Bush and Enron chairman Ken Lay appears on Gov. Jeb Bush's daily schedule.

January 18, 2002 -- In an e-mail response to Katie Baur regarding a public records request from the Miami Herald asking for documents regarding communications between the governor's office and Enron, Gov. Bush says "I remember one meeting with Azurix and none with Florida Gas. Nothing happened from the Azurix meeting." The meeting with Azurix -- an Enron subsidiary --happened in September 1999. Gov. Bush does not mention the Ken Lay phone call from nine months earlier.

January 28, 2002 -- Gov. Bush is asked whether he had discussed his desire to deregulate Florida's wholesale electric market with Enron representatives, Bush thought for a moment before shaking his head and saying no. He said the only company to meet with him about deregulation was Duke Energy. (Tampa Tribune 2/7)

February 6, 2002 -- Gov. Bush's Communications Director Katie Baur, responding to a question about Gov. Bush's phone call with Ken Lay, is quoted in the February 7 So. Florida Sun-Sentinel saying: "Enron was the seventh-largest corporation in the nation. They requested a meeting with the governor. They got a phone call. ... Nothing came of the phone call. There's no story here."

February 7, 2002 -- Bush states that he didn't talk with Lay

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and more @


JEB - CEO of Florida Inc.
... Bush is to Florida as Ken Lay is to Enron It seems ... The company is Bacardi-Martini
USA ... Investigation clears water management staff of wrongdoing WEST PALM BEACH ...
www.whoseflorida.com/jeb_ceo.htm - 90k - Cached - Similar pages

Enron & Friends - 12/12/02
... Now Bacardi-Martini has filed a belated report admitting to ... Gramm's wife being on the board of Enron is an ... Here's a water project in Arkansas that could be ...
gning.org/enron/enron-38.html - 71k - Cached - Similar pages

Enron & Friends - 9/15/02
... decisive" favorable ruling in a case that Bacardi was pursuing ... measure is also a privatization of water from the ... called Azurix, which used to be part of Enron. ...
gning.org/enron/enron-32.html - 17k - Cached - Similar pages

NewsFollowUp, TransparencyPlanet, promote govt/biz transparency ...
... July 27, 2004; Taking on Tom Delay Bacardi, Enron, MTBE, refiners ... W. Va., Ammmonium Perfluoroctanoate, perfluoroctanoic acid, PFOA, water repellent, carcinogen ...
www.newsfollowup.com/arch005.htm - 101k - Cached - Similar pages

EWA News 27 March 2002
... Stockholm Water Prize Founders include Anglian Water, Aragon Fondkommission, Bacardi Limited, Compaq, DuPont, Fujitsu ... ENRON'S AZURIX TO SELL WESSEX WATER. ...
www.riza.nl/ewa_news/news_27_march_2002.html - 59k - Cached - Similar pages

The Michigan Review
... than to fill that little bastard’s water dish every ... Yes, but so was Enron, so count your lucky blessings ... years of time to kill waiting for Bacardi to respond ...
www.michiganreview.com/article.php?id=1346 - 35k - Cached - Similar pages

Business & Human Rights : Access to water
... already saddled with high air and water pollution, is ... www.business-humanrights.org/Categories/ Issues/Other/Accesstowater?&&&batch_start=21 - 57k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

and pages and pages more

[DoYouEverWonder]

7. Nice to see the Barcardi's get some of the attention

they deserve. Jeb and the Barcardi's go way back. I hope this Delay scandal has tenticles.

[Mika]

8. I would just love to see those mo-fo's go down..

.. for the count.

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••• Please Boycott Bacardi Products & the University of Miami •••--> http://www.miami.edu/iccas/casabacardi.htm
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/43b/116.html
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~uczxcia/ecoguide/boycotts/bacardi.htm
http://www.rcgfrfi.easynet.co.uk/ratb/boycott/wysk.htm
http://perso.club-internet.fr/vdedaj/cuba/lazy_cuba_bacardi_hb.html
http://www.cpa.org.au/garchve1/982bac.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/cuba/story/0,11983,774849,00.html
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=bacardi+%2B+terrorism

[tibbir]

9. As a Texas, I would love to see Delay and all his pals go down.

Hopefully some of these first indictments will cause someone to start doing some canary singing.