Repost from April 6: "James Kelly is Bush's Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and the Pacific Affairs - which makes him America's chief diplomat for East Asia. Before his appointment, Kelly laundered $100,000 of Taiwan's slush fund. According to Joshua Micah Marshall, Kelly also served as a Director of a mysterious Chinese company named Dan Form Holdings, which is run by Dai Xiamoning, an associate of Chinagate figure John Huang. But Dai Xiamoning is really an agent for Chen Yuan, the son of Chinese revolutionary hero Chen Yun. According to The Economist, Chen Yuan is 'the most powerful of the princelings' - the sons of Mao's revolutionary elite. These activities makes Kelly an agent of China (through Chen Yuan) AND their enemy Taiwan (through the Taiwangate slush fund). How many other countries does Kelly work for? And which country is he LOYAL to? We demand an investigation of this TRIPLE AGENT!" Enter 'taiwan' in our search engine for much more!

Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly's extensive role in Taiwangate is slowly emerging, and it's an ugly picture. Kelly helped Taiwan bribe a former top Japanese defense official, so Japan would push the US to include Taiwan in our proposed Asian missile defense "shield" ("sieve" is more like it). While laundering Taiwan's $100,000 bribe (in the form of a Harvard fellowship), Kelly may have kept $60,400 of it for his Pacific Forum, part of the Scaife-funded CSIS. (CSIS initially lied about the money, but now admits its money-laundering role.) Kelly's financial actions made him a foreign agent, but he failed to register with the Justice Department - which makes him a criminal. Kelly's role is described in great detail in Joshua Micah Marshall's article in Salon.

James Kelly is Bu$h's Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and the Pacific Affairs - which makes him America's chief diplomat for East Asia. Before his appointment, Kelly laundered $100,000 of Taiwan's slush fund. According to Joshua Micah Marshall, Kelly also served as a Director of a mysterious Chinese company named Dan Form Holdings, which is run by Dai Xiamoning, an associate of Chinagate figure John Huang. But Dai Xiamoning is really an agent for Chen Yuan, the son of Chinese revolutionary hero Chen Yun. According to The Economist, Chen Yuan is "the most powerful of the princelings" - the sons of Mao's revolutionary elite. These activities makes Kelly an agent of China (through Chen Yuan) AND their enemy Taiwan (through the Taiwangate slush fund). How many other countries does Kelly work for? And which country is he LOYAL to? We demand an investigation of this TRIPLE AGENT!

The facts reported in Friday's Washington Post lead us to conclude that Republicans on Taiwan's payroll nearly started World War III between China and the US. Does that constitute the most serious crime against the United States - treason? Caspar Weinberger accused Jonathan Pollard of committing treason for selling US secrets to our ally, Israel. Compared to that, nearly starting World War III with China seems significantly more threatening to the security of the US. Join the discussion here (registration required).

The Washington Post's investigation of Taiwangate has discovered possible TREASON. "One of the big successes claimed by the secret fund's administrators was then-President Lee's trip to the US in 1995, which touched off a rapid deterioration of U.S. ties with China and brought Taiwan, China and the US to the brink of [war].... Cassidy and the other firms [lobbied the GINGRICH/LOTT REPUBLICAN] Congress to pressure the Clinton administration to grant Lee a visa to attend a reunion at Cornell U. The trip enraged China, which fired missiles miles into the sea off Taiwan's two main ports. The US dispatched two aircraft carrier battle groups to the region to signal support for Taiwan." Thus, Taiwan's bribes caused Newt Gingrich and Trent Lott to bring the US to the BRINK OF WORLD WAR III WITH CHINA. Was this the GOP goal? If so, it was TREASONOUS! We demand an investigation by the Senate Foreign Relations Committees, chaired by Joe Biden!

The Nation's David Corn has once again ventured where no other US reporter dares to go - asking serious questions about Taiwangate. With reports swirling about Asia, Corn called Carl Ford and James Kelly, who refused to comment. Corn also called their previous employers, which allegedly received Taiwanese slush funds. ". Does it make any difference to Cassidy and Associates that the payments may have come from a slush fund, funneled through a research institute? 'That's a metaphysical question,' the spokesman replies." Meanwhile, the [Richard Mellon Scaife financed] Center for Strategic and International Studies isn't much interested in whether it received slush funds. "It's an interesting prospect to go back and ask people who gave you money, is this legal or not?" Corn is asking the right questions - it's time for the rest of the Washington press corps to start asking them also.

In the past week, Taiwan has been rocked by the revelation that ex-president Lee Teng-hui operated a $100 million slush fund to buy influence overseas. Part of this money was used to buy influence in the US through two people NOW IN TOP POSITIONS IN THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION. Carl Ford was a lobbyist for Taiwan at Cassidy and Associates, which was reportedly paid $1.5 million from the slush fund to gain influence with Bush, and reportedly gave $1-$1.75 million to Bush and the Republicans in 1999 and 2000. Ford's reward was being appointed Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Research, where he engineered Bush's sale of $4 billion in high-tech weapons to Taiwan last year. The sale included submarines built by General Dynamics - ANOTHER client of Ford's. James Kelly ran the Scaife-funded Pacific Forum (connected to CSIS), which received $100,000 from the slush fund. Kelly is now Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia. This scandal has received NO coverage in the US!