New York magazine notes today how, according to Hillary's recent financial disclosure forms, she and several of her staff have accepted free use of a Lockheed-owned private plane at least five times since 2001.
Apparently this happens quite frequently with elected officials, but in recent months Democrats have been focusing on such free plane trips as part of the so-called Republican "culture of corruption." Now their leading presidential candidate admits doing the very thing they have been decrying.
Hillary, it may be remembered, recently helped the company snag a $6.1 billion contract to build presidential helicopters in upstate New York. Press reports indicate the contract was awrded to Lockheed Martin on January 28, 2005, the Federal Election Commission's website shows that Lockheed Martin's political action committee gave her a $5,000 donation several weeks later, on March 14, 2005.
For what it's worth, Lockheed also figured prominently in the Clinton-China scandal of the mid-90s. In fact, in 2000 Lockheed agreed to pay a $13 million settlement to the U.S. government for illegally helping Red China to improve its rocket technology.
The New York story detailed one particular trip on a Lockheed jet for Hillary and a staffer up to the city of Troy for the "first ever New York States Little Italy Heritage Tourism Conference." The trip was labeled as a "speaking engagement," which is fine enough, but that still doesn't justify the all-expense paid flight. The fact that Lockheed Martin paid for the round trip violates Senate ethics rules, according to the article. But evidently this doesn't matter anyway, seeing as the same Senate Ethics Committee who might judge their colleague on this issue recently decided not to investigate her about a scandalous fundraising issue.
