|
|
Post by jdredd on Apr 23, 2013 2:45:15 GMT -5
www.nytimes.com/2013/04/21/business/media/koch-brothers-making-play-for-tribunes-newspapers.html?src=recg"Three years ago, Charles and David Koch, the billionaire industrialists and supporters of libertarian causes, held a seminar of like-minded, wealthy political donors at the St. Regis Resort in Aspen, Colo. They laid out a three-pronged, 10-year strategy to shift the country toward a smaller government with less regulation and taxes. The first two pieces of the strategy — educating grass-roots activists and influencing politics — were not surprising, given the money they have given to policy institutes and political action groups. But the third one was: media. Other than financing a few fringe libertarian publications, the Kochs have mostly avoided media investments. Now, Koch Industries, the sprawling private company of which Charles G. Koch serves as chairman and chief executive, is exploring a bid to buy the Tribune Company’s eight regional newspapers, including The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun, The Orlando Sentinel and The Hartford Courant."
And here I thought it might be Murdoch buying the LA Times. Instead it might be some other corrupt billionaires, the notorious Koch brothers. Let's see: Manchester running the U-T, the Koch brothers running the LA Times. These billionaires are not only serious about ruining running the country, they are blatant about it. Good thing we have lots of alternative media outlets online now. And it will save me $1.50 every morning.
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Apr 30, 2013 15:48:50 GMT -5
www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-virgin-galactic-20130430,0,507052.story "With a sonic boom that resounded above the Mojave Desert, a rocket plane belonging to British billionaire Richard Branson's commercial space venture Virgin Galactic got one step closer to carrying tourists into space. On Monday the company's SpaceShipTwo ignited its rocket motor in mid-flight for the first time and sped to Mach 1.2, faster than sound, reaching about 56,000 feet in altitude. The test flight is the biggest milestone in Virgin Galactic's 8 1/2-year endeavor to be the world's first commercial space liner, which would make several trips a day carrying scores of paying customers into space for a brief journey."
Branson is one of the new generation of "fun" billionaires, not the stodgy Murdoch type. He's going to help rich people spend a minute or two in "space" at $200,000 a pop. Who am I to disagree?
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on May 2, 2013 18:45:41 GMT -5
www.washingtonpost.com/politics/penny-pritzker/gIQAF4JR9O_topic.html" Chicago hotel and real estate heiress and Obama mega-bundler Penny Pritzker is President Obama’s nominee to be secretary of Commerce. Pritzker, who with a personal wealth of $1.85 billion ranks #277 on the Forbes 400 list of wealthiest Americans, was reportedly in the hunt for that job back in 2008. But she withdrew her name apparently because of toxic subprime loans involving a failed bank partially owned by her family. There were also concerns that her $1.8 billion net worth included offshore accounts. One could make the argument that Pritzker was the most important person in Obama's 2008 presidential bid - except, perhaps, for Obama himself. A longtime friend, Pritzker was national finance chairwoman for the Obama campaign throughout his 2008 presidential effort. She helped him raise a record $750 million from a dizzying array of donors. Pritzker bundled a minimum of $500,000 for Obama for the 2012 election and was national co-chairman of the 2012 campaign." Hereis a billionaire even you righties can hate, along with Soros of course. Still, I believe she is one of the new generation of anti-Teacher Union Democrats. She's a billionaire, isn't she?
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Jul 1, 2013 1:21:17 GMT -5
www.thenation.com/blog/175021/newark-union-head-barely-wins-re-election-after-zuckerberg-donation-funded-reform-plan#axzz2Xltxyrfx"Eight months after negotiating “performance bonuses” funded by a Facebook fortune, Newark Teachers Union President Joseph Del Grosso was re-elected Tuesday by a margin of nine votes. A challenger slate that’s drawn inspiration from the Chicago Teachers Union captured seventeen of the twenty-nine seats on the NTU’s executive board, while barely falling short in its bid to oust Del Grosso. The new and old union officers will be sworn in together this afternoon, setting the stage for further conflict over the union’s orientation towards a nationally ascendant education reform agenda." "As I reported for In These Times in October, the Newark contract deal was celebrated by Republican Governor Chris Christie and by American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten, who called the deal “a system of the future” and an example “that collective bargaining really works.” In contrast, Rippey told The Nation that the deal “basically is a complete capitulation to the corporate agenda.” Under the agreement, management agreed to have a portion of teachers’ evaluations be based on “peer review” by other teachers; the union agreed to have a portion of teachers’ compensation come in the form of bonuses distributed based on their evaluations. The bonuses will be paid for from a $100 million fund donated by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in 2010, a high-profile example of the influence a wealthy philanthropist can wield with donations to a cash-strapped school system."
What is with billionaires trying to "reform" public schools? Frankly, as I've said before, I think they smell money to be made, if the long term goal of privatizing education becomes reality.
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Jul 12, 2013 18:04:55 GMT -5
www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-carl-icahn-dell-20130712,0,2371996.story "Billionaire Carl Icahn has again upped his bid for Dell Inc., this time by adding a warrant to his takeover plan. Under the modified plan by Icahn and Southeastern Asset Management, shareholders would receive $14 a share and a warrant for every four shares that they tender. The warrants could be used to purchase Dell shares for $20 in the future. The move is widely seen as an attempt to force company founder and Chief Executive Michael Dell, who is hoping to take the computer maker private in a $24.4-billion leveraged buyout, to increase his bid. Michael Dell's bid of $13.65 a share, made with global technology investment firm Silver Lake Partners, was seen by many as too low."
Rottengeezer Vulture Capitalist Icahn is still at it at 77. Fortunately God is more powerful than billionaires, even though he does seem to take his time in sending them where they belong. I'm sure Satan has a special room just for billionaires. 
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Aug 8, 2013 4:15:09 GMT -5
www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-steyer-virginia-20130808,0,1783428.story "WASHINGTON — California billionaire and clean energy philanthropist Thomas Steyer is spending $400,000 on television ads critical of Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Ken Cuccinelli, the latest effort by the former hedge-fund-manager-turned-environmental activist to inject climate change into statewide elections." "Although Steyer is a longtime donor to liberal causes and politicians, he has changed his approach over the last year, retiring from San Francisco-based Farallon Capital Management in October to focus on direct activism. He has become one of the loudest voices in the nationwide movement to pressure President Obama to reject the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, largely because of what critics say is its potential to increase heat-trapping greenhouse gases." I know you righties love the billionaires ("job creators", right?), but the problem I have with them is how their money enables them to have undue influence on our political system. I don't want America to be a plutocracy any more than it already is. But maybe that ship has sailed. Not my problem for long, I suppose, and Gen X and the Millennials seem perfectly happy with the powers-that-be.
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Aug 17, 2013 13:24:37 GMT -5
www.nytimes.com/2013/08/18/nyregion/a-mayor-who-puts-wall-street-first.html?hp&_r=0"Among the various enduring images of the Bloomberg years, many are positive and some perhaps even blessed: bike lanes, smokeless restaurants, new expanses of green space, the increased presence of ferries on the city’s waterways. But to my mind, this gesture of therapeutic outreach to an institution that defrauded its own clients is unmatched in its symbolic weight, so clearly encapsulating the mayor’s most devoutly held allegiances and the civic repercussions accompanying them, the tireless coddling of the overclass. No mayor in New York’s history has done more to consolidate the city’s identity with Wall Street. Mr. Bloomberg obviously does not bear responsibility for the creation of the indecipherable, huckster financial instruments that resulted in our economic crisis and the litany of personal miseries that followed, but he was one of the country’s most impassioned and nurturing supporters of Wall Street during its most ethically unhinged hour. It was not simply that he was such an obvious champion of the financial industry, but also that in the city he ran he could barely brook any dissent of it."
Both NYC and London are twinsies, both running on international financial manipulation. Great for now, but how long can it last?
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Sept 25, 2013 4:26:11 GMT -5
www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/cotown/la-et-ct-wanda-film-empire-20130924,0,5309473.story "Wang Jianlin is the wealthiest man in China, owns the biggest theater chain in the world and wants to create the world's largest movie studio in his home country. Hollywood is taking the billionaire chairman of Dalian Wanda Group Corp. seriously, but proceeding cautiously. Studio executives, talent agents and luminaries such as Leonardo DiCaprio, Nicole Kidman and Harvey Weinstein stood with Wang for the Sunday unveiling of the planned Oriental Movie Metropolis — an $8.2-billion project that would include 20 film and TV sound stages near Qingdao, along with a theme park, wax museum and space for an annual film festival."
While Hollywood is always looking for cheaper places to film overseas, here is a Chinese businessman who has something American management no longer has: Patriotism. It appears he actually cares if China prospers.
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Sept 26, 2013 14:41:33 GMT -5
Sorry, rockwill, I accidentally deleted your post.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Nov 4, 2013 13:25:08 GMT -5
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Dec 15, 2013 5:19:21 GMT -5
www.nytimes.com/2013/12/14/business/international/las-vegas-sands-drops-giant-spanish-casino-project.html?src=me&_r=0 "MADRID — Sheldon G. Adelson, the billionaire casino magnate, on Friday abandoned his plans to build a $30 billion gambling and leisure resort on the outskirts of Madrid after failing to win financial concessions and other favors from the Spanish government. The decision by Mr. Adelson’s company, Las Vegas Sands, to drop its EuroVegas resort project is an economic blow not just for Madrid but for Spain as a whole. The country has been pining for foreign investment to help revive its economy and cut its 26 percent unemployment rate." "With an estimated net worth of $28.5 billion, the 80-year-old Mr. Adelson is one of the richest men in the world. The bulk of his wealth comes from the extravagant casino resorts he has developed in Las Vegas, the Venetian and the Palazzo; several built or redeveloped more recently in Macao, a former Portuguese colony that is now part of China; and one in Singapore. Mr. Adelson, long a supporter of conservative causes, has been an active player in American politics. In the 2012 presidential election, he donated more than $60 million to his preferred candidates, first Newt Gingrich and then Mitt Romney, a sum that made him the single largest financial contributor in a presidential race. In a statement on Friday, Sands said that it had dropped the Madrid project after an extensive review and that it would instead pursue alternative investment opportunities in Asia. It did not detail the review’s conclusions." So rotten geezer billionaire Adelson is betting on Asia instead of Old Europe. How much good can come of one person having this much power? (As we all know, money is power)
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Mar 7, 2014 2:10:36 GMT -5
www.nationalreview.com/article/372803/harry-reids-two-minutes-hate-charles-c-w-cooke"First it was a hallmark of the fever swamps and the gutter press. Then it was adopted by the less self-aware partisans of the republic’s press corps, who nervously pulled it to their lips as a teenager might a joint. And finally — as his fortunes began to fade — the Senate Majority Leader himself picked it up and ran with it. Meditating on the troubles that the republic faces, Senator Harry Reid settled upon “Koch,” that all-encompassing and “un-American” malady. Koch is trying to “buy the country,” Reid announced from the Senate floor this week. Koch is proof that “whoever has the most money gets the most free speech.” Koch is “evil.” Critics who have wondered where this preoccupation is leading us now have an answer: To an all-out political war. “Democrats,” intend to pick up the theme and to run with it the New York Times records today, and will soon be seen “embarking on a broad effort that aims to unmask the press-shy siblings and portray them, instead, as a pair of villains bent on wrecking progressive politics.” The campaign’s new slogan? “The G.O.P. is addicted to Koch.”
Are the mean old Democrats picking on the poor innocent Koch brothers? Maybe they are just taking a page from the GOP's decades long demonization of evil "Union bosses". Really, if the Kochs can't take the heat, they should get out of the kitchen.
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Mar 12, 2014 23:41:55 GMT -5
www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/03/anti-koch-campaign-rich-lowry-104604.html?hp=l1#.UyE0286wXQw"Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has high standards for American-ness. That’s why it carried such weight when Reid described the Koch brothers in a speech on the Senate floor as “about as un-American as anyone that I can imagine.” Coming from a typical Democratic politician lacking Reid’s powers of patriotic discernment, this would have been shameful hyperbole. From Reid, it was a peerless act of taxonomy. What immediately had him so exercised was anti-Obamacare ads funded by the Koch brothers, but surely other potentially un-American activities lurked in the back of his mind. David Koch gave $100 million to a theater in New York City so people can perform ballet and opera there. Has David Koch never thought to invest in cowboy poetry? No wonder Reid harbors the darkest suspicions about his true loyalties." What irks me about this is anyone who has decided they are the judge (self-appointed) of who or what is "Un-American". Remember the sleazy HUAC? The Kochs may be dirtbags, but that doesn't necessarily make you "Un-American", whatever that is.
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Apr 7, 2014 1:17:52 GMT -5
online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303978304579475860515021286?mod=trending_now_2"Instead of fostering a system that enables people to help themselves, America is now saddled with a system that destroys value, raises costs, hinders innovation and relegates millions of citizens to a life of poverty, dependency and hopelessness. This is what happens when elected officials believe that people's lives are better run by politicians and regulators than by the people themselves. Those in power fail to see that more government means less liberty, and liberty is the essence of what it means to be American. Love of liberty is the American ideal. If more businesses (and elected officials) were to embrace a vision of creating real value for people in a principled way, our nation would be far better off—not just today, but for generations to come. I'm dedicated to fighting for that vision. I'm convinced most Americans believe it's worth fighting for, too." Ya gotta love this. Murdoch's WSJ giving one of the Koch brothers a chance to whine about being demonized and a soapbox to preach his Libertarian hokum from. How precious is that?
And I am certain the Kochs have helped themselves to quite a few things. 
|
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Apr 16, 2014 10:53:59 GMT -5
www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-27053321"Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has announced a $50m (£30m) election year push for stricter gun laws across the US. In an interview with the New York Times, Mr Bloomberg said his new group Everytown for Gun Safety would focus on building grassroots support. Gun control laws face a difficult path in the US Congress, which is packed with allies of the powerful gun lobby. But Mr Bloomberg noted that some states have tightened gun laws on their own." Here's a rotten geezer billionaire you righties can hate. Doesn't it feel wrong that he can try to buy our political system? That one individual may have the power to stomp on the gun rights of millions of Americans because he squeezed billions from our rigged economic system?
|
|
