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Title: McCain Adviser Was Lobbyist for Georgia
Source:
WSJ
URL Source: http://online.wsj.com/public/articl ... ecial_page_campaign2008_topbox
Published: Aug 11, 2008
Author: MARY JACOBY
Post Date: 2008-08-11 20:33:08 by Jethro Tull
Keywords: None
Views: 63
Comments: 2
McCain Adviser Was Lobbyist for Georgia By MARY JACOBY August 11, 2008; Page A5 John McCain's top foreign-policy adviser, Randy Scheunemann, is a leading expert on U.S.-allied Georgia -- and was a paid lobbyist for the former Soviet republic until March, in the run-up to what has become a major battle between Georgia and Russia. Democratic rival Barack Obama's presidential campaign was quick to try to paint Mr. Scheunemann's dual roles as a conflict of interest after Sen. McCain swiftly took Georgia's side in the dispute, and cited it as evidence that Sen. McCain is "ensconced in a lobbyist culture," as Obama spokesman Hari Sevugan told reporters over the weekend. But given the rapid escalation of the fighting, and the fact that Georgia is being viewed as a victim of its neighbor's aggression, Mr. Scheunemann's ties to the small nation and its pro-Western Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili may look less like a weakness and more like a strength in the first foreign-policy crisis of the general election campaign. "In a major international crisis, what is their response?" Mr. Scheunemann said of the Obama campaign in an interview Sunday. "To take a cheap shot at me, as if helping a struggling democracy is somehow wrong." Mr. Scheunemann took a formal leave of absence from his two-person lobbying firm earlier this year amid controversy over Sen. McCain's ties to lobbyists. Mr. Scheunemann's firm, Orion Strategies, continues to represent Georgia in Washington, and signed a new $200,000 contract with the country in April. Mr. Scheunemann remains an owner of the firm, though he is no longer registered to lobby for it. Mr. Scheunemann said he has made more than a dozen trips to Georgia since he began lobbying for the country in 2004. The crisis puts a spotlight on Mr. Scheunemann, 48 years old, who has long been a leading neoconservative voice in the American foreign-policy debate. He played a prominent role advocating for toppling Saddam Hussein, serving in 2002 as executive director of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq. At a key moment before the war, he helped to line up allies in "New Europe" -- notably former Soviet bloc states like Latvia -- to write a letter in support of the invasion. That came as "Old Europe" American allies like France and Germany resisted. Mr. Schueneman has made a career in lobbying for countries, including Georgia, that aspire to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Russia's objections to expansion of the Western military alliance are a factor in the current assault in the Caucasus. As a foreign-policy aide to then-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott in 1997, Mr. Scheunemann accompanied Sen. McCain on a trip to the newly independent former Soviet republic. At a dinner, Sen. McCain first met Mr. Saakashvili, who had been a law student in Washington, and was then a young reform-minded Georgian parliamentarian, Mr. Scheunemann said. In 2003, Sen. McCain returned to Georgia and gave a speech calling on then-President Eduard Shevardnadze to conduct fair presidential and parliamentary elections. The elections weren't perceived as fair, however, and democratic activists launched the protests known as the Rose Revolution that led to Mr. Saakashvili's gaining power. In August 2006, Sen. McCain returned to Georgia on another congressional delegation, visiting Mr. Saakashvili at a presidential villa on the Black Sea. While Mr. Scheunemann watched from a dock, Sen. McCain and the Georgian leader rode jet skis together, Mr. Scheunemann said. "He knows all the top players" in Georgia, Zeyno Baran, an analyst on energy and the Caucasus region at the Hudson Institute in Washington, said of Mr. Scheunemann. Mr. Scheunemann is an architect of the U.S.-led expansion of NATO to include former Soviet satellite states, a bipartisan policy begun under the Clinton administration intended to contain Russia. But in the 1990s and early 2000s Russia had little economic and diplomatic power to stop its former satellites and republics -- including Poland, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Romania -- from joining the Western alliance. Sen. McCain has said that NATO leaders' failure to advance Georgia's application for membership at a summit of the alliance in Romania earlier this year emboldened Russia to invade. Mr. Scheunemann said he had foreseen the possibility of a Russian attack on Georgia. He had long counseled President Saakashvili to avoid overreacting to provocations from the Russian-backed breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia that are at the center of the current conflict, these people say. "At all sort of critical moments, when there have been repeated Russian provocations, Randy was a calming influence" advising Georgians against responding to Russia with military action, Ms. Baran said. Mr. Scheunemann's firm has earned more than $2 million since 2004 lobbying U.S. officials, including Sen. McCain and his staff, on behalf of various clients including Georgia, records show.
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#1. To: Jethro Tull (#0)
McCain is nothing but a puppet of PNAC handlers like Sheunemann.
Randy Scheunemann was the President of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, which was created by the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), of which he is a board member. He was Trent Lott's National Security Aide and was an advisor to U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Iraq. He is 2008 U.S. presidential campaign|2008 Presidential candidate John McCain's foreign-policy aide.[1] Scheunemann has been criticized for his close association with Ahmad Chalabi during the George W. Bush administration's campaign to generate public support for the 2003 invasion of Iraq.[2] In mid-July 2008, the Sunday Times of London linked Scheunemann to Stephen Payne, a lobbyist covertly filmed as he offered to arrange meetings with Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and others, in exchange for donations to the George W. Bush Presidential Library. Payne said Scheunemann had been "working with me on my payroll for five of the last eight years". [3] if (window.showTocToggle) { var tocShowText = "show"; var tocHideText = "hide"; showTocToggle(); } "Randy Scheunemann founded Orion Strategies LLC in 2001 to provide strategic planning, communications, policy, and government affairs consulting services to corporate, government, foundation and private clients. As President and Managing Partner, he and his team develop strategies, provide counsel and implement action plans specifically tailored to individual client needs."[4] "Before launching Orion Strategies, Mr. Scheunemann served as President of Alexandria, Virginia-based Mercury Group, Inc. where he supervised and directed all operations of the $3 million consulting and communications company."[4] "From 1999-2000, Scheunemann served as Defense and Foreign Policy Coordinator for the John McCain/"McCain 2000" presidential campaign where he appeared throughout the U.S. as a campaign spokesperson on national security issues. During 1996, Mr. Scheunemann was a senior adviser to Republican Presidential Candidate Bob Dole. He served on the 1996 Republican Platform Committee and wrote major portions of the foreign policy, defense and intelligence planks."[4] "Prior to joining the private sector, Mr. Scheunemann served as National Security Adviser to Senate Republican and Majority Leaders Bob Dole and Trent Lott from 1993- 99. As a senior adviser, he developed, coordinated and implemented policy for the Majority Leader and Republican Senators on all foreign policy, arms control, national security and intelligence issues."[4] "Mr. Scheunemann was involved in Senate deliberations concerning the use of American military power in Somalia, the Korean peninsula, Iraq, Haiti and Bosnia. He also served as coordinator for Senate Republican policy on United Nations reform, Congressional-Executive war powers, NATO enlargement, global climate change, economic sanctions, ballistic missile defense and technology transfers to China. He has traveled to over 80 countries to examine U.S. policies and programs."[4] "From 1986-1993, Mr. Scheunemann served on the staffs of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and the House Republican Policy Committee. Mr. Scheunemann has authored articles for The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Foreign Policy and other national publications. He has served as guest lecturer on foreign policy and security issues for the Foreign Service Institute, the National Defense University, the Defense Trade Advisory Group, the Republican National Committee's Team 100, the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, American University and the U.S. Information Agency. Mr. Scheunemann serves on the Board of Directors of the U.S. Committee on NATO, as a consultant to the Office of the Secretary of Defense and as Treasurer of The Project on Transitional Democracies."[4]
#2. To: Rupert_Pupkin (#1)
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