Kaine has a Corzine problem

By Norman Leahy | Friday, November 4th, 2011 | Catch-All

Former Gov. Tim Kaine, who hopes to one day make his bones as Virginia’s junior U.S. Senator, has a bit of a problem. It appears as though Mr. Kaine, both as a candidate for governor in 2005 and as chairman of the Democratic National Committee in 2010, accepted contributions from former Democratic pol and one-time Master of the Universe, Jon Corzine.

If you’ve been living under a rock for the past few days, Corzine was, until today, the head of MF Global, the commodities firm that is currently in bankruptcy after Big Jon decided the sleepy little firm needed to become the next Goldman Sachs.

Plenty of nasties are coming out in the wake of that filing…how hundreds of millions of dollars of client money is still missing…regulators are asking questions (after the fact), as is the FBI.

Corzine is “technically eligible to get a $12 million compensation package, though the company says he won’t take it.” Which is sweet of him, though he may rethink that decision once the legal bills start rolling in.

The question for Mr. Kaine, though, is whether he will say anything about cashing Corzine’s checks. To be fair, they were cut and accepted before Mr. Corzine’s current troubles, and the money has long-since been spent.

But recall that back in 2010, after the House approved sweeping financial regulatory reforms, then-DNC chairman Kaine lauded the move as a victory against Wall Street excesses:

“President Obama, Congressional Democrats and the American people achieved a victory with the passage in the Senate of strong Wall Street reforms that will rein in big banks’ riskiest financial practices and extend new financial protections to American families and taxpayers.

Right.

Oh, and the President has said he will return the contributions Corzine personally made to him…but only if Corzine is indicted. Even then, the President won’t necessarily return the $500,000 Corzine raised for him as a bundler.

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