There once was a time that, in space, no one could hear Bono scream, but in 2009, a former Bill Clinton aide reportedly turned to the State Department and Huma Abedin for her help in breaking down that sound barrier.
New Clinton email dump shows Bono requested an outer-space connection for his concerts https://t.co/Yl5IResiYs pic.twitter.com/1ege7Z8wjz
— People (@people) August 23, 2016
The latest batch of State Department emails released by Judicial Watch included several requests by donors to the Clinton Foundation and Clinton Global Initiative, but one particularly amusing email gave Huma Adebin the task of hooking up Bono with NASA so U2 could use a feed from the International Space Station as a stage prop.
https://twitter.com/aseitzwald/status/767793341736116224
Judicial Watch reports that Abedin one day opened her email and found a request with the subject line “Bono/NASA.” That’s a sure sign that a bad day at work lies ahead, and sure enough, former Bill Clinton aide Ben Schwerin, who helped set up the Clinton Foundation, needed assistance in helping Bono “do a linkup with the international space station on every show during the [U2] tour this year.”
The hookup was presumably to be a fixture during tour stops. During U2’s “ZooTV” tour in the early ’90s, Bono would call the White House from the stage every night as part of the show. (Bono and President George W. Bush would go on to become good chums.)
State Department Fielded Request From Bono At Bill Clinton’s Aide’s Request https://t.co/fu9dBgWrMg pic.twitter.com/ccQeB8EcXd
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) August 23, 2016
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But the request for how to get help from a contact at NASA or a member of the congressional committee on science and technology apparently was beyond the reach of former Bill Clinton aide Doug Band, whose response was simply, “no clue.”
CNBC makes it clear, though, that the bizarre request was just one of many, and not all were quite so abstract.
The ask from Bono is fun, but why emails for Hillary Clinton are still serious https://t.co/EM6pHXGweF
— CNBC (@CNBC) August 23, 2016
“Taken together, the emails … create the impression of a swirl of wealthy donors to the various Clinton charity initiatives who seemed to expect various favors from Hillary Clinton — requests that were often passed on to her team at the State Department,” writes Eamon Javers.
Good point: and the reason the emails give the impression of donors expecting favors is because that’s exactly what they show.
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