The announcement March 7 of avowed McCain Democrat Donna Brazile's new post as enforcer for the Democratic Party, has put the spotlight on the question: "What really happened at the mid-2001 Arizona meetings among Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Democratic Senators Daschle and Leiberman?" What effect will the political alliance of Eleanor Holmes Norton's Donna with McCain, have to do with Daschle's abrupt withdrawal of his previous written pledge to defend D.C. General Hospital?

The present escalation of that scandal-ridden case has centered on the curious alliance of Donna with John, and has erupted in the same time-frame as the February 28 announcement of the resignation of Washington, D.C. Health Department Director Dr. Ivan Walks, a key flunky of the financial oligarchy's corrupt operation to shut down the only full-service public hospital in the nation's capital.

Donna, the former chief of staff for Washington's Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, is also former chief of staff of the 2000 Al Gore Election Committee; a sometime Gore-McCain go-between; and, is currently campaign finance reform lobbyist for Senator McCain. Donna, with her connections to McCain, had been a key part of the operation of her crony, Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, in the scheme to shut down the hospital.

Lyndon LaRouche, whose forces led the fight to save D.C. General Hospital last year, as part of a broader international effort to defend health care and the principle of the General Welfare, issued a statement on Feb. 25, 2002, three days before Walks walked: "Donna Brazile's relationship to Senator John McCain," said LaRouche, "is the keystone of an arch of corruption embracing all of the interests, including [D.C.] Mayor Tony Williams and Eleanor Holmes Norton, who colluded in a patently corrupt operation to shut down and loot the remains of the only public general hospital of the nation's capital. Whether the Arizona money involved in that swindle was directly associated with McCain, or not, McCain's association with Brazile, Norton, and Williams is a feature of the scandal which could potentially, bring down not only McCain, but McCain's crony Lieberman."—Sen. Joe Lieberman, is the Democrat from Connecticut and Al Gore's 2000 running-mate.

That scandal continues to mount, as an international fight has erupted around the stated agreement among Senators Daschle, Lott, and President Bush, to introduce "fair trade" policies into the marketing of steel, and possibly other categories of endangered vital industries of the U.S.A. The question is: Is health care for the people, also an essential industry of our nation?

In the meantime, the connections between the D.C. General scandal and the Enron scandal are becoming more and more difficult to overlook. This connection is not new.

Last year's Schiller Institute and LaRouche-led mobilizations in defense of the General Welfare, also focussed, then, on stopping the energy deregulation and energy piracy associated with Enron and other privateers. LaRouche focussed on the case of D.C. General, in battling the HMOs' "shareholder values" drive to dismantle national health care and offer it up for looting in the same general manner as Enron had been looting the nation's energy supplies; and that the steel industry, among others, were being similarly looted.

At that time, this mobilization catalyzed hundreds of citizens to lobby their Congressmen and state officials in Washington and locally, and it threatened to create in Congress and among state officials (e.g., California), a reverse paradigm shift, reviving the FDR tradition. Suddenly, at the beginning of June that year, forces in the U.S. Congress were pressured into sinking the hopes of keeping a public, full-service general hospital alive in the capital of the most powerful nation on this planet.

On May 30, 2001, South Dakota Democrat Tom Daschle, who had just become the Senate Majority leader, signed a petition supporting LaRouche's drive to save D.C. General Hopital, entitled, "It's Time To Draw the Line: Saving D.C. General Is a Matter of International Importance." This signing occurred during a large public gathering. Five other Congressmen had previously signed the petition, and Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) had held a Congressional briefing on the "National Public Hospital Safety-Net Crisis," which featured LaRouche national spokeswoman Debra Freeman and other speakers from the Coalition to Save DC General.

Suddenly, on June 1, 2001, Senators Daschle and McCain met in Arizona. That same day, Daschle sent a fax to the Schiller Institute, asking that his name be removed from the LaRouche statement supporting D.C. General Hospital. On or about this date, the pattern of evidence indicates, a dirty deal was struck in the establishment to "stay away from LaRouche," and to betray any commitments to the General Welfare—resulting, among other things, in the closing of the hospital one month later.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) tacitly acknowledged this at a Nov. 14, 2001 Congressional briefing on public health care when she stated: "And a lot of people shied away from that [the D.C. General issue] because the LaRouche organization was at the forefront of trying to help us understand what was going on. We should all apologize. And I do now. I apologize because, you're right."

It has recently come to light that D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams' campaign has received $480,000, since last July, of which more than 20%, or $98,000, has come from Doctors Community Healthcare Corporation (DCHC), its hospitals, its employees, and its affiliated businesses. Paul Tufts, CEO of DCHC, also recently made a $500,000 donation, the largest in its history, to the University of the District of Columbia. Tufts was also the sole out-of-area contributor to Eleanor Holmes Norton's 2000 election campaign, donating the maximum contribution of $1,000.

And, all of this matters, because DCHC is the outfit which took over, privatized, and dismantled D.C. General Hospital, as a result of the illegal shenanigans and manipulations involving second- and third-tier flunkies of Eleanor Holmes Norton, Tony Williams, and the Congressionally mandated Financial Control Board. All of these forces were operating against the wishes of the medical community, the citizens, and the D.C. City Council. DCHC and its partner company, National Century Financial Enterprises (NCFE), are headquartered in John McCain's Arizona. And they're currently facing lawsuits for racketeering, embezzlement, and fraud in four separate jurisdictions. McCain's possible connections to DCHC and NCFE are now, naturally, under investigation.

What about fourth-tier flunky Ivan Walks, whose flagrant disregard for the truth and the well-being of Washington's citizens, whose health he was charged with protecting, played an important role in this operation? On Dr. Walks' watch, two postal workers died during the anthrax incidents last Fall; on his watch, there are at least 75 other individuals, to date, whose deaths may have been caused by their inability to obtain timely and adequate medical care, as a result of the closing of D.C. General Hospital.

Walks will perhaps be remembered best for his comment at a Public Benefit Corporation (D.C. General) Board meeting in July 2000, where he callously remarked: "A couple of folks may exsanguinate [bleed to death] on their way to the Washington Hospital Center," if D.C. General is closed.

Walks has walked, but the scandalous image of the "Boys from Brazile"—Norton, McCain, and Lieberman—is an odor which will not quickly go away.

LaRouche commented: "It is never over until it's over. The crass, corrupt, and fully intentional commitment to increase the death-rate among citizens and other residents of the nation's capital, is a stink hovering around Capitol Hill, that will simply not go away, until a restoration of the citizens' rights to the Constitutional protection of the General-Welfare principle is served, once again, as it was under the former Hill-Burton law."

Related Pages: DC General Hospital Page (links to other articles, statements, and DC General petition) Join the Schiller Institute! Meet Lyndon LaRouche The Inalienable Rights Of Man Physical Economy Page Concert in Honor Of DC General Staff
		June 2001 March and Mass Rally