John Edwards' Aide Joked About Selling Sex Tape

John Edwards' Aide Joked About Selling Sex Tape


A former confidante of John Edwards testified today that he and Edwards' longtime aide Andrew Young had come to dislike Edwards so much that they laughed about the money to be made from selling a sex tape the presidential candidate had made with his mistress.

Tim Toben, a North Carolina businessman and one-time Edwards' supporter, admitted on the stand during Edward's corruption trial that he and Young joked about the consequences of releasing the sex tape, and disparaged Edwards, a man both men once admired but came to resent.

Toben said Young had told him about a "personal and private video tape" depicting Edwards and mistress Rielle Hunter having sex, while the two men watched a football game together.

"I wonder what that tape is worth today," Toben asked Young in an email soon after a National Enquirer ran a story about Edwards' love child.

Toben said they joked about how much money they could sell the tape for, adding "the numbers were pretty big numbers."

Toben, who was once so close to Edwards he was asked to sneak a pregnant Hunter out of North Carolina in the dead of night, said after Edwards quit the race he went to the Obama campaign to warn them of offering Edwards a job in the administration.

 
He recalled dining with Edwards at a swank restaurant in Chapel Hill, N.C., in which Edwards bragged about his prospects in a potential Obama administration, despite the National Enquirer story about his mistress and baby.

"That was so astonishing to me," Toben said. "The clear message I got was if he was offered a slot he would take it."

Toben arranged a meeting with an Obama campaign official and told an Obama operative that the campaign should take seriously the stories reported in National Enquirer about Edwards' then unconfirmed mistress and baby if considering the senator for the posts of vice president or attorney general.

"Usually, they get it wrong. In this case I don't think they did," Toben said of the tabloid's reporting.

Tobens said he was let down by Edwards' behavior.

"I thought he betrayed the trust of the people he spoke for," Tobens said.

Edwards is accused of illegal using nearly $1 million in campaign donations to hide his mistress. If convicted, Edwards could be sentenced to 30 years in prison.

Edwards' defense is that the money was never intended for political purposes, but only to keep his mistress a secret from his wife. He claims he did not know about much of the money Young had sought from wealthy donors and that Young was out to keep much of it for himself.

Edwards' lawyers sought to depict Toben and Young as embittered men, angry at Edwards and out to make money off their knowledge of his affair.

In a series of emails between Young and Toben, the men routinely disparage Edwards and his wife Elizabeth, who was dying of cancer.

In his emails to Young who was writing a tell-all memoir at the time, Toben calls Edwards a "pathetic little man" and "a sick evil bastard."

"I can't wait for you to OUT him," Toben wrote to Young. "He's an ass and always will be."

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Al Jazeera shuts English bureau after China visa denial

Al Jazeera shuts English bureau after China visa denial


BEIJING (Reuters) - Al Jazeera has closed the China bureau for its English channel after Chinese authorities refused to renew its correspondent's visa, marking the first time an accredited foreign correspondent has been forced to leave the country in over a decade.
Melissa Chan had reported from Beijing for Al Jazeera's English language channel since 2007, as well as maintaining a Twitter feed with more than 15,000 followers.
"China addressed this problem in accordance with laws and regulations. The media concerned know in their heart what they did wrong," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei told reporters at a regular briefing on Tuesday. He did not provide further details about the case.
"Our laws and policies are extremely clear. When you came to China, our relevant laws and regulations were explained to you."
Chan declined to comment.
The Foreign Correspondents' Club of China (FCCC), which Beijing does not recognize, said the decision to allow Chan's accreditation to lapse came after they expressed dissatisfaction about some of Al Jazeera's content, including a documentary produced overseas.
Al Jazeera has produced a number of critical programs about China in recent years, including one examining the alleged use of prison labor to make products sold in Western markets.
The FCCC quoted Chinese authorities as saying that Chan, a U.S. citizen, had violated unspecified rules and regulations.
"This is the most extreme example of a recent pattern of using journalist visas in an attempt to censor and intimidate foreign correspondents in China," FCCC said. Chan was a member of the FCCC board.
The Qatar-based news broadcaster said it would continue to cover China and hoped to work with Beijing to reopen its bureau.
"We are committed to our coverage of China. Just as China news services cover the world freely, we would expect that same freedom in China for any Al Jazeera journalist," the channel said in an emailed statement.
Al Jazeera's Arabic language channel will continue to have a correspondent in Beijing.
In Washington, the U.S. State Department voiced dismay at China's handling of the case.
"We are disappointed ... in how the Chinese government decided not to renew her accreditation. To our knowledge, she operated and reported in accordance with Chinese law, including regulations that permit foreign journalists to operate freely in China," State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters.
He later said that the United States had raised the matter with Chinese officials.
In 1998, China expelled a Japanese and a German journalist, both accredited, in unrelated cases, accusing them of possessing state secrets. In 1995, authorities did not renew a German reporter's accreditation, citing "aggressive, biased" reporting.
Unaccredited foreign reporters have been expelled more recently.
China requires all foreign journalists to renew their accreditation annually, while other business visas are typically multiple-year visas.
There are about 700 overseas or Hong Kong journalists working in Beijing.
(Reporting By Lucy Hornby and Michael Martina; Additional reporting by Arshad Mohammed in Washington; Editing by Don Durfee, Brian Rhoads and Vicki Allen)

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Putin and Medvedev complete job swap in Russia

Putin and Medvedev complete job swap in Russia


MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's lower house of parliament confirmed former president Dmitry
Russia's former President and prime …Medvedev as prime minister on Tuesday, completing a job swap with Vladimir Putin that has sparked protests against the two leaders' grip on power.
The approval vote, comfortably won by Medvedev as Putin looked on, ignored growing concern in the country that keeping power in the hands of the same men who have led Russia for the past four years will bring political and economic stagnation.
Police led away more than 20 people, including two opposition leaders, when they broke up a peaceful protest near the Kremlin hours before the vote, after detaining more than 700 on the previous two days to keep a lid on dissent.
"They just started to grab people and put them in police buses," said Alexander Delfinov, 40, who was held for hours and ordered to appear in court on Friday, facing a fine or up to 15 days in jail.
Activists regrouped later and were chased around central Moscow by police who hemmed them in and detained dozens more.
In Twitter posts from police vans, prominent opposition activist Alexei Navalny and Ksenia Sobchak, a television host who has fallen out with Putin, said they were among those detained - Navalny for the second time in a day.
The United States said it was concerned by arrests and by clashes that erupted at a rally on Sunday, a day before Putin's inauguration as president, when police beat demonstrators with batons and some protesters wielded pieces of metal fencing and flagpoles.
"We are disturbed by images of police mistreatment of peaceful protesters both during the protests and after detentions," State Department spokesman Mark Toner told a daily briefing in Washington.
Medvedev's confirmation vote in the State Duma, the lower house, was held under tight security, with camouflage-clad riot police guarding the building near Red Square and police trucks and buses parked nearby.
Medvedev stood and nodded to Duma deputies to show his gratitude and then shook hands with Putin. The president smiled and applauded the outcome of the vote, one day after he was sworn in as president for a six-year term.
"I thank you for showing your trust in me," Medvedev told the assembly. "I am absolutely sure that if we work together we can achieve results."
Medvedev, 46, had told the chamber before the vote that Russia must reduce red tape, crack down on corruption and protect property rights to improve the business environment and become more competitive.
"The attitude to business in this country must change drastically," he said before the 299-144 approval vote.
Medvedev pledged wholesale changes in the line-up of the government, without naming any of his cabinet, but said the new team would be one of continuity, pursuing a similar direction to its predecessor under Putin.
He also promised to be open to dialogue with his political opponents, though it was not clear whether he had in mind the non-parliamentary opposition, which has organized the biggest protests since Putin first rose to power in 2000.
Putin's opponents question the legitimacy of his victory in the March presidential election and say his choice of Medvedev as premier is a slap in the face for democracy.
"Everything as always has been decided without consulting the people ... People don't like this," said Ilya Ponomaryov, one of the organizers of protests that were triggered by allegations of electoral fraud last December.
Nikolai Levichev, a senior member of the Just Russia party, criticized the lack of political reform during Medvedev's presidency and said many of the promises he had made - such as on battling corruption and strengthening the independence of the judiciary - had not been fulfilled.
WEAKER PREMIER THAN PUTIN
Putin, 59, gave a brief speech to the Duma presenting Medvedev as an experienced politician who had served Russia well as president and would not let the country down now.
They have been friends since working together in the St Petersburg city administration in the 1990s, and Putin steered the younger man into the Kremlin in 2008 because he was barred from a third successive presidential term himself.
But Medvedev will be a less influential prime minister than Putin, who has remained Russia's dominant leader for the last four years even though the presidency has much more power, including command of the armed forces.
Putin displayed his dominance of the political system by taking the floor after the proceedings to give his own answers to questions deputies had put to Medvedev.
None of the deputies asked about the protests in their questions to Medvedev, focusing instead on issues such as the pension age and state support for science.
Putin and Medvedev face a huge challenge in modernizing the country and reforming the $1.9 trillion economy to reduce its heavy dependence on energy exports, which makes it vulnerable to any reduction in the global price of oil.
Putin set out their intentions on Monday by ordering the government to boost investment and shake up state-run industries to usher in a "new economy".
He also set long-term goals that included raising capital investment to no less than 25 percent of GDP in 2015, from the current level of 20 percent, and creating 25 million high-productivity jobs by 2020.
An flurry of decrees also set goals meant to make life easier for ordinary Russians, including raising wages for state workers, making mortgages cheaper, expanding kindergartens and improving health care.
Putin and Medvedev face a battle to quell rivalries between liberals and conservatives, and Putin's picks for the cabinet will go some way to showing how determined and able he is to push through reforms and privatization.
The U.S. State Department's expression of concern on Tuesday came before Putin, who in December accused Washington of stirring up protest against his rule, meets President Barack Obama at a Group of Eight summit in the United States later this month.
State Department spokesman Toner called for calm on both sides.
"We are also concerned by reports of violence perpetrated against law enforcement by a small group of protesters and we call on all parties to refrain from violence and strongly urge the authorities to respect the rights of freedom of assembly and of speech," he said.
(Additional reporting by Maria Tsvetkova, Alissa de Carbonnel and Gleb Bryanski in Moscow and Arshad Mohammed in Washington; Editing by Andrew Osborn)


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Romney taking credit for auto industry success

Romney taking credit for auto industry success

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EUCLID, Ohio (AP) — Campaigning in the backyard of America'sauto industry, Mitt Romney re-ignited the bailout debate by suggesting he deserves "a lot of credit" for the recent successes of the nation's largest car companies.

That claims comes in spite of his stance that Detroit should have been allowed to go bankrupt.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee told a Cleveland television station on Monday that President Barack Obamafollowed his lead when he ushered auto companies through a managed bankruptcy soon after taking office.

"I pushed the idea of a managed bankruptcy, and finally when that was done, and help was given, the companies got back on their feet," Romney said in an interview inside a Cleveland-area auto parts maker. "So, I'll take a lot of credit for the fact that this industry has come back."

Romney has repeatedly argued that Obama ultimately took his advice on the auto industry's woes of 2008 and 2009. But he went further on Monday by saying he deserves credit for its ultimate turnaround.

The course Romney advocated differed greatly from the one that was ultimately taken. GM and Chrysler went into bankruptcy on the strength of a massive bailout that Romney opposed. NeitherRepublican President George W. Bush nor Democratic President Barack Obama believed the automakers would have survived without that backup from taxpayers.

Romney opposed taxpayer help.

"If General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the American automotive industry goodbye," Romney wrote in a November 2008 opinion article in the New York Times. "It won't go overnight, but its demise will be virtually guaranteed."

General Motors posted a record profit last year.

The issue is critical in at least two general election swing states: Ohio and Michigan, where the auto bailouts are popular among some Republicans and Democrats.

The Obama campaign pounced on Romney's statement Monday night, calling it "a new low in dishonesty" and calling on him to have "the courage and integrity" to admit he was wrong.

Romney is scheduled to campaign in Michigan on Tuesday.