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Friday, June 30, 2017

So Who Can Explain This?

Just yesterday, Vermont senator Bernie Sanders told MSNBC that allegations that he used his office to pressure banks to make a large loan to Burlington College when his wife was president of that institution are nothing but lies.  Instead of talking about what he and his staff did regarding that loan, however, Sanders used the question to attack President Trump and his supporters.  It was a weird moment even for Sanders and MSNBC.

Let's look at what we do know.

1.  Mrs. Sanders, as president of Burlington College, applied for and got a huge loan so that the school could buy a property that was to be used for expansion.

2.  In the loan application, Mrs. Sanders told the banks that the school had over $3 million in pledges which would be used for the expansion once the property was acquired.

3.  After the loan was made and the property acquired, it turned out that only just over half a million dollars in contributions were made, a far cry from the more than $3million Mrs. Sanders had represented to the banks on the loan documents.

4.  Mrs. Sanders left her job as president of the college and Burlington College never used the property for expansion.  Not long after that, Burlington College went under and shut its doors.

5.  Senator Sanders has been a public employee for most of his adult life.  The senate is the highest paying job he has ever held.

6.  Even though he has never had a very high paying position, Sanders still has managed to amass enough of a fortune that he owns three homes including a very expensive vacation home.  It is unclear how Sanders manages to support these homes and his life style on his salary as a senator.

Now let's move on to what has been claimed but which we don't know for certain.

1.  It is claimed that when Mrs. Sanders sought the loan for the property acquisition, her husband the senator put pressure on the banks to make the loan.  Sanders denies this.

It's worth noting that if Mrs. Sanders told the banks the college had over three million in pledges when it really had something more like half a million, that is a federal crime:  bank fraud.  That crime carries severe penalties with it.  Further, if senator Sanders used his office to help his wife get that bank loan, it could also be a federal crime.  That would depend on the details of what actually happened.

We know that the FBI is investigating the bank loan and the Sanders connection to it.  We also know that both the senator and his wife have hired high powered Washington lawyers to represent them in connection with this matter.

It's funny.  In the Russia/Trump investigation, there is no evidence of any wrongdoing, but we hear about it from the media non-stop.  In the Sanders investigation, there is a great deal of troubling evidence, yet the mainstream media doesn't even bother to cover the story.

I want someone to explain how Sanders has never had a job that paid him well but he has amassed a rather large amount of money as well as three homes.  That's not something the senator can claim to be a lie.  He really ought to provide us with an explanation.

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