John David Dyche: Mitch McConnell's Money.
Mitch McConnell's money
Written by John David Dyche
There are many matters on which one can legitimately criticize the U.S. Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. Those assailing his role in passing the Medicare prescription drug benefit or supporting multiple wars without paying for them are on firm ground. So are critics of his failure to embrace the Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction plan.
But anyone making the serious allegation or implication that McConnell has “gotten rich from public service” bears a heavy burden of proof. Since this newspaper published a story stating that McConnell’s net worth is estimated at $27.2 million, however, several people have levied such a charge without providing supporting facts. McConnell may be wealthy, but there is no evidence in the public record that he is venal.
McConnell’s public financial disclosure reports for 1994, 1999 and 2008 indicate that the substantial growth in his net worth came mostly from two family inheritances and a gift from the family of his wife, former Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao. His 1994 report details the disposition of his mother’s estate to him, his 1999 report includes the distribution to him from his uncle’s estate, and his 2008 report shows the Chao family gift made after his wife’s mother died.
Additionally, McConnell long ago divested himself of individual stocks to eliminate any appearance of impropriety regarding legislation that might impact an individual company. By putting his investments in managed funds, McConnell acted proactively to prevent allegations against him like those recently made against Speaker of the House John Boehner and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. News reports allege they made financial transactions based on information they received in the course of their official duties.
Yes, as his potential 2014 opponents should well note, Mitch is rich. But so are many Democrats, including some the masses wrongly deem great friends of the working people. But if politicians come to fortunes by fair means the mere fact of affluence is not a legitimate basis for insinuations of impropriety.
These recent baseless attacks on against McConnell are not the first of the kind. Some have previously suggested that McConnell’s relationship with his wife’s well-connected Chinese family somehow improperly affected his position toward China. Those charges have likewise failed for lack of proof and are further refuted by recent events in Burma.
The Obama administration is reaping the political benefit of Burmese reform, but McConnell has long been America’s leading champion for that oppressed country. For years when the public was not paying attention McConnell bucked China and won kudos from even the New York Times for putting and keeping Burma on the American agenda. Burmese Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Ky, with whom Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently met, has lauded McConnell for his steadfast support.
Aggressive and sometimes openly hostile investigative journalists have made a cottage industry of trying to find evidence of corruption in McConnell’s career. None of their efforts has survived scrutiny or otherwise stuck. Anyone having such evidence should produce it for public examination instead of making groundless slurs.
In America’s greatest political novel, All the King’s Men, that incomparable Kentuckian Robert Penn Warren wrote, “Man is conceived in sin and born in corruption and he passeth from the stink of the didie to the stench of the shroud. There is always something.”
Maybe there is “something” on McConnell, too. But thus far lacking any supporting evidence and being contradicted by his public disclosures, these repeated and superficial intimations that McConnell somehow got rich in public service should stop.
John David Dyche is a Louisville attorney who writes a political column on alternating Tuesdays in Forum His views are his own, not those of the law firm in which he practices. He is the author of a biography of Sen. Mitch McConnell (”Republican Leader”). Read him on-line at www.courier-journal.com; email: jddyche@yahoo.com.
Written by John David Dyche
There are many matters on which one can legitimately criticize the U.S. Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. Those assailing his role in passing the Medicare prescription drug benefit or supporting multiple wars without paying for them are on firm ground. So are critics of his failure to embrace the Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction plan.
But anyone making the serious allegation or implication that McConnell has “gotten rich from public service” bears a heavy burden of proof. Since this newspaper published a story stating that McConnell’s net worth is estimated at $27.2 million, however, several people have levied such a charge without providing supporting facts. McConnell may be wealthy, but there is no evidence in the public record that he is venal.
McConnell’s public financial disclosure reports for 1994, 1999 and 2008 indicate that the substantial growth in his net worth came mostly from two family inheritances and a gift from the family of his wife, former Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao. His 1994 report details the disposition of his mother’s estate to him, his 1999 report includes the distribution to him from his uncle’s estate, and his 2008 report shows the Chao family gift made after his wife’s mother died.
Additionally, McConnell long ago divested himself of individual stocks to eliminate any appearance of impropriety regarding legislation that might impact an individual company. By putting his investments in managed funds, McConnell acted proactively to prevent allegations against him like those recently made against Speaker of the House John Boehner and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. News reports allege they made financial transactions based on information they received in the course of their official duties.
Yes, as his potential 2014 opponents should well note, Mitch is rich. But so are many Democrats, including some the masses wrongly deem great friends of the working people. But if politicians come to fortunes by fair means the mere fact of affluence is not a legitimate basis for insinuations of impropriety.
These recent baseless attacks on against McConnell are not the first of the kind. Some have previously suggested that McConnell’s relationship with his wife’s well-connected Chinese family somehow improperly affected his position toward China. Those charges have likewise failed for lack of proof and are further refuted by recent events in Burma.
The Obama administration is reaping the political benefit of Burmese reform, but McConnell has long been America’s leading champion for that oppressed country. For years when the public was not paying attention McConnell bucked China and won kudos from even the New York Times for putting and keeping Burma on the American agenda. Burmese Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Ky, with whom Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently met, has lauded McConnell for his steadfast support.
Aggressive and sometimes openly hostile investigative journalists have made a cottage industry of trying to find evidence of corruption in McConnell’s career. None of their efforts has survived scrutiny or otherwise stuck. Anyone having such evidence should produce it for public examination instead of making groundless slurs.
In America’s greatest political novel, All the King’s Men, that incomparable Kentuckian Robert Penn Warren wrote, “Man is conceived in sin and born in corruption and he passeth from the stink of the didie to the stench of the shroud. There is always something.”
Maybe there is “something” on McConnell, too. But thus far lacking any supporting evidence and being contradicted by his public disclosures, these repeated and superficial intimations that McConnell somehow got rich in public service should stop.
John David Dyche is a Louisville attorney who writes a political column on alternating Tuesdays in Forum His views are his own, not those of the law firm in which he practices. He is the author of a biography of Sen. Mitch McConnell (”Republican Leader”). Read him on-line at www.courier-journal.com; email: jddyche@yahoo.com.
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