By Kurt Schlichter
For over a decade, former AIG head Maurice Hank Greenberg has been pursued on bogus civil charges by the New York Attorney General’s office, first by liberal New York Attorney General and noted hooker aficionado Eliot Spitzer, and now by one of the progressive hacks that succeeded Client 9, Eric Schneiderman.
Greenberg’s real “crime” has nothing to do with the arcane, eye-glazing regulations related to reinsurance accounting procedures that he is accused of breaching. It’s that he’s the rare New Yorker who dares to spend millions of his dollars supporting conservative candidates.
Why does it matter that leftist officials are persecuting some billionaire? Because the United States is supposed to be a nation of laws where dime store Javerts are not allowed to use their offices to pursue their personal political agendas. If they are brazen enough to abuse their power to harass a man with the resources and the will to fight back against the limitless power of the government then they will persecute anyone.
But Greenberg is no stranger to fighting. He lied about his age to enlist as a soldier in World War II and marched through Europe with Patton’s Third Army, where he saw firsthand the bloody carnage of National Socialism (Watch from the 35 minute mark). Later, he returned to active duty to fight in Korea. He earned the Bronze Star and was recently awarded the French Legion of Honor for his service on D-Day. Back home, Greenberg turned AIG into a global giant but, mindful of the chaos he witnessed firsthand as a young man, he devoted significant time and effort to philanthropy and to promoting peaceful trade and international relationsto help avoid repeating the mistakes of the past.
It was in that context that he was part of a small group that met in 2006 with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. When the malignant little dwarf started up on his Holocaust denial spiel, Greenberg would have none of it, telling the little creep, “I went through Dachau in the war and saw with my own eyes.”
So it was no surprise that Greenberg didn’t back down when Spitzer launched the crusade against him in 2005 over the accounting for an immaterial reinsurance deal that took place in 2000, half a decade earlier. After seven of nine civil charges were laughed out of court, it was revealed that the NYAG’s office was playing fast and loose with the testimony of their only witness. The witness’s actual statements debunk the remaining two civil charges. Spitzer’s Mini Me, Schneiderman, has already conceded that money damages are off the table even if he manages to prevail on the remaining two claims – which he can’t.
To read the rest of this story of prosecutorial abuse/bullying of a military hero, please click here and read it an Independent Journal
