The Company He Keeps

by Steve Soto

While the Stepford Cultists on the right blather on about Obama's wife and pastor, perhaps the rest of us should worry more about why the Doddering Imbecile feels comfortable with a key economic advisor who helped bring about the mortgage and credit meltdown, and whose employer is facing a federal criminal probe.

For weeks now, John McCain's presidential campaign has faced awkward questions about the outside activities of several top advisers. Add one more name to the list: former Texas senator Phil Gramm, McCain's longtime friend and one of his five campaign co-chairs. .... According to McCain spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker, the co-chair position affords Gramm "broad input into the structure, financing and conduct of the campaign." She added that Gramm, who has a doctorate in economics, is also "a valued voice on economic policy." Gramm is not a paid McCain adviser, but his day job—vice chairman of a U.S. division of Zurich-based financial giant UBS—could pose new tests for a candidate who has promised high ethics standards and ditched advisers who failed to meet them.

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NEWSWEEK has learned that UBS is also currently the focus of congressional and Justice Department investigations into schemes that allegedly enabled wealthy Americans to evade income taxes by stashing their money in overseas havens, according to several law-enforcement and banking officials in both the United States and Europe, who all asked for anonymity when discussing ongoing investigations. In April, UBS withdrew Gramm's lobbying registration, but one of his former congressional aides, John Savercool, is still registered to lobby legislators for UBS on numerous issues, including a bill cosponsored by Sen. Barack Obama that would crack down on foreign tax havens.

"Forclosure Phil" also has his fingerprints on the Enron scandal, and is also credited with making it harder for federal law enforcement agencies to obtain banking records for terror investigations.

Any candidate who listens to the likes of Phil Gramm and Carly Fiorina for economic advice has serious judgment issues.