This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Author: muckety
-
Muck tracker – Burris admits fund-raising for Blagojevich
Sen. Roland Burris acknowledged Monday that he did, in fact, try to raise money for then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich at the request of the governor’s brother – and that he did so while trying to get appointed to Barack Obama’s Senate seat, reports Politico. But Burris said he was unsuccessful.
Click here to sign up for the Muckety Newsletter
Read related stories: Muck trackerThe relationship map to the left is interactive.• Solid lines are current relations. Dotted lines are former relations.• Expand items with + signs by double-clicking or by selecting multiple items in the map and pressing the “e” key.• Move an item in the map by clicking and dragging.• You can also delete items, separate boxes and save maps. Right-click on the map or select Map Tools for these options.• Find out more about an item in the map by right-clicking on the item and choosing Information about…• View map color key.• This interactive map requires Flash player.
-
VW ‘an accident waiting to happen’September 26, 2015 at 7:53am
Experts on corporate governance tell the New York Times they’re not surprised by the troubles at Volkswagen.
Martha Stewart’s pay package – plenty of ‘good things’
Not everyone is feeling squeezed by the economic downturn.
Television host, publisher and corporate mogul Martha Stewart is still the epitome of the elegant lifestyle her diversified media and merchandising company promotes.
Hint: Click in map to explore connectionsStory continues below interactive map
Click to activate interactive map
(requires Java)MAP HINTS: Click expands a name. Control+Click centers map on a name. Solid lines are current relations. Dotted lines are former relations. For advanced tools choose Tools > Options from the menu at top. More help. Not seeing the maps? Please go here to check for the latest version of Java.In 2009, Stewart is slated to receive a guaranteed bonus of $495,000 from Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia (MSLO), the company she founded in 1997. That’s on top of her $2-million-plus in compensation and another $2 million she gets for allowing the company to film shows at her residences, which include homes in Bedford, NY, Mt. Desert Island, ME, and East Hampton, NY, according to footnoted.org.
The details of her compensation package may upset some MSLO investors, however, who are not faring quite as well as the majority shareholder.
Company spokesperson Elizabeth Estroff told FishbowlNY in December that the company had eliminated about 100 jobs over the course of the year, as MSLO was “streamlining costs at the corporate and business unit levels.”
Moreover, while MSLO won’t announce fourth-quarter results for another week, its third-quarter results were disappointing. And the stock has been trading at under $5 a share since mid-November.
Perhaps because of her personal insulation, or perhaps because of her comeback since March 2005, when she completed a prison sentence for lying about a stock sale, Stewart has sounded relentlessly upbeat in interviews.
While on a tour promoting her latest book last October, she told CNBC: “The customer is there, and the customer wants good value. . . . They want products that fit their lifestyle at the present time when they are on, actually, some serious budgets.”
Perhaps. But after reading MSLO’s financial reports, one can’t help wondering what Stewart knows about “serious budgets.”
Click here to sign up for the Muckety Newsletter
Read related stories: Business · Recent Stories0 Comments
-
There are no comments yet, be the first by filling in the form below.
Leave a Comment
-
Antitrust nominee Christine Varney described Google as a monopolistFebruary 20, 2009 at 10:24am
New legal challenges for search giant Google Inc. may be looming – and from chief executive Eric Schmidt’s new BFF Barack Obama, of all people.
Christine A. Varney, nominated by Obama to be the U.S.’s next antitrust chief, has described Google Inc. as a monopolist that will dominate online computing services the way Microsoft Corp. ruled […]Burris Incurs Political Wrath After Adding Testimony on Blagojevich Contacts
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Michael Moore Plans Film About Biggest Swindle in American History
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Muckety Mover Blackwater by Any Other Name
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Yoo Takes Break From Berkeley to Teach at Orange County Law School
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Burris incurs political wrath after amending Blagojevich testimony
After managing to be seated as Illinois’ senator last month, Roland W. Burris may be self-destructing even before he stands for election.
Burris admitted in a newly submitted affadavit made public Saturday by the Chicago Sun-Times that he was, in fact, asked to contribute money to the ousted Illinois governor, who appointed him to fill Barack Obama’s seat.
Hint: Click in map to explore connectionsStory continues below interactive map
Click to activate interactive map
(requires Java)MAP HINTS: Click expands a name. Control+Click centers map on a name. Solid lines are current relations. Dotted lines are former relations. For advanced tools choose Tools > Options from the menu at top. More help. Not seeing the maps? Please go here to check for the latest version of Java.In the latest filing, Burris said he had not donated anything to then-Gov. Rod R. Blajojevich and “made it unequivocally clear . . . that it would be inappropriate and pose a major conflict because I was interested in the Senate vacancy.” But his failure to mention the importuning when quizzed about his contacts with the governor by an impeachment committee of Illinois lawmakers has stirred a political storm.
Illinois State Rep. Jim Durkin, the highest-ranking Republican on Blagojevich’s impeachment committee, called Sunday for Burris’ resignation.
“I think it would be in the best interest of the state if he resigned because I don’t think the state can stand this anymore… I can’t believe anything that comes out of Mr. Burris at this point.”
State lawmakers are now talking about a perjury investigation, while Senate Democrats are facing pressure to launch an ethics committee probe to determine whether he should be expelled.
In Burris’ new affidavit – dated Feb. 5, three weeks after he was sworn in to replace President Obama – he admits he spoke three times between October and November to Robert Blagojevich, the former governor’s brother, who solicited funds for the governor’s campaign coffers .
In a sworn statement filed with the House panel Jan. 5, before he testified, Burris said he had no contact with Blagojevich’s camp about the Senate seat aside from his appointment in late December.
Then, when testifying before the committee a few days later, he added that he had spoken with Lon Monk, Blagojevich’s former chief of staff.
The governor, who’d already been arrested on charges that included seeking to sell the Senate seat, was subsequently removed from office by the state Legislature.
Burris called a news conference Sunday to deny that the affadavit had changed his story in any substantive way. He said that the questioning by the committee had led him in other directions, and there was never an appropriate opportunity for him to fully disclose the contacts.
“We went in the direction of the other names,” Burris said.
Burris said Sunday he had decided to submit a new affidavit after reading the full transcript of the state proceedings and realizing it was incomplete.
Some, however, suggested that he offered the new disclosures because he realized he might be on tape in the ongoing FBI probe of the former governor, and wanted to put out information himself before it comes out from other sources. In another statement Monday morning, he denied that is the case.
The newest version of events puts Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) in a difficult spot. The two men had originally refused to seat Burris on the grounds he was appointed by a governor who’d already been arrested for allegedly trying to auction off the Senate seat.
But with African-American supporters charging that the refusal to seat Burris was racist, and concerns about the party losing the seat in a special election, the leaders relented.
As one condition for seating him, Democrats said Burris needed to testify under oath to a state committee investigating whether to impeach the governor.
Click here to sign up for the Muckety Newsletter
This post is tagged with: Barack Obama, Lon Monk, Politics, Recent Stories, Robert Blagojevich, Rod R. Blajojevich, Roland W. BurrisRead related stories: Politics · Recent Stories1 Comments
-
Obama’s stealing the census from Congress has suddenly awakened and enraged the Republicans. Maybe this will arouse them as well to challenge Obama for stealing the Presidency itself. They surely know he is not an Article 2 “natural born citizen” (which is more than merely being a 14th Amendment “citizen”) by virtue of either Obama’s birth to a dad of Kenyan/British citizenship or birth in Kenya itself — as manifested by his unwillingness to supply his long form birth certificate now under seal.
Leave a Comment
-
Master of the Upper East Side helps the homelessFebruary 19, 2009 at 10:13am
In a homecoming on behalf of the homeless, celebrated writer Gay Talese made a return this week to The New York Times.
Michael Moore plans film about ‘biggest swindle in American history’
Filmmaker Michael Moore is looking for “a few brave people who work on Wall Street.”
The muckraking director of films about the auto and health-care industries and America’s love of guns is now working on a movie about what he calls “the biggest swindle in American history.”
Hint: Click in map to explore connectionsStory continues below interactive map
Click to activate interactive map
(requires Java)MAP HINTS: Click expands a name. Control+Click centers map on a name. Solid lines are current relations. Dotted lines are former relations. For advanced tools choose Tools > Options from the menu at top. More help. Not seeing the maps? Please go here to check for the latest version of Java.But he says in his letter that he needs a couple of informants to help guide him.
“Your identity will be protected and you will decide to what extent you wish to participate in telling the greatest crime story ever told,” Moore says in an open letter posted last week on his website.
If the CEOs of Bank of America, Citigroup and Merrill Lynch think that members of Congress have been tough on them, they have no idea what awaits.
The 54-year-old filmmaker born in Flint, MI , the son of an auto assembly-line worker, made his reputation as a populist bomb thrower in Roger & Me, which documents his unsuccessful efforts to confront then-General Motors CEO Roger Smith about his management of what was then the world’s largest automaker.
He went on to demonize then-President George W. Bush in Fahrenheit 9/11 about what he described as the real reasons for the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and the greed of the American health-care industry in Sicko – films that became the highest-grossing documentaries of all time.
Moore claims to have heard from “a few brave people” for his new project already.
“Based on those who have contacted me, I believe there are a number of you who know ‘the real deal,’” he wrote. “You have information that the American people need to hear. I am humbly asking you for a moment of courage, to be a hero.”
Moore’s project was announced at the Cannes Film Festival last May. It’s being financed by Overture and Paramount Vantage, a unit of Viacom Inc.’s Paramount Pictures Corp. handling distribution outside North America, according to an Overture spokesman.
He has not divulged the title of the new film, but he asks people to email him at bailout@michaelmoore.com.
Click here to sign up for the Muckety Newsletter
This post is tagged with: , Entertainment, Fahrenheit 9/11, Michael Moore, Overture, Paramount Vantage, Roger & Me, SickoRead related stories: Entertainment · Recent Stories0 Comments
-
There are no comments yet, be the first by filling in the form below.
Leave a Comment
-
Top Google exec funds online news startupFebruary 18, 2009 at 12:45pm
Some are billing it as a back-door way for Google to enter the news business.
John Yoo takes leave from Berkeley law faculty
Former Bush Administration official John Yoo has temporarily traded his job on the law faculty at the University of California, Berkeley, for a teaching gig in more conservative Orange County, CA.
Yoo, one of the architects of the Bush policy on torture, is spending this semester as a visiting professor at the relatively new Chapman University School of Law, which opened in 1995, reports the Los Angeles Times.
Hint: Click in map to explore connectionsStory continues below interactive map
Click to activate interactive map
(requires Java)MAP HINTS: Click expands a name. Control+Click centers map on a name. Solid lines are current relations. Dotted lines are former relations. For advanced tools choose Tools > Options from the menu at top. More help. Not seeing the maps? Please go here to check for the latest version of Java.The Times suggests that one factor in his decision may have been the hostile reception he was getting in ultra-liberal Berkeley, where city leaders branded him a war criminal, and human rights activists erected a billboard to denounce him.
Yoo, a former deputy assistant attorney general in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, was a primary author of memos that argued that the president’s authorization of controversial interrogation tactics did not violate the Geneva Conventions.
The memos, which were later withdrawn by the Justice Department, justified harsh treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere, including the controversial waterboarding technique.
But in an interview in his Chapman office, Yoo denied that Berkeley’s liberal tilt had anything to do with his decision. A tenured faculty member at Berkeley, he said he took the visiting professorship because he wanted to spend on a smaller, newer campus and to experience living in Southern California.
“I certainly don’t get upset about being criticized,” he said. “I would feel I wasn’t doing my job as an academic if I wasn’t writing or saying things that other people disagreed with.”
For the most part, students at Chapman have taken Yoo’s presence in stride, according to the Times.
“I think it’s interesting to have him there,” said Billy Essayli, a second-year law student who heads the campus California Republican Lawyers Association. Still, Essayli conceded that he was surprised there wasn’t a greater public outcry at Yoo’s arrival in January.
A statement encouraging civil debate is posted on the website of Chapman by Dean John C. Eastman.
“It would be simple for academic institutions to ignore views from one end or the other of the political spectrum,” Eastman wrote. “Indeed, all too many law schools have faculties that are much too homogenous with respect to their views on contested matters. We, on the other hand, pride ourselves on having built a law school that is now one of the most ideologically diverse in the nation.”
But now, some members of the Berkeley community who organized against him there are mobilizing to come to Orange County.
The anti-war activist group, World Can’t Wait, maintains a website in protest, www.firejohnyoo.org, and said it hopes to stage panels and distribute petitions at Chapman.
Yoo, however, shows no sign of being intimidated.
Last month, he wrote an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal criticizing President Barack Obama, saying that his decisions to close Guantanamo and to terminate the CIA’s authority to interrogate terrorists had opened the door to future terrorist acts in the U.S.
Click here to sign up for the Muckety Newsletter
This post is tagged with: Berkeley, Chapman University School of Law, George W. Bush, John Yoo, Law, Recent Stories, U.S. Department of Justice, University of CaliforniaRead related stories: Law · Recent Stories0 Comments
-
There are no comments yet, be the first by filling in the form below.
Leave a Comment
-
Can Arthur G. Sulzberger III go from cub reporter to savior?February 19, 2009 at 5:28pm
Following in his father’s footsteps, Arthur G. Sulzberger III reports to work Monday as a Metro desk reporter at The New York Times.
Muck Tracker Burris Says He Was Asked for Help
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Thomas Montag Rakes it in Despite Economic Crisis
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Muck tracker – Burris says he was asked for help
U.S. Sen. Roland W. Burris of Illinois says that the brother of former Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich sought fundraising help before Blagojevich named him to the Senate, The New York Times reports.
Click here to sign up for the Muckety Newsletter
Read related stories: Muck tracker0 Comments
-
There are no comments yet, be the first by filling in the form below.
Leave a Comment
The relationship map to the left is interactive.• Solid lines are current relations. Dotted lines are former relations.• Expand items with + signs by double-clicking or by selecting multiple items in the map and pressing the “e” key.• Move an item in the map by clicking and dragging.• You can also delete items, separate boxes and save maps. Right-click on the map or select Map Tools for these options.• Find out more about an item in the map by right-clicking on the item and choosing Information about…• View map color key.• This interactive map requires Flash player.
-
Monsanto’s lobbying cloutJuly 25, 2015 at 8:16am
Central to the argument over labeling genetically modified food is the point raised by opponents, who say that government regulators have declared the practice safe.
Thomas Montag rakes it in, despite economic crisis
What bad economy?
Thomas K. Montag, the new head of global markets at Bank of America Corp., had a very good year in 2008 despite the worldwide downturn in the markets.
Hint: Click in map to explore connectionsStory continues below interactive map
Click to activate interactive map
(requires Java)MAP HINTS: Click expands a name. Control+Click centers map on a name. Solid lines are current relations. Dotted lines are former relations. For advanced tools choose Tools > Options from the menu at top. More help. Not seeing the maps? Please go here to check for the latest version of Java.As reported in The New York Times, Montag was one of nearly 700 Merrill Lynch & Co. employees who collected bonuses of at least $1 million just before the company was sold to Bank of America.
Merrill later reported a $27 billion loss for 2008.
Quite likely, Montag was the leader in this privileged group of bonus recipients.
He had been brought to Merrill by John A. Thain, the company’s then-CEO and his former colleague at Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
According to the terms of his May 1, 2008, compensation agreement with Merrill, Montag earned a bonus of $39.4 million for joining the brokerage firm.
But that may have been only half of the Merrill money that came Montag’s way in 2008, even though he worked for the company for just a few months, having started his job in Aug. 4 at an annual salary of $600,000. Upon the December sale of the firm, he went to Bank of America.
In addition to his Merrill bonus, Montag also received stock options and shares from Merrill that have been estimated to be worth at least $40 million.
These were granted to him as compensation for the Goldman equity he lost in joining Merrill.
Montag, 52, had worked at Goldman for 22 years before retiring at the end of 2007.
He spent seven years in Japan as the co-head of Goldman’s Asian efforts and was widely credited with turning that operation into a profit center, once tripling the company’s profits in a two-year period.
“Tom is extremely personable, extremely quick, very smart and good analytically,” a former Goldman colleague of his told Bloomberg News.
“Peers who were direct reports of his universally rave about him as a manager and a leader.”
Montag returned to the U.S. in 2006 and was Goldman’s global co-head of securities overseeing the Americas before retiring.
The New York Observer reported in February 2008 that Montag had purchased a six-story townhouse on New York’s Upper East Side.
Designed by Stanford White in 1903, the house was listed for $38 million. A source told the Observer that Montag had paid “well below” the asking price.
Making millions, Montag has given away millions, as well.
Bloomberg News reported that he donated $2 million to Beaverton High School in Portland, OR. Montag played football, basketball and baseball while a student at the school.
He also gave $1.4 million to Stanford for a stadium scoreboard and $2 million to Willamette University in Salem, OR, his parents’ alma mater.
Click here to sign up for the Muckety Newsletter
Read related stories: Banking · Recent Stories0 Comments
-
There are no comments yet, be the first by filling in the form below.
Leave a Comment
-
Top Google exec funds online news startupFebruary 18, 2009 at 12:45pm
Some are billing it as a back-door way for Google to enter the news business.
Feds Probe Firms With Close Ties to Rep John Murtha
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Feds probe firms close to Rep. John Murtha
Another possible pay-to-play arrangement appears to be unraveling under public scrutiny – this one involving Rep. John Murtha, the powerful defense appropriator from Pennsylvania.
Federal investigators are looking into whether a prominent defense lobbyist and former top aide to Murtha funneled bogus contributions to the Democratic lawmaker in return for earmarks for his clients.
Hint: Click in map to explore connectionsStory continues below interactive map
Click to activate interactive map
(requires Java)MAP HINTS: Click expands a name. Control+Click centers map on a name. Solid lines are current relations. Dotted lines are former relations. For advanced tools choose Tools > Options from the menu at top. More help. Not seeing the maps? Please go here to check for the latest version of Java.ABC News broke the story this week that the FBI had raided the offices of the PMA Group in Arlington, VA in November, right after the elections. One of the capitol’s largest lobbying firms, PMA Group is headed by Paul Magliocchetti, a former top aide to Murtha. At least one other former Murtha aide, Julie Giardina, also worked there. Dan Cunningham, another PMA staffer, is a former Congressional aide who is close to Murtha, according to The Hill newspaper.
As the chair of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, Murtha helped deliver $100 million in defense-related earmarks to PMA clients in appropriations bills for 2008, according to government watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense, which tracks earmarks.
He also received hundreds of thousands in donations from PMA’s executives and clients during this election cycle. Roll Call found earlier this week that over the last three election cycles, Murtha received about $1.75 million from PMA and its clients.
Murtha, once described as “one of Capitol Hill’s most accomplished masters at the art of pork” by U.S. News & World Report, denies any quid pro quo and says he has no indication he is a federal target.
Federal prosecutors haven’t shown their hand. But late last month, the FBI and IRS also raided the offices of a defense contractor with close ties to Murtha – Kuchera Industries and Kuchera Defense Systems. Murtha has reportedly channeled $100 million in earmarks to those companies.
Even without any indictments, the fallout is already being felt. This week, The Hill reported that the PMA Group is disintegrating, with Magliocchetti heading off to potential retirement in Florida and other principals informing clients that they are starting a new firm, Flagship Government Relations.
The head of the new firm is Kaylene Green, who had been vice chairman of PMA Group and a former Senate Armed Services Committee staffer.
Last year, PMA ranked as the 10th largest lobbying firm in DC, representing a long list of defense companies, among them, Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics, both of which have facilities in Johnstown, PA. Boeing and Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC) are also on its client list.
Update 2/19: Roll Call reports that PMA has notified clients that it plans to cease operations March 31,
Click here to sign up for the Muckety Newsletter
This post is tagged with: , Flagship Government Relations, John Murtha, Kaylene Green, Kuchera Defense Systems, Kuchera Industries, Paul Magliocchetti, PMA Group, PoliticsRead related stories: Politics · Recent Stories2 Comments
-
IS THERE AN AGENCY THAT INVESTIGATES PEOPLE AND COMPANIES FOR THEIR
SORDID AFFILLIATIONS AND REPUTATIONS? – THAT ISN’T FUNDED BY SOME OF THEM? -
It’s about time that the PEOPLE got MAD and we thew everyone of the bums out! Vote NO on all incumbents!
Leave a Comment
-
Icahn buys low, then takes a seat at the tableMarch 2, 2009 at 7:26am
When stocks and stockholders are depressed, Carl Icahn is energized.
Feds Probe Firms With Close Ties to Rep John Murtha
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Retired British Army Officer Commits Suicide Over Madoff Losses
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
Bag Lady Penney Spins Madoff Losses Into Book Deal
This post was archived from createpositivechange.org/. View the original on the Wayback Machine.
-
0 Comments
There are no comments yet, be the first by filling in the form below.
Leave a Comment