Saudis spent $1.35 million on Obama gifts in 2014

http://www.wnd.com/2015/11/saudis-spent-1-35-million-on-obama-gifts-in-2014/

Saudi Arabia spent a king’s fortune on gifts for President Obama and his family in 2014.

The State Department said Saudi King Abdullah and top kingdom officials spent $1.35 million on Obama in 2014. The figure was released with its annual list of gifts from foreign governments on Wednesday.

Some of the luxury items sent to Obama include a gold and silver wristwatch valued at $18,400, and a “48-inch gold-plated brass replica of the Makkah Clock Tower” valued at $57,000, Yahoo News reported Friday.

Malia and Sasha Obama also received jewelry, earrings and a watch from the Saudi government valued at $80,000.

It's good to be the sultan. Er... I meant king.

Unless they pay for the items, they are turned over to the National Archives.

Records indicate the Obamas kept none of it.

Now why did you go and ruin my fun. I was enjoying the ignorant comments.

Even though heads of state have traditionally exchanged gifts as expressions of goodwill, the Constitution (Article I, Section 9) prohibits anyone in the US Government from receiving a personal gift from a foreign head of state without the consent of Congress. Today, the handling of gifts from a foreign official to any Federal Government employee, including the President, is largely governed by the Foreign Gifts and Decorations Act of 1966 and further legislation passed in 1977. Congress has allowed Federal employees to retain any gift from a foreign government, as long as the total US retail value of the gifts presented at one occasion does not exceed an amount established by the General Services Administration (GSA).[1] Foreign official gifts over this “minimal value” are considered gifts to the people of the United States, which the recipient must purchase from GSA, at fair market value, in order to retain. The White House Gift Unit sees to the disposition of foreign official gifts that the President and First Lady do not retain.

How much have they contributed to the Clinton Foundation?

For that matter, how much have foreign governments contributed to the Clinton Foundation?

Markle wrote:How much have they contributed to the Clinton Foundation?

For that matter, how much have foreign governments contributed to the Clinton Foundation?

Can't answer that.  But I can point out that the Saudis have done nothing in regard to this...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/09/04/the-arab-worlds-wealthiest-nations-are-doing-next-to-nothing-for-syrias-refugees/

And that's even though the United States is seven thousand miles away from 
Syria,  while Saudi Arabia is about 60 miles from the Syrian border.

House of Bush, House of Saud: The Secret Relationship Between the World's Two Most Powerful Dynasties is a 2004 book by Craig Unger that explores the relationship between the Saudi Royal Family and the Bush extended political family. Unger asserts that the groundwork for today's terrorist movements and the modern wars that have sprung up about them was unintentionally laid more than 30 years ago with a series of business deals between the ruling Saudis and the powerful Bush family. The Saudis received investments and military protection in exchange for cooperation on lucrative oil deals. The author claims that the result has been a shady alliance between "the world's two most powerful dynasties." Unger writes, "Never before has an American president been so closely tied to a foreign power that harbors and supports our country's mortal enemies."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Bush,_House_of_Saud

For Markle.  What Bill O'Reilly has never talked about...

https://www.google.com/search?q=bush+ties+to+saudi&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

The Saudis are not our friend.

ZVUGKTUBM wrote:

Bob wrote:

I wonder if the King tried to summon Dumbya to his chambers that evening?

I think I would have bowed and taken whatever flak the media offered....

You're talking about our rapist President Bill Clinton.

Wordslinger wrote:We should send gifts back to the Saudis ... via B-1 and B-52 bombers.

"The donations weren’t announced by the foundation and were discovered by The Wall Street Journal during a search of donations of more than $50,000 posted on the foundation’s online database. Exactly when the website was updated isn’t clear. The foundation typically updates its website with the previous year’s donations near the beginning of the year. All 2014 donations were noted with asterisks.

At least four foreign countries gave to the foundation in 2013—Norway, Italy, Australia and the Netherlands—a fact that has garnered little attention. The number of governments contributing in 2014 appears to have doubled from the previous year. Since its founding, the foundation has raised at least $48 million from overseas governments, according to a Journal tally.

United Arab Emirates, a first-time donor, gave between $1 million and $5 million in 2014, and the German government—which also hadn’t previously given—contributed between $100,000 and $250,000.

A previous donor, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, has given between $10 million and $25 million since the foundation was created in 1999. Part of that came in 2014, although the database doesn’t specify how much."

http://www.wsj.com/articles/foreign-government-gifts-to-clinton-foundation-on-the-rise-1424223031